Just for the next few lines I’m going to stick up for smartcol. I came through the modular route with one of the largest if not the largest FTO’s, finishing my training ahead of schedule and getting first time passes in everything. I’m slightly older but still the right side of thirty and have led a disciplined life, my shoes are shiny and I take great pride in my appearance. I can’t get a job, so now I‘m doing the cabin crew thing and I hate every minute of it (apart from the nightstops). Pax and management treat me like a child with no brain, so I bite my tongue, keep my ear to the ground and wait for that first break. One day I’ll show them what I can do. I now know that the company I work for have no intention of putting me at the front of one of their shiny jets, likewise the other three chaps with frozen ATPL’s within the company in Ops and other departments will all stay on the ground.
During the last 18 months in the search for a job I have been through every emotion going, highs, lows and every now and then you feel bitter and want to have a good whinge (from what seen working in a large airline that wont change for the rest of your career). I think smartcols on a low and he’s entitled to be. Feel sorry for yourself for a while, because no-one else will no matter what they say, but make sure you come out of your low on a high and even more determined than ever. Oh and by the way no other wannabe will help you get a job, we’re all too busy trying to get one ourselves. Once I’m sorted I’ll help everyone that I can, but not before.
I too feel let down by my FTO. Of course I didn’t expect them to get me a job, that wasn’t in the contract, however I feel that they should have been more customer orientated. At the end of the day I am a customer and I was just treated like a commodity. In addition a little after sales care would have been appreciated, it could even have been to their advantage from a marketing point of view, many people ask for recommendations on a school and I would not recommend mine. If I may be brave enough to disagree with WWW things may always have been this way, it does not mean in this modern age that they are right. Perhaps things will change now if the schools need to work harder to attract custom.
Anyway smartcol keep your chin up and I hope that you and every wannabe out there gets a job soon…….just after me.