Very useful information jetjockey696. As I've posted before the whole flight training scenario these days are geared towards pay2fly. Oxford & CTC with their prohibitively expensive Integrated courses due to their connections with airlines after which you have to pay for your TR anyway. Or a modular route combined with a line training programme. The cost works out the same at roughly £100,000. And if you go modular and decide to try and wait it out instructing or doing another job, that's years of potential earnings as a pilot wasted.
It's a numbers game, an airline's market and either way you pay the same price. Sure you can argue the standard of flying differs but, experience makes up for it and any pilot could make a mistake at any time. That's why we become first officers to learn from our mistakes. The only reason I don't condone p2f is because it's biased towards the wealthier but not necessarily the less apt individual. In today's debt strapped money hungry world no one wants the risk of guaranteeing another individuals skills. Thus, very few airlines offer a bond these days of which most are very well established airlines or airlines from rich countries and a cadet pilot is forced to bear their own risk. The route for the self improver traditionally used to be through regionals and to the majors.
With the downsizing over the last few years regionals stopped hiring thus removing a method for most self improvers to progress in their careers. And recently with the introduction of MPL and already established Integrated schools signing on new training contracts with regionals and majors. The self improver that trained between 2008 to 2011 is all but entirely overlooked as a casualty of the recession, evident even by BA's hiring requirements. Thus, being good business people P2F firms like EagleJet found a way to make money by offering something that was required. They play a similar role to the Integrated schools in sourcing pilots and profit from them in almost the same way.
There is a way to fix it in UK and that is to follow a similar route to Germany that places no bias on where you train but rather on a fair and universal test. But airlines need to change their attitude towards cadets and the regulators/unions need to realize whats actually happening rather than brown nosing each other. Until then, stop showing an air of superiority and claiming you're more of a 'professional' pilot than someone else because it comes off as very unprofessional. There are bad eggs in all baskets and each person is a victim of their circumstances and choices. So, good luck to all pilots since we all share the same airspace.
Last edited by dood; 6th Dec 2011 at 20:18.
Reason: spelling