You're wrong I'm afraid. Wizz FO contract has been €20,000 for quite some time I believe.
On top of that the FO earns €30 per sector flown.
An SFO (not sure what the criteria is for that), earns €25,000 basic, plus €30 per sector flown.
Wizz do at least offer a basic salary, unlike Ryanair. Therefore, I cannot really understand your logic. Why would Wizz want more FO's to fly less hours?
The Ryanair model is based upon selling expensive type ratings and dividing the workforce. Wizz's model is not. It is based on having the absolute minimum number of staff in EVERY department, but using them to as near as maximum as is practicable.
I believe that Wizz do not want to impose unpaid leave on anybody at all. However, if the take up of voluntary unpaid leave is not sufficient, then it may become necessary to do just that.
As I said previously, in 2010 the take up of voluntary unpaid leave exceeded the available unpaid leave. Not sure if that will be the case again this time, but let us hope it is.
I left Wizz 18 months ago. But the limited information I have is that the company is profitable, but not stupid. They are looking to minimise Winter losses in order to continue to provide jobs and services going forward.
Let's face it: If you can afford to take 2 weeks unpaid leave in a period of crappy weather at predominantly Cat1 Eastern European airports, what's not to like?
Go skiing instead
