Veitnam 777 Pilots
The attitude towards expats has hardened considerably over the last year or so, many of the pilots contracts are renewed in March 2013 so we will see what happens.
The saving grace for expats at the moment is that they are desperately short on the 777 type and are not replacing pilots departing because of natural attrition such as retirement or resignation.
The down side is that they are being worked to death literally! there is no real monthly limit as they can discount heavy crew hours by 50%; So 130 hours ++ per month is normal and also a killer.
Recently an expat TRE of long standing was downgraded and penalized severely because he told a known incompetent local captain to go around because he was unstable. It has become a time on all fleets where keeping your head down has become the order of the day. Poke it up and they will most certainly knock a hole in at the very least.
Corruption is endemic there as in much of that region and the Airline appears to be hemorrhaging from the butt financially, they are cutting any cost they can and that includes expensive expats. Unfortunately the good days are at least on hold and probably long gone. The management are desperate to blame anybody or anything for the poor performance of the Airline but in reality it is simply not a very well run airline compared to the cut throat competition it now has to live with in both their international and domestic operations.