Airlines that have its pilots pay to fly

[Gilles Hudicourt]

I think we should make an updated and current list of airlines whose pilots gained access to their flight deck seat by paying a large sum of money to the airline whose aircraft they fly, or to a third party that has an agreement with said airline.

I am not referring here to airlines that have corrupt employees who take personal bribes from pilot candidates before accepting them on a course, which is common in certain areas of the world, but about airlines whose official policy is to hire pilots who accept to pay a large amount of money for either their type rating, for their line training, or in some cases for both.

We should list those that do it directly with the candidate, and those that do it through a third party, whether an agency, a flight training company and disguise the practice as "training".

Airlines that re-reimburse the whole training cost to the pilots should not be included. Others that reimburse part of the cost but keep a portion, or allow to keep the school or hiring agency to keep a large sum, should be included.

Of course we must not include airlines that hired non pilots and trained them, but only airlines that do this to candidates who are already in possession of a pilots licence, and sometimes even a type rating.

Would also like to hear about airlines that used to make pilots pay to fly but have since discontinued the practice, and why, and also about airlines that did not do this in the past, but now engage in this practice.

[fox niner]

Some airlines can't be named on pprune. Just like "that play written by Shakespeare".

[Smudger]

MOL has a lot to answer for

[Gilles Hudicourt]

RyanAir seems to be one that fits the description:

https://pilot.cae.com/Programs/Ryanair.aspx?prog=6

[P40Warhawk]

Good plan Gilles,

About Ryan Air , that one does not fit the real description . There you pay for your own TR. Agree with that, but then you GET paid to fly for them.

P2F is where you pay for own TR+LT. And now days no salary during LT.

But further I support your plan.

[Gilles Hudicourt]

Ok, they make you pay the type rating. But what about this part:

After paying the 28,500 Euros, it says:

Opportunity to Fly for Ryanair
Successful candidates may be offered an opportunity to fly for a contract pilot agency that supplies a pool of pilots that operate on Ryanair aircraft.

How often are successful candidates not hired by the "contract pilot agency" after spending the money ? How often are they hired for a short while and then let go for no apparent reason ?

[Gilles Hudicourt]

Why did I just post something about P2F airlines, just to see it instantly moved to the "Wannabes Forums" ? I am not a Wannabee. I am a 15,000+ hour airline pilot employed at the same airline for the past 16 years but who wants to discuss the P2F issue in World airlines. I think its a problem that needs to be discussed and that it should not just be of concern to Wananbee pilots, especially in light of recent high profile accidents that may have involved P2F pilots.

The Urban dictionary describes "P2F" like this:


P2F or 'Pay To Fly' is a phrase used to describe the aviation industry's dirtiest little secret. That whereby which new pilot recruits (co-pilots) pay an airline in order to fly their passenger loaded, profit making aircraft. Sums of $30k to $50k are routinely exchanged in an industry full of so many jobless young pilots that the airline cannot resist in the face of such a supply vs. demand situation.

P2F is the product of an obscene lack of regulation within the pilot recruitment industry whereby any Nicholas, David or Angela who has the money can fly a 200+ passenger aircraft for a short while whilst building valuable flying time. Often jokingly referred to as a "training" contract, it in reality relieves the airline of the headache associated with permanently employing experienced pilots. Pilots who might otherwise have a genuine need to be paid a salary or be based close to family.

Is P2F a "dirty little secret" on this Forum also ?

[Gilles Hudicourt]

P40Warhawk wrote that Ryan Air charges for expensive Type Ratings but that the pilots do not pay for line flying, and that they are paid to fly, so that this airline does not fit the definition of P2F.

He also wrote about chances of getting hired after the training:

Well the chances are really big that you stay after training. But that is what I heard from pilots who work for FR. That I cannot confirm.

Otherwise it is only that you pay a lot of money for your TR. True on that.

[Jwscud]

In Ryanair, the deal is that you get taken on as a contractor on a multiple year contract with an established agency when you start your type rating. The costs incurred are offset against tax over the following years.

However, you do have to find a large lump sum up front to pay for your type rating. The only time you would be binned is for lack of ability.

It is not P2F in the sense that you pay for a rating and 300h LT and you are out at the end as Norwegian are offering at the moment.

[yoland]

Name and Shame:ok:

[Gilles Hudicourt]

t is not P2F in the sense that you pay for a rating and 300h LT and you are out at the end as Norwegian are offering at the moment.

Any details on Norwegian ?

[Aluminium shuffler]

For all its faults and bad treatment of staff, RYR don't do this. Giles and smudger, do your homework before you throw accusations. Look a little closer to home at the orange outfit - I don't know if they still do it, but they had P2F through CTC. Funny how they are portrayed as saints all the time, despite behaving so dispicably.

[Gilles Hudicourt]

I think this was discussed. They charge this:

https://pilot.cae.com/Programs/Ryanair.aspx?prog=6

Financial Structure
Assessment fee: £260 (The Assessment fee is non-refundable)
Type Rating Course:

- € 28,500 excluding VAT (for courses starting before 31 March 2015)
- € 29,500 excluding VAT (for courses starting on/after 01 April 2015)
Extra costs (travelling, housing, ID application, etc.): at cost, payable by student.

but then do not charge any further for line training, and also pay the pilots who are on line.

