Crabetc,
We had a 'happy hour' setup...most of us were based offshore and when doing our 4 or 5 days a week on duty in country were housed in the same hotel.
The Hotel, undoubtedly wanting to keep us away from other guests, had given us a large room complete with full size pool table, huge carved wooden bar, big glass fronted bar fridge, TV with cable and sufficient low tables and soft lounge chairs. They sold us booze at cost and room 217
was administered by myself and two other F/os....after the Captain in question was banned by the company from being anywhere near it and had been forced to attend counciling for his problem in Australia...where we were all nominally based. Banning him didn't work as he just drank himself into oblivion alone in his room...and after a few months when things 'quitened down' he started frequenting the bar again...having a few beers and then taking a sh!tload back to his room for later.
It was as good as any RAF/RAAF Officers Mess setup I've ever heard of and the drinking and parties were something to behold
The airline in question also had a VERY good CRM course which had been put together by a senior airbus captain....which was essentially wasted on captains like this guy and a few others but which prepared us younger blokes as well as could be expected...it even had a pretend section labeled by the head CRM bloke specially for this captain and named after him....as I said, he'd been a well known problem... for about 15 years!
Yes he was an extreme example...and there were a couple of less extreme examples we also had to deal with on a daily basis...but that's life in the big bad world!
Chuck.