To be honest, it's not entirely heresay that's beign stated on here. A quick google for easyjet gave me the following:
UK Contracts - Salary & Benefits - Pilot Careers - Careers in the Air - easyJet Careers
Reading the website explains the salaries. It's not quite as simple as 'you get paid x amount'. Give it a gander, it's quite interesting. Obviously easyJet is just an example, but I'd say it's pretty similar across the board and, considering that easyJet are the primary employer thus far, I'd look to them as the main example to go on.
In addition, I recall reading here soem time ago where a current cadet with one of the partners displayed his bank balance details. The figure that he showed for repayments by the airline came in at over £1000 per month, which suggests several things:
- There is no tax paid on the £12,000 which goes into the bank account (with easyJet - obviously with BA, getting paid a full FO salary, tax will come out, which is why easyJet is possibly a better short-term investment though I have no idea on the salary increases expected from the respetive organisations, so BA may be more appropriate long-term financially until year 7).
- The figure is not capped at £12,000. I do not know the details, of course, but I would assume that this is either done for tax purposes, to reduce the payment schedule or to meet the loan repayments including interest.
Either way, £111,000 is a huge amount of money. The real worry with this is if you get placed into the hold pool and need to make repayments yourself for these months. I am personally saving around £6,000 and will be living like a troll in order to make sure that I have enough saved up to cover me for at least a few months, enough for me to acquire another job in the meantime. Proper Planning Prevents Poor Performance, afterall, and you don't want to go down the route of being on the hold pool with no plan how to make the £1350 per month repayments!