[Aluminium shuffler]

Self-sponsored type rating sadly is the norm these days. It is not remotely the same as P2F, which starts with a self sponsored type rating and then a contracted period where the pilot pays the airline for line training and experience, typically about £10k for six months. This clearly is not P2F.

What is poor about the RYR scheme is running the selection panel at a profit and employing the cadets on zero-hour contracts.

[Gilles Hudicourt]

Very interesting info. EasyJet tried P2F and rejected it. Now they require a large "Security deposit" which is re-imbursed over 7 years.

RyanAir just charges a large sum for the type rating.

What other companies (Wordwide) do P2F these days. Any details please ?

[despegue]

AIR BALTIC
ROYAL AIR MAROC
GERMANIA
TUNISAIR
SWIFTAIR
FARNAIR
LIONAIR
AIR ASIA
ENTER AIR
SMALL PLANET

Please add...

All of these outfits have at one point, or still practice Work to Fly, which is not only morally discusting, it is also dangerous.

Public beware.
DO NOT FLY ON THESE DANGEROUS CARRIERS.

[J74]

Nuvolair
Atlasjet
Corendon
SunExpress
Freebird
Blue Air
Blupanorama
Smartwings
Albastar
Vueling
Pegasus
Windjet
AirMediterranee
FlyHermes
Adria
Air Italy
Air Bucharest
Maldivian Airlines
Biman Bangladesh Airlines
Air Go airlines
Al Masria
Skies Airlines
Armavia
Air Armenia

[Nonni777]

How exactly are the airlines responsible for this, they are not forcing anybody to do anything.

The people responsible for this are the people who are stupid enough to pay for working, if everybody stopped paying this would simply come to an end.

I would never pay to work, I get paid well for my time on the job.

[captjns]

Many of you know my views of the P2F schemes and participants.:=

[Three Lions]

Lets not forget, PTF can be sneakily hidden beneath the veneer of high course cost and reduced initial salary.

And yes there are a number of companies in the UK trying to steal an edge on the decent operators by maximising the utilisation of this sharp practice.

There is an opinion that both are driving the whole effect downwards, and dragging the decent operators with them, it is clear to see that the blue propoganda is much more transparent in this particular area than the orange.

[testpanel]

I think we should make an updated and current list of airlines whose pilots gained access to their flight deck seat

I think we should not forget those (56-58 years old) retired legacy carrier pilots "stealing" our jobs, blocking the flow of new entries.:=

If they need the money, make it somewhere else, if it is because they "love to fly", start flying doctors and food around in Africa!

And no, i don´t support P2F either!

[RVF750]

Bit out of date, mate. Nigels can stay on till 65 now to cover their various alimony payments....

[Jwscud]

Turkish Delight - given that lovely solicitor who takes a half page ad in the BALPA magazine every month advertising her divorce, pension protection and child access services that would be lots of them :{

[de facto]

I think we should not forget those (56-58 years old) retired legacy carrier pilots "stealing" our jobs, blocking the flow of new entries.

If they need the money, make it somewhere else, if it is because they "love to fly", start flying doctors and food around in Africa!

And no, i don´t support P2F either!

Wouldnt that be blocking the brand new PPs from getting their first gig??
Maybe you should go out there,learn how to fly and then complain about experienced pilots willing to continue flying longer because A they still love it and/or B the new Aston is out.:E

[ShyTorque]

56-58 retired and stealing jobs? Take off your jealous angry glasses and take a reality check, chum. My so-called pension doesn't begin till I'm 66, same as many others. As long as I, and folks like myself, can earn a living (doing what we've invested in for the privilege of doing), I shall obviously continue to do so.

Life is a competition, despite what they might have led you to think at school. When you're good enough, and your time comes, you'll get a job, if you have the right attitude, of course. Meanwhile, get yourself a job stacking shelves, or working on a building site, like many of us had to do before we got a flying job.

[Gilles Hudicourt]

From the Lion Air Ops manual:

Second In Command (SIC) is only allowed to become a Pilot Flying (PF) after reaching a 300 flight hours on the aircraft type flown (on type)
SIC with more than 300 flight hours on type, may become the PF on takeoff, but to become the PF for landing, he/she restricted to approach using an instrument landing system (ILS).
Especially for Boeing 737-900 ER, with the degree of difficulties because the length of the aircraft, SIC may become a PF after reaching 500 flight hours on type.
An extreme caution must be exercised anytime flying with less experienced pilot. The PIC must be prepared to take over the flight control, especially during takeoff and landing when the SIC is the PF. PIC must keep soft touch on rudder pedal, control column and thrust levers.
When the PIC has less than 300 flight hours on type. The PIC is not allowed to entrust the control to the SIC, irrespective of the SIC total flight time on type.
At all special airports and or when following condition exist (s) PIC always the PF •
The prevailing visibility value in the latest weather report for the airport is at or below 1 kilometer. •
The runway visual range (if reported) for the runway to be use is at or below 1,500 meters •
The runway to be used has water, snow, slush or similar condition that may adversely affect airplane performance.
The braking action of the runway to be used is reported to be less then “good”.
The cross wind component for the runway to be used in excess of 15 knots •
Wind shear is reported in the vicinity of the airport. •
Any other condition in which the PIC determines is to be prudent to exercise the PIC prerogative. •
Approach and landing on Non Precision Approach (NPA) runway.

