Details given to me by a cadet who is affected:
-Initial TR payment is 4K.
-Pay of £500 a month during TR training.
- £1200 a month thereafter with no flight pay up to 6 month mark.
- Pay of £48 an hour with £20 an hour deducted to go towards TR cost - for 3 years, which you are bonded for. They do not guarantee hours. 700 hours will mean a salary of just shy of £20K and a TR repayment of £42K.Salary des not cover loan repayments .
-If you leave before 3 years you pay back full TR cost.
This is the worst deal in the history of CTC/easyJet, I cannot think of any deal worse that involves such a huge financial stake from the cadet in return for a "contract" that you wouldn't even line your cat's sh
t bowl with. It is worse than the FR deal with Brookfield.
For all those who think going to CTC is a good idea and have enjoyed listening to their spin, bear in mind this: when the likes of myself and One Post Only went through the CTC programme, we were offered provisional jobs with easyJet
before we even set foot in a single engine piston for day one of training. We were given £5000 each to spend on beer and strippers in New Zealand. We went out to NZ in course sizes of 6, though many courses were smaller. We were provided with a laptop each for ATPL study and were given one car per 2 cadets to use as we wished. Once training was finished, those of us bound for easyJet were straight onto an MCC course, and were then given a choice of a B737 rating or an A320 rating. Hell some guys were even given a choice of airline. This is all with 250hrs under your belt. It was quite something. We all paid 60K as a "bond" (loan) and that covered everything. Not a penny more was required. This was the period between 2003 - late 2007/early2008.
Let us fast forward not even 2 years. The deal is now this. (Current cadets please correct me if I go wrong anywhere). The cost of the course is now £69,000. Course sizes have been doubled. You are required to fund the PPL part of the training to the tune of $12,000 kiwi dollars in addition to the £69K. You are required to sort out your own insurance, this was previously provided as part of the cost of the course. The laptops and cars are gone. Once finished you will face a wait of anything between 6 months and over a year for a type rating and there are several cadets who have declared themselves bankrupt. And the latest development is when you get an offer it will be from ezy and it will be the details outlined above.
The point I am making is the sales pitch delivered at these CTC open days is very much based on the scenario I describe in the first paragraph, whereas the reality of being a CTC cadet is very much the second. It was always a high risk get-to-a-jet-job-quick scheme. It required a large financial outlay but provided a good job on a decent permanent contract and good pay at the end of the training. Now the course requires a much bigger financial burden to be carried by the cadet, and, as the guys who were sold the 2003-2007 dream are finding out as they reach the end of training, the original deal is dead.
Things will hopefully improve in the industry in a wider sense at some point, but don't think those graduating in 2/3/4 years will be back on deals we saw in the the previous golden days of airline hiring. The latest debacle of a contract has set the bar even lower, and easyJet, and therefore other airlines will be in no rush to improve a brand new cadet's terms and conditions. The way of the future is clear, cadets on temporary, badly paid contracts. No job security and no idea where they will send you next.
I'm not saying this to pour salt in any wounds or show off how easy those of us who trained between 2003-7 had it, just to point out how quickly things have turned totally crap. I was lucky, along with the guys I trained with, the guys coming through now are sh
t out of luck and I have a massive amount of sympathy for them. There are plenty of pilots at ezy who are disgusted at the way cadets are treated and we are trying to get Balpa to find a way to do something that helps the guys affected by the recent changes to the way cadets are employed and paid.
I never thought I'd say this but I really, really don't think this career is worth the hassle any more.