20 years in Qantas would be a VERY junior 747 captain at the moment given that those of us with 17 1/2 years are very junior 767 Captains. Perhaps he's been around a bit longer than that.
If he (or she) is only doing 500 hours a year it's because they're rotating onto a blank line every 8 weeks. Given the reduction in flying, there are more guys and gals on reserve than their used to be and thus less flying for everyone to do. I'm a rotator and I'm doing 500 hours a year. I'd LOVE to be doing more- as would all of us.
Doing more than 100 hours in the month? Yahoo for you. Sadly, FTLs prohibit QF crew from doing the same!
Yep. The question we should be asking is why isn't Qantas expanding? According to you logic it's all down to pilot salaries. Whilst I agree there are inefficiencies that need to be addressed, why is it the pilot's fault that these are not being addressed? Over multiple EBAs Qantas itself have signed off on these conditions as being acceptable. Over multiple EBAs (including the current one) Qantas has wanted to 'simplify' the EBA only to back away from making wholesale change. Even on this current one I bet they won't get the simplification they were after because they were too stupid to negotiate and instead are going to leave it to the FWA who I suspect will go the 'minimalist' route in sorting the thing out.
So enlighten me as to how the bid line system prohibits flexibility? The flying is the flying. You put it into trips that are as efficient as possible. You allocate the flying in seniority order. That doest prohibit any flexibility at all.
Got a gripe against rotating? So do most Qantas pilots and believe if it were shared around not only the average hours pick up and the O/T for assigning some people over divisor would come down. My understanding is that there is some agreement between AIPA reps and company pilot reps on this issue for the EA under arbitration at the moment. Whether AJ will ratify these agreed points remains to be seen. If past behaviour is a pointer to future behaviour I wouldn't put any money on him taking the sensible option. That said, it wasn't that long ago that crew on reserve were doing more flying and hours than those on rostered patterns due to crew shortages. At that time many crew were regularly knocking up against the flight time limits for 30/7, 100/30, 900/365. So tell me again why QF crew were inefficient?
So, it appears that so far, your comments about the hours are poorly sourced or selective of a situation that isn't the normal state of operation at Qantas. It appears that your comments about the willingness of Qantas pilots to adapt is incorrect. Your assertion about bid lines is partially correct in terms of having some crew doing not much flying on reserve but it wasn't long ago crew on reserve were at max hours- as were many on rostered blocks of flying- so that's not a solid basis to be basing your assertion on. Do you want to keep trying?