[despegue]

John Smith,

They are more than welcome to proceed with legal actions.
I will have a field day exposing their practices to the general public.

So I can be sure that they will NOT proceed.

Why are they criminal and dangerous?

Because they abuse young, inexperienced people, new in the industry to increase their profit, prefer these profit bringers over more experienced personnel that has to be paid ( can they proof that experience does not increase safety factor?!), mislead their passengers claiming they put Safety first where in reality, they put profit in front, I can go on and on.

[MichaelPL]

Thing is, its becoming more and more blurred nowadays.

I'm in a position to get onto a deal almost identical to that of Ryan in one of the outfits mentioned by despegue/j74. Ie paying for TR, but a paid long-term contract afterwards.

At the same time Norwegian (not mentioned in the list) has recently advertised a position of non-tr FO "summer contract" where you pay for your TR to be offered a fixed term contract of... 3 months.

And thing is, I'll probably take the offer I got. I've spoken to quite a lot of pilots during the last 4 years - working the ramp and flying on the jumpseat everytime I had the possibility. While 4 years ago opinions were varied and some said Ryan is a black sheep of the industry, in the last year every single pilot I met told me that I have to be prepared to pay for my TR. Most of them I could quote on 'if you get a shot at Ryan, by all means go for it'...

[gorter]

John Smith,

They are more than welcome to proceed with legal actions.
I will have a field day exposing their practices to the general public.

So I can be sure that they will NOT proceed.

Do you actually think the general public care?

[despegue]

Paying for training is different to paying to WORK.
Ryanair pays you a salary when flying their passengers.
Air Baltic and others ask you to PAY for flying their passengers.

[MichaelPL]

despegue,

The reason behind my post was precisely that one (that I know of) of the carriers you mention as 'air baltic and others' is paying a salary, while some better-established companies who aren't are lacking from the list.

There's the enormous question of PR involved, plus that within companies things can vary quite a lot between one contract and another.

[Kirks gusset]

ATLAS JET, CORRENDON. SUNEXPRESS AND FREEBIRD all pay salaries after type rating..duff info coming out here....again.. and another load of PTF dribble.. nowadays expect to pay for a type rating as part of the "education" look at it as a " requirement for employment" My daughter is at medical school and this is costing at least three times the cost of a type rating and afterwards a low salary even while working as a qualified doctor..There is, of course, a fundamental difference, medical students will nearly all get jobs, whereas baby pilots stand a 20% chance.. that's the real issue..

[Can737]

nowadays expect to pay for a type rating as part of the "education" look at it as a " requirement for employment"

I wonder how pilots can manage such a financial burden. It is horrific.


- What is the average time spent by P2T in those airlines?
- Would it solve the issue if you involved union reps or pilot committees and have the P2F blocked from flying elsewhere?
- What is different between a P2F training / other respectful airlines? (Safety)

[TheBigD]

I have a feeling that the inboxes of the HR departments of the various airlines listed in this thread must be full of emails from wet CPL holders inquiring about their training programs.

[Oldaircrew]

John Smith

"I don't buy the morality angle either. Companies exist to make profit for their shareholders. They are not there for the benefit of their employees."

Once again I find myself disagreeing with you.

These days it seems as though companies do exist to make profit for the shareholders only, however the relationship between employer and employee should be a symbiotic one where both parties benefit. They need us as much as we need them and there should be mutual respect.

The quest for greed on the part of the shareholders has brought us to a point that is almost untenable and one that will result in disaster for everyone (A la French Revolution) in time.

[JaxofMarlow]

Whilst John_Smith has clearly replaced WBF as the chief of polarised positions he does make valid points as well. Just sometimes expressed in a way that irritates.

Shareholder value is king. It is across the capitalist world. Airlines are just late to this game. A family member has worked in the City for 40 years and tells of horrific abuses of staff and customers in the name of profit. Just look at RBS. Once the bastion of commercial prudence, greed and the drive for profit at all costs has driven it time and time again to cross the line into gross abuse of trust and incompetence. They are being fined billions for these sins.

Companies that have understood the symbiotic relationship between a quality, motivated and happy work force generate sustainable growth and manage costs in a humane and controlled manner. Those that don't eventually fall to their knees. Airlines are not and will not be exempt.

[J74]

ATLAS JET, CORRENDON. SUNEXPRESS AND FREEBIRD all pay salaries after type rating..duff info coming out here.:ugh:

I can assure you that Sunexpress took lot of people from Stella Aviation and made them to pay 30k for Line training.
And besides that few more people connected to fly gosh and again others by Mr. K.Z. Leeds Base... then they receive a fixed salary of 3k x month and this is another story, and different conditions of others companies, but still P2F!

Then still some agencies like AviationCV, still recruiting for various Companies people for TR+LT, same BAA TRTo and Air baltic TRTO.

however the relationship between employer and employee should be a symbiotic one where both parties benefit. They need us as much as we need them and there should be mutual respect.

Agree with you, but the sinergy between them has broken times ago!

