ECAMSURPRISE,
Regarding LOL I think BALPA is too expensive and not very good. APPN covers you for considerably more for just about half the price of BALPA.
For those asking regarding time to command if joining now: It all depends on your experience but right now my guess would be 5-7 yrs as no more expansion is expected. 2014 will have a big numbers of upgrades- figures out so far, somewhere between 100-200 then it is all going to stop apart from retirements and people leaving the company.