Job in the UK!!!

[Amateur Turbines]

Just curious, if I had my uk passport(which I can get) and an ICAO ATPL(which I have), and about 3500 hours all multi crew turbine with some of that pic. Would any EU airline be interested in sponsoring me to get my JAR license? What do you think? And if you know of anyone that does that sort of thing please post back here.

[wobblyprop]

Pretty unlikely I'd would have thought.

[yyzdub]

Considering the number of qualified pilots out there with similar time and qualification as yourself....

if you were an airline which would you take? Pilot A that doesn't need sponsoring or Pilot B, a pilot that is looking for sponsoring?

[Amateur Turbines]

I full on agree. I'm just wondering if there was the demand would they consider it. I personnaly think that over the next 2-3 years our pilot surplus will be coming to an end and these compnaies may need to consider offering some sort of sponsor ship program. Cx does it already. Along with most asian airlines.

[yyzdub]

Those sponsorship programs are geared specifically towards Nationals only. You will find in the case of CX, that cadetships are offered only to Chinese nationals or HK resident card holders - same applies to all, and there's not a huge amount, other carriers. Since most flagships who offer these programs are partly or with a majority of funding provided by the government, there would be very few - if any - situations where you'd find a gov't paying for flight training or approving their flag carrier to pay for a foreigner to be a qualified pilot for their airline.

I see you're from Canada, as am I, and I am sure you would agree that you'd be a little pissed to learn that Air Canada was paying for foreigners to learn how to fly for their airline. As for Europe, there may be some quietly known sponsorship programs however, these will be geared towards 18-21 year olds, straight out of their A levels/ GCSE or highschool and would involve a very lengthy pscychological and psychometric testing.

It seems these days that the only way of pursuing and achieving a successful flying career is a bunch of money and a little bit of luck regardless of surplus or shortage.

yyzdub

[CanAV8R]

AT,

I came to the UK in the last year and have done very well. I have similar time to you and was left seat in a much bigger faster machine here than in Canada. I am now going on a Boeing. Just got the licence and the jobs were there. I was not forced to pay for a rating as some would have you believe. If you have 3000-4000 hours of JET A time you will get noticed and by more than one operator.

Although I miss home my career has rocketed over in Europe and I will return when I am ready.........Semi retirement!!!

Good Luck.

[Pilot Pete]

I would say the chances of sponsorship to get your JAR licence are next to none. However, if you pay to convert it and have a JAR licence and EU passport, your chances of employment in the UK with your experience are quite high.

I would recommend you bite the bullet, pay to convert and get yourself employed; much better than waiting two years for a 'possible' swing in the employment stakes in favour of licence holding pilots (which you still won't be!) In those two years you could have easily earned more than the conversion cost, be two years further in your career, two years of increments up a payscale and more importantly with your hours, possibly pushing for a command if you are in a turbo-prop airline or low-cost jet airline.

Good luck.

PP

[Amateur Turbines]

Thanks for your help. I haven't really looked to far into where to convert my license but if anyone has any suggestions I'm all ears. BTW I'm a Canadian pilot ie really cheap and broke.

[CanAV8R]

Conversion cost you 20K CAD plus and it is lots of work but well worth it. Jetsgo will ask u for that to fly a crappy old MD80 or a F100.

Look at it long term and it will make sense. I would do it again in a heartbeat. Beg, borrow or steal to get it done if you can and yes you can prepare while you fly in Canada.

Good luck

[yyzdub]

AT,

Keep in mind that it will take 12-18 months to get your UK passport - if you're serious about it, my advice would be to get going on things.

[CanAV8R]

That is not true. If you have the required docs ie birth cirtificates and marriage docs etc you can have it in your hands in as little as 2 weeks. In my case this was true.

Good luck.

[uhhh...hmmm...pass?]

Why don't you start with getting the passport? Then find someone to give you a job on your current type. I believe that you can get the Canadian license validated by the CAA for up to a year. As far as converting goes, it'll be more than 20K CDN to convert, and you will not find an airline to help with that.

[510orbust]

I am just finishing up the conversion process. With your time you are not required to sit the ground school courses its all self study so buy the books from either Bristol or Oxford. I myself would go for Bristol GS books as they get right to the meat of whats on the exams. The books will cost well over 1000 pounds and to write each exam is currently £55 this does not include re writes. You have a chance to write each exam 4 times to a max of six sittings if you go over any of these you have to write all 14 again. I have written in two different venues and find Glasgow much more relaxed and informal then writing down in Gatwick. The first step if I were you would be to do the CAT 1 medical as its a little more involved then the canadian medical. No point doing it all just to find there is a problem somewhere and its not cheap so make sure you go to the medical with a CURRENT CANADIAN CAT 1 MEDICAL. If you dont you will be charged the full price of over £500 pounds. As far as the flying portion goes, if there is a simulator over in the UK do your SKILLS TEST as they call it here and you are good to go, otherwise you are looking at 15 hours conversion for the instrument rating, maybe 1 hour prior to get your multi engine rating and then a few hours for the commercial conversion. The cheapest I have found for the flying conversion is around £3600 for the IR conversion plus the little bits for the multi/commerical and flight test fees bringing it up to around £5500. Some schools down south will try and soak you for your money, dont get drawn into it as they are used to converting people with 200 hours total time from a US flight school.

As far as your orig question, they will not convert for you, most say right in the application European Licence/right to live and work here. There is a good network of Canucks here converting to help with exams and such.

regards

510