I have a feeling that the inboxes of the HR departments of the various airlines listed in this thread must be full of emails from wet CPL holders inquiring about their training programs.

Again, you're correct...lot of people they will use this thread like they find a piece of Gold...as they still too lazy to navigate in internet and find some informations by their own.

[Efe Cem Elci]

I agree with Three Lions. I've always said if you're settling for a much lower wage than usual its P2F. In my opinion there is no difference between paying 3K a month to the airline to fly and agreeing to be paid 3K-4K less than your counterparts in the company and around the world.

[Aluminium shuffler]

Giles, why do you continue to put RYR in this category, even after it has been made clear that they are (surprisingly) not in it? Axe to grind?

John Smith, notorious for complaining that we are all paid too much and have an easy job, now defending P2F. No real surprise there. Either a manager or just trolling, but while his argument of why management think we earn to much or why they like P2F, I fail to see why he approves of it. Oh, yes, born into wealth with no financial concerns, I seem to recall - mum and dad paid for everything.

P2F is dangerous. I have seen low paid cabin crew unable to afford to eat, hot bunking in an overfilled shared house of squalid condition. They were being poorly paid, not shelling out vast sums to the company. P2F pilots will often be ill-rested and malnourished, highly stressed and alround unfit for duty. Some might manage if they come from a background lik Smith, where mum and dad will look after them, but many don't. So, it's certainly dangerous and immoral. Criminal may be more difficult to prove, but endangering the safe conduct of a flight is a criminal offence, so creating these schemes could be regarded as criminal. The companies would use the "no pilot will report for duty if unfit" line in their Part A manual as a get out, though.

[too_much]

Guys your intentions are sound... But in reality what your campaigning for doesn't exist in 2015.

You are describing a perfectly 100% fair & honest world and it will just never happen...

I'm sorry I wish life was different but you should just accept the way the world is.

[FRogge]

I would definetely call the RYR Line Training P2F... even the BRK contract stated a price for line training, but we were offered a reduced rate of 40e/sbh. Plus that you have to pay for your own hotels, meals etc. when you can be every week in a different base... I've even heard that some guys doing LT this winter had gaps of up to 2 weeks in flying (without any salary of course)

[FANS]

John Smith's views are broadly spot-on, albeit delivered somewhat bluntly.

I just don't understand where this utopia is that he's going to in 8 months?

[Bokkenrijder]

I paid for my training through an unsecured loan, with absolutely no help from my parents (who wouldn't have been able to afford to help anyway) What I am is an ordinary line captain with a realistic take on things. It's not my problem if, as I suspect, you're too ignorant, pig-headed, or a combination of both to see the writing on the wall. The big problem is that because of the cheap credit in the past, there are too many pilots with a blue collar background (and I don't mean this in an accusatory or insulting way) who have very little idea and grasp of The Big Picture. They swallow the usual propaganda of "investing in oneself" and management nonsense like "we have to stay competitive so you have to make sacrifices" like a giant blue pill because that's what their upbringing has taught them.

The "just shut up, do the work and keep a low profile" is the prevailing mentality what you see on factory floors and assembly lines all over the planet, and this is exactly what managers want, so I can understand why people accuse John Smith of being an management pilot.

They think that P2F or P4T is like the entry price in order to be in the white collar club. It's not! They will never be part of the white collar club because they decide to pay for their own white collar uniform and training and thus degrading it to a blue collar job.

Denying the deterioration in T&C's, wishful thinking that things will eventually stabilize or perhaps even improve, and thinking that as long as you don't rock the boat you can keep up the facade for the outside world (and the blue collar family members) is a foolish strategy.

[Captain Greaser]

Tespanel, one of these days you might be glad to be sitting beside a 56-58 ex Legacy Carrier pilot when the :mad: hits the fan. You can't beat experience,,,,and no I don't condone paying for flying. Ryan Air do not carry out this practice. Easy Jet certainly have

[Cliff Secord]

I do agree with the point John Smith has raised above. Getting into UK flying now has become the remit for either the well heeled, those with means of securing loans or those from a background that can support the financial requirements. It has effectively barred anyone entering who is young and from a less affluent background. Try asking for unsecured credit when your parents can't release any equity in their little house. BA certainly have attempted to address this issue with their FPP program which I think is a good thing to recognise the financial prejudice that exists.

I certainly do not agree with the notion that "blue collar" workers have lowered the terms and conditions. Class seems no barrier in lengths of desperation people step to when determined to enter the profession.

[Mikehotel152]

BA certainly have attempted to address this issue with their FPP program which I think is a good thing to recognise the financial prejudice that exists.

What? BA haven't changed their spots since the days they were into flying boats.

Their cadet scheme is simply designed to get the best candidates. That's always been the case.

[Cliff Secord]

What spots are those? I never said at the detriment of quality did I.

As I understood it the fanancing arrangements were/are such that not coming from a well heeled background with collateral need not be a barrier. I'll admit I don't know the arrangements in detail but read their website and the point that the financial barrier exists in financing a flying career was referenced by BA themselves.

Maybe I read it wrong or misunderstood the scheme. Quite possibly.

