Someone at REX once asked me why I would want to work for JQ. I believe the exact wording was "Why do you want to work for Jetstar? The pilots are getting absolutley flogged over there! they are doing 90 hours a month"
to which the reply was "we are getting flogged too. at least over there I will get paid better for it"
as a SF340 cpatain, on a BASE wage of 71k, and no prospect of it improving it is/was a no brainer to leave for a company that STARTS you on 80k.
Along with the fact that I was getting called every day to work, they even called me 6 times on a SUNDAY after I had finished work, to ask if I could change my roster for the NEXT day to suit them!!!
I would have been quite happy to stay but there were a few things that needed fixing, but would NOT get fixed anytime soon:-
- more support. Pilots having to do every job under the sun made it not enjoyable.
- dress me properly. the uniform standard showed that they had no respect for us, or their image.
- supply us the tools we need to do the job you want. computers that break down, no car parking, no raincoats, inadequate meals, no time rostered to update jepps, fcom etc.
-constantly having to be on call 24/7. IF you want to call me re work, and I am on a day off.... at LEAST apologise for calling me on my RDO!!! but when I need to call you on a weekend, I get abused for it!
- some common sense from those in management. ie if pilots use their initiative to help the company, quite often the work done is rejected because one senior manager gets his nose out of joint that he hadn't thought of it!(or would get credit for it)
- no sensibility in the rostering. ie day 1 1750-2030. day2 0600-1655. day 3 0800-1800. why couldn't they roster 3/1/2 rather than 1/2/3 ?
- NO communication from head office to frontline staff. Quite often we heard what was happening by rumour and gossip, rather than from the company.
- reward me for my time! don't get all sulky when I refuse to extend for free. You are quite happy to pay someone else 350 to do 2 sectors on an RDO... why not pay ME 350 to extend for you ? either way, someone gets paid and the flights get done!
- Stop making me feel guilty every time I stand up for my rights as defined by the eba/cao's etc.
- stop treating the aircraft as if it is a space shuttle! it is NOT. it was designed to be a simple aircraft.
rant over