Lester you’ve hit the nail on the head.
Whatever failings people may think the Rex recruitment process may have, one thing you couldn’t fault is the amount of detail provided re bond, pay, basings etc. All this info is provided before you have even been accepted. During my interview they spent 5-10min going through the EBA pay scale and the details of how the bond worked.
Penny, you signed your name on the dotted line, deal with it and don’t crap in the nest of those that follow.
As for cost of living in Sydney (which seems to get a run here regularly), there is no requirement to live there. When I joined, a Sydney base required some level of seniority, i.e. everyone that was in SY had chosen to move there. From my observations, the Sydney crews were generally the unhappiest, so much so that I ended up refusing to pax there and fill in when they were short of crew. Once again, you signed your name on the transfer request form, deal with the reality.