[too_much]

Just to be clear RYR is not P2F

My definition of P2F is Eaglejet international out of Miami whom sell 300/400/500 hours line training completely unpaid for circa 70,000 EU

Your Ryanair & similar are not P2F at all they are just lessor terms and pay.

Any Tom dick or Harry can come up with the 70,000 and go fly a jet for 300 hours line training even if they are completely unsuitable to be an airline FO

I think it is this that gets people's backs up and is causing the problem...

[Bokkenrijder]

I said: ...cheap credit in the pastI was talking about the glory days of P4F during the era 2001-2008.

The same low-interest-rates-no-questions-asked policy that fueled massive housing booms in the US and Europe also significantly lowered threshold for for people who, IMHO, otherwise would never have been able to finance a start in aviation.

Nevertheless, regardless of what background people come from, what continues to baffle me is the short sightedness, the immense financial risk-taking and the huge amount of wishful thinking that is displayed in making the decision to even start a career in aviation.

I wonder what airline managers, chief pilots and authorities would think if we would display similar behavior in the sim or on the line... :rolleyes:

[rogerg]

In WW1 you were unlikely to be able to be a pilot unless you could already fly an aircraft as the RFC did not have any ab-initio flying schools. Was that "pay to fly"?

[Gilles Hudicourt]

Many people here state that such and such airline does not practice P2F but that another airline does. P2F has many ugly faces and takes different forms. How does one draw the line to say what one airline does is P2F and what another one does isn't ?

I must state that I work in Canada where paying for type ratings does not exist at the airline level and where P2F does not exist. Certain airlines have bonds, where you must re-imburse your training costs if you quit before working a certain amount of time for your employer, but no one pays up front for his training. In Canada and in the US, airlines do not hire low time pilots as SIC of airliners. One starts on Cessna's Beavers, Aztecs, Navajos, move up to Turbines on a Caravan, a King Air, a Pilatus, a Beech 1900, a Dash 8 and ATR-42 and smaller commercial jets before moving onto a large passenger jet on scheduled flights. There are exceptions, and some rare people sometimes skip a step or two of the ladder, but that is how it works for most.
So no 200 hour pilot in Canada or the US is going to pay a A320 or B737 type rating out of his pocket, because that will not get him hired by an airline.
No one is going to pay a type rating and 300 hours of line flying out of his pocket because no one is going to hire a 500 hours pilot who spent his 300 hours of line flying as PNF for LionAir.
My first jet was a B757. When I was hired on it, I already had about 6500 hours of flying under my belt, all of which I was paid for, except the first 250.
I have 7 type ratings on my licence. I never paid for any of them. My employers paid for them. I hope the business model that has taken root in Europe in certain other parts of the World never makes it to North America for I don't like it one bit.

Now about the different types of P2F.

Where some well established flight training facilities advertise a B-737NG type rating course for as little as $12,000 USD, what can we call it when RyanAir charges $33,000 USD for the same course, when you are not even guaranteed to be hired ? Is the training of pilots a profit center for RyanAir ? Are passengers offered cheaper flights thanks to the amount of profit the RyanAir pilot training center was able to generate on the backs of hopeful RyanAir pilots ?

At Travel Service, in the Czech Republic, I was told that new hires have to pay for their type rating. I do not know the amount they have to pay, but I think its hefty. Then, once they are hired, they are paid 660 Euros a month for the first 18 months, after which time they are paid 1200 Euros. In Canada a Beechcraft 1900 First Officer, about the cheapest scheduled flying job one can find, earns 1700 Euros a month. So when a pilot in the European Union, after being forced to pay his own type rating is stuck with flying a B737-800 full of paying passenger while getting paid 660 Euros a month for 18 months, can one consider that he is "paid to fly" or is this P2F as the others who do it more openly ?

I have heard of airlines who provide a $1000 per month salary to their pilots, but only after another contracting company, or a flight training company had charged the same pilot $50,000, or often much more, to secure that "job". Is that pilot "paid" or is it P2F ?

In the 17th and 18th century, many armies were led by officers that had not gained their military commissions through merit and experience, but paid for them. There was a price to become a Lieutenant, a Captain, a Major, a Colonel, not only to join the military, but also to get promotions once you were in. The richer people were always in command of the poor. This practice of selling military commissions has ceased in most modern countries now. Anyone care to take a wild guess on why this practice has ceased ?

[too_much]

With regards to the likes of Eaglejet etc it is them whom chase airlines or whomever they can get to agree to take line training on.

They then market these schemes to the pilot community

They are without doubt the root cause of P2F

Twindiling T&C's within the industry can only really stop if we are completely United which is unlikely to happen.

However if these LT providers could somehow be eliminated from existence then it could well stop conventional P2F from continuing.

[Three Lions]

P2f in its purest form in the UK hasnt existed now for over 5 years

However in its hidden form ie. over paying for a course and then starting on a salary well below the going rate, and that remains below the going rate for a number of years has been viral ever since then.

Its easy to see if you look hard enough

[too_much]

Sure but with so many hopefulls out there they would be insane not to take a paying job in an airline....

As I said above T&C's I personally believe cannot get better because there is not enough unity within the low time community, those guys are just going to keep on accepting what they are given, none of them will take a stand after investing 100k +

Most will probably say to themselves I will just struggle for a few years the get the 250k job in China after 3-4 years.

