Is this a case of 'Pay peanuts get monkeys'?
In fact it is worse, you are trying to recruit experienced guys/girls to your outfit and expect them to pay for the priviledge of being interviewed and assessed.
Which monkey is going to pay for his peanuts? Only the desperate with nowhere else to go will apply.
In fact this is happening more and more with pilots having to pay for their own ratings, uniform, recurrent etc.
I get the impression these days that the job of a pilot is seen as very easy, any kid who can hold a Playstation paddle can do it, ATC is excellent, computers do the planning, ops schedule your flights and after all modern aircraft can practically land themselves......so why pay money for good experienced pilots?..........
The first time management realise their mistake is when they see a smoking hole on Sky News with the company logo on the tail sticking out of it.
or
Someone does a wheels up landing on a routine training sortie?
Good pilots already have jobs or will be able to pick and choose, so if companies want them, they have to be willing to pay for them.
Too often HR and the bean counters are winning this battle and this results in the overall degredation of T&Cs and a lowering of basic pay scales.
I am told we are already getting to a point where for young wannabes the cost of training is outweighing the pros of the pilot lifestyle. And the cycle will return with a shortage of pilots and low paying companies haemorrhaging pilots looking to greener fields.