Maxed Out and Lump
Don't despair! As part of the BALPA team that thrashed this out, the specific aim of the exercise was to take on our own Cadets and train them in house thus removing the big hitters in the TRTO world from their current pretty much exclusive position. We wanted to be able to take the best candidates from whatever background and because we wouldn't be paying agency fees, we could pay the cadet more and still be cost neutral to the company.
IMHO the only reason we are not taking on cadets this year is because we have a fairly big pool of known quantities in our sadly recently redundant colleagues and in the CTC guys currently with us, none of whom will be needing the full Type Rating that a cadet would need. We are also going through a huge refleeting programme which this winter will see 100+ of our pilots change type and bluntly, we don't have the training capacity for another 25-30 full ratings.
I firmly believe that we will be looking at cadets sooner rather than later BUT DONT QUOTE ME ON THAT
When we do, the deal is already sorted. They will join on an 8 month fixed contract and earn somewhere in excess of the £1200 PCM quoted because they will get FDA etc and yes, we did count the taxation factor in it. In that time we would expect them to get to somewhere beyond Final LIne Check standard.
At the end of the 8 months there will be no commitment either way. The cadet will have the 738 on their licence and some experience from a quality TRTO and can seek employment elsewhere owing nothing. The company MAY take them on the next year on the PPY50 deal on a PERMANENT contract as above but that will depend on availability and also whether they've been up to scratch in the cadet year.
TRTO means Type Rating Training Organisation and Cadet in this context means no type rating and frozen ATPL plus all that MCC stuff that is way after my time!