The way to win wars is to take out the bad guys whom are causing the biggest attack and at this time that is eagle, line training.net, skies, Baltic, MSD, CFA, etc

[Three Lions]

Disagree. The biggest culprits are in the UK.

[Gilles Hudicourt]

Some people have stated here that there is no relation between aircraft safety and P2F. That is one of the most ridiculous statements I have read here.

Imagine this:

Air Traffic Control school in South London is accepting applications. If you pass the medical exam and all the course exams, (and pay 150,000 pounds), you be provided with an Air traffic Control Licence and be guaranteed a job at London Approach Control Center. No interview, psychological or aptitude exams required. For only 100,000 Pounds, you can also get a job in Newcastle tower.

The Royal Navy is accepting applications for it future F-35 pilots. No exams, no aptitude tests, no contests. Just a physical and you pass all the courses The cost is 1.5 million pounds.

Jokes put aside, look at the last three accidents that LionAir from Indonesia had. The last two had low time P2F pilots at the controls. A bounced landing with tail strike and other damage, the other crashed in the ocean after proceeding beyond the MAP when they were not visual. The third to last, a runway overrun, had the PIC at the controls but a 750 hour P2F SIC in the right seat.

The recent Air Asia accident? That French pilot was hired with no prior commercial flying experience. It was his first flying job. Why does an Indonesian airline put a zero experience 40+ year old pilot at the controls of an Airbus 320 if its not P2F? Were there no inexperienced Indonesians to put there in his place?

Would any of these accidents have occurred with two experienced pilots at the controls ? There is a direct relation between P2F and accidents, its just that it has so far been covered up.

Some will bring up the AF447, which was not P2F but still involved a 250 hour pilot that was hired and put in the right seat of an Airbus 320, later upgraded to the A330.

It is not by accident that 2 pilots are required in the flight deck. There is always an experienced captain who is ultimately responsible for the aircraft but his second in command is not just there to fulfill a regulatory requirement. He is there to be a second pair of eyes, a second pair of ears, and especially a second brain, because the experienced Captain can make a mistake, he can misinterpret a clearance, he can be stressed or under duress, or have a sick child at home. What kind of backup can a 250 hour P2F SIC provide such a captain when he is in error ? Will he even dare ? Will the captain listen to him, considering his known lack of experience. My employer hires new pilots that have a minimum of 4000 hours. When my brand new SIC tells me something I listen, because he is not a new pilot, he is just new in my company. He had thousands of hours of experience flying other aircraft before joining me in the flight deck of my Airbus 330, or B-737 or whatever I was flying. I am not afraid of leaving this new pilot alone in the flight deck to go to the washroom. I can leave him at the controls while we do any kind of takeoff and approaches (except Low Vis Take off and CAT II and III because of regulations).

Who think will eventually put a stop to this ? The insurance companies. When they finally understand what is happening, how much it is costing them, and begin to specify what kind of pilots they will require in the aircraft they insure. They have done it in the past to certain companies, they will do it again when P2F is finally fingered as the culprit in a number of expensive claims. I am doing my share and hope some insurers read this and go back and look at what they have been spending and why.

[JaxofMarlow]

Two excellent and spot on posts Gilles Hudicourt. For some reason the experience of pilots involved in incidents is never mentioned in the UK press reports of accidents. We have had a couple of runway mishaps here in the last month or so.

[Mikehotel152]

No safety concerns between P2F and safety? Who said that?

Theoretically, it could be very safe. But that's because theoretically a person with a lot of natural ability could go down that route.

The reality, however, is different.

Because the CPL is a basic flying qualification and ATPL exams are easy, any person of average ability can gain the required licences to apply for a TR plus 500 hours course. All they need is money. So, yeah, I'd agree with Gilles that P2F is a safety concern because airline imposed recruitment standards are too low.

Yet, I'd venture to suggest that the likes of AirAsia and Lion would be having over-runs irrespective of the use of P2F cadets. The reality is that the environmental and cultural conditions in that part of the world are demanding and there are a lot of poor pilots flying for those operators for whom the use of P2F is merely a slice of an otherwise poisonous pie.

Thankfully, the likes of the European low-cost airlines are not in this category because they are able to sift through all the chaff in order to find the wheat. To back this up they generally have good initial and recurrent training regimes and robust SOPs. Their safety records speak for themselves.

[truckflyer]

Gilles Hudicourt:

Unfortunately the basis of your argument is wrong. I too agree P2F is the cancer of this business, however to claim that the people who do P2F are not made to jump trough the same hoops are wrong.

Many of the P2F schemes I have heard about, don't simply allow you in just because you have a licence and the money!
You still need to pass normal selection tests, normal sim sessions, OPC, LPC, Line checks etc.

The P2F has simply made you bypass the rest.

I have heard of P2F guys being chopped for not being good enough, failing to meet required standards. One of the guys I heard about was doing it for Lion Air via Eagle Jet.

So the argument that they are given an automatic pass inside just because they have paid is not correct.

You could claim the same about guys "buying themselves in" via flight schools like CTC, morally there is not much difference, as they are massively overpaying the flight school, but with a "guaranteed" job at the end of the line.

