1) This is a type rating that comes with a job attached - v. important.
2) You require no money in the bank. The company will arrange a loan on favourable terms for you. Just sign here Sir.
3) You are given OVER AND ABOVE salary £5,000 a year extra to pay off the loan over 5 years. Thats £25,000 you get to pay off the loan.
4) You are bonded for 5 years whilst this pays itself off - where exactly are you planning to go in those 5 years? Which airline? Surely you'll want 1000 Command hours before you leave for pastures new? Which will take 5 years anyway more or less.
5) You are paid less. Well lets look at this. As soon as you hit 1,500 hrs i.e. within a couple of months you will be on a basic salary of £31,700 + £6,000 sector/duty pay. Anyone moaning about £38,000 a year in their first year of their first jet airline (probably)?
6) Joining with - say - a 1,000hrs means in 3 years time you would have 3,500hrs TT and qualify for a Command assesment. Say you pass and you now have £55,000 basic plus about £10,000 sector/duty pay. Plus 5% length of service bonus, plus any profit share and/or share options. And a 7% pension. And a 737 NG Command. Ooh, and there would be a couple of hundred pilots behind you in the last in first out redundancy queue.
Not *such* a rip off I think.
Pity they just don't take guys and type them and bond them like they used to though and its a *real* pity they require MPA time.
Hopefully they will drop that bit soon - surely their aren't THAT many guys out there with this and all the other bits and bobs needed to pass the interview/test/sim...?
Good luck whatever your position,
WWW