The maths does not work out very different if you consider what CTC cadet pays and gets paid in his first "guaranteed" job.

Some of these flight schools have now cornered the market, making it very difficult for pilots to get inside unless they have experience.

I would think a modular pilot training incl. TR and line training P2F, would probably cost the same as a CTC integrated pilot training with a job attached to it incl. the first 500 of line training with partner airline.

So attacking one minority, does not really hold grounds, unless you put the whole industry under scrutiny.

And with the increased popularity of the MPL with some airlines, you are opening a new can of worms!

[Kelly Hopper]

Well, could it possibly be?

https://uk.news.yahoo.com/airasia-jet-sound-condition-crash-investigators-054052839--finance.html

[Avenger]

According to the family the co-pilot had been in flying there for 3 years.. thats a hell of a long PTF:bored:

[Kelly Hopper]

Yes I believe he had some 2200 hours but did he "buy" the job?

[Can737]

What about airlines who pay for the TR, isn't it a competitive disadvantage with those who hire P2F?
P2F can only be dragging down the industry to the bottom.

Obtaining a license gives you a privilege, airlines hire you so that A/C can fly. The system is all gone :mad:

They day airlines will admit P2F is hurting the business model as a whole, they will stop hiring P2F and places like eaglejet will disappear I hope.

How can a P2F eat and sleep adequately before flights without decent money?

[ShotOne]

Calm down, Superfly, this isn't all about you,! No doubt many of those who have chosen/been forced down the p2F route are perfectly able. That doesn't make it a great idea, either for the travelling public or for the piloting profession. Aside from anything else, it's simple human nature to place little value on something that was free -whether it's a pilot or a disposable plastic bag!

[Gilles Hudicourt]

The P2F has simply made you bypass the rest.

I have 15,364 hours of flight in my electronic logbook today. All accident and injury free, knock on wood. We are all exposed to accidents though, I pray my career continues like this.

After obtaining my multi-twin IFR, I worked for a number of different companies on Cessnas 206, 207, 210, 310, 337 and 404, on Piper Aztecs and Navajos, on Beechcraft 18, 23, and 55, on AeroCommander 500 and 685, on C-46, on Embraer 110, and on Metroliner. Then I was hired on jets and flew Boeing 737, 757, and also flew Airbus 310 and 330.

In the course of my career I had 5 in flight engine failures, I lost a prop blade in flight, had several electrical failures, one electric fire, had a scary flap asymmetry incident on approach, a communications failures where I used the light instructions from the tower. I lost airspeed indication in flight, lost vacuum pumps, magnetos, generators, got caught several times in IMC at night in thunderstorms without airborne RADAR. I did several manual gear extensions. I had a cabin heater failure at night at -35 and landed nearly frozen. I began flying before GPS was available using mapping, dead reckoning, Radar Mapping,and old fashioned ground-based radio navigation. I flew hundreds of Instrument approaches, including ILS, BC, VOR, and NDB, often in non radar environment, much of it in single pilot IFR flying. I had a frightening out of stab trim experience at night, followed by a out of trim manually flown BC approach that I will never forget. I had days where I performed several full non precision approaches down to minimums in a single day and I also had days where I did two or three missed approaches in a single day. I was sometimes frightened by captains I had little confidence in.

All of this occurred before I ever laid a hand on my first jet, during my first 6500 hours of flight.

What I have just described is "the Rest" that I would have bypassed had I gone the P2F route that some pilots feel is necessary to their career. "The rest" in question made me the pilot that I became and I do not think that it would have served me, my employer, my crew-members or my passengers had I skipped that part of my career and gone straight from flight school to large jets.

The French gentleman who was at the controls of Air Asia was at his first ever job. He was hired with zero experience, although I read he had 850 hours of flight at the time he was hired. It however was 850 hours of flying lessons and private flying, all paid out of pocket. No commercial flying at all.
When a person with such little experience is put in the right seat of a fully automated fly-by-wire aircraft with all sorts of pilot-proof protections in his first job, his flying skills go flying out the window, just like the flying skills of the AF447 SIC went out the window when he too was put in the right seat of a A320 as a low time AF Cadet. He was certainly a master of A320/330 autopilot operation, but had lost his stick and rudder skills.

Look at the last RyanAir accident preliminary report

http://www.aaib.gov.uk/cms_resources.cfm?file=/Boeing%20737-8AS%20EI-EFB%2012-14.pdf

Commander’s Age: 26 years
Commander’s Flying Experience: 4,905 hours (of which 4,754 were on type)

4,905 hours TT - 4754 hours on Type = 151 hours on other types.
As a passenger or as a SIC, is this the kind of experience you want your captain to have ?

[Superpilot]

4,905 hours TT - 4754 hours on Type = 151 hours on other types. As a passenger or as a SIC, ss this the kind of experience you want your captain to have ?

Aviation is not the same everywhere and therefore expectations should not be the same, it depends on where you are in the world.

In the UK (and most of Europe), we don't have much GA. We are a tiny island where fuel costs over 3 x as much as it costs you over in Canada. GA is therefore not economically viable here. Also, being a relatively small land mass our cities and towns are much closer together and not massively separated like the municipalities of remote regions in the US and Canada. We have a bigger need for transporting 100-200 people 500+ miles away then we do for transporting 10-25 people over the same distance or less. Our farm and food stock is transported by road as is most mail. We are surrounded by sea and sea ports all of which serve the country in one way or another! For these reasons and many more, smaller aircraft and turboprops don’t work as well for us as they do in other parts of the world. By my rough guess there are probably less than 50 Edit: 50 registered was wrong, I stand corrected but the essense of the message remains, at any one time there are over 10 times more jets flying than turboprops! UK registered turbo-prop or commercial 'light' aircraft flying with UK airlines today. Compare that to the number of jet aircraft of which there are over 500!

Therefore it is quite normal for a 200 hour pilot to come out of flight school and straight onto flying a large commercial aircraft because realistically that is the only place he will find a job. There are far more jet jobs available than there are instructing, air-taxi, banner towing, crop-dusting and dropping jobs put together. We just don’t have the aviation diversity to support the kind of “career progression” you guys look forward to and are so used to. It’s a different ball game over here. Also, the JAA fATPL course is a much tougher and more regimented pilot training course compared to the US FAA or ICAO/Canada one.

[Fair_Weather_Flyer]

Well Superpilot, Flybe, alone has 45-50 Q400's. Then you've got Loganair, Stobart, Aurigny, Blue Islands, Atlantic and Eastern, probably others I've missed too. That must be 150+ turboprops and they used to be a great way to enter the airlines, get hands on flying and progress to bigger planes that provide bigger pay cheques.

Now things have changed and thanks to cadet schemes, these turboprop jobs are not as good a stepping stone as they used to be. Why take on on an experienced TP pilot (or regional jet for that matter) and pay them well, when you can take on somebody with no experience but willing to pay insane amounts of money for "tagged" training? P2f and its derivatives have killed it as a progressive career in the UK.

[Three Lions]

There are different dynamics in different countries.

P2F in itself doesnt necessarily weaken safety (although there are further arguements about the effects stresses and strains due reduced wages and high debt over a number of years)

P2F in its purest most transparent form hasnt been present in the UK for 5 years + (someone quoted 2008 on here)

P2F in its untransparent form (over paying for training and starting on lower salary for a number of years to secure a link to a "partner airline") is alive and well and has flourished in the UK in an extensive manner for a number of years

P2f doesnt create higher risk to flight safety, if a suitable training regime exists and rigid adherence to SOPs can mitigate all but the most unusual risks - which before anyone tries to counter the point could equally catch out experienced crew. As is historically proven and oft quoted on here

All that said. P2F doesnt inherently make the operation stronger nor weaker safety wise as can be seen in a number of examples whereby some british isles locos have recruited extensively in the less clear version of p2f.

And to counter that arguement nor does the more conventional route possibly via military flightcrew service and operating turbo props,

Safety couldnt and isnt It isnt the arguement or challenge for or against p2f

The damage it is doing to the industry as a whole however is a different kettle of fish. This is the only arguement available with regard to p2f. Put the safety issue to bed. It doesnt factually deserve inclusion on the merits and disadvantages of p2f

For clarity, I include all mentioned forms of p2f in my own posts the purest form and the more hidden version

FWF is on the money with one negative that p2f has brought to the party, and remains to do so.

[PaulFrank]

Therefore it is quite normal for a 200 hour pilot to come out of flight school and straight onto flying a large commercial aircraft

It has become more normal of late, but you do not have to go that far back into the past to realise that this progression was certainly not the norm. Today it has been driven in by economics, the 200 hour cadet is cheap to employ.

We just don’t have the aviation diversity to support the kind of “career progression” you guys look forward to

Really? We did in the, not too distance, past. The reason there is less of it now is because you can by-pass it by buying your way into that jet job at Ryanair et al. The career progression route, such as instructing then to turboprops then to jets has been blocked by the likes of Ryanair, who look towards 200 hour cadets rather than more experienced pilots. The career progression route has been destroyed by the 200 hour cadets going direct to jets.

Why take on on an experienced TP pilot (or regional jet for that matter) and pay them well, when you can take on somebody with no experience but willing to pay insane amounts of money for "tagged" training? P2f and its derivatives have killed it as a progressive career in the UK.

Spot on.

Also, the JAA fATPL course is a much tougher and more regimented pilot training course compared to the US FAA or ICAO/Canada one.

Naive and a bit arrogant. Europe is a big place and certain EASA states certainly do not have the same standards of training, even though they are supposedly training to the same system. Here too there seems to be a race to the bottom.

Safety couldnt and isnt It isnt the arguement or challenge for or against p2f[sic]

Ask yourself this. Will there come a point where rich and able candidates for p2f start to run dry, especially as the airline industry continues to lose its status? And the airlines are left to choose from the rich, but less able candidates. Will they abandon p2f because the standards of applicant have decreased? Or will they choose to lower their selection standards. After all, it is a very cheap way of getting pilots, and modern jets are really really safe and are difficult to crash...aren't they????

[Gilles Hudicourt]

By my rough guess there are probably less than 50 UK registered turbo-prop or commercial 'light' aircraft flying with UK airlines today. Compare that to the number of jet aircraft of which there are over 500!

I don't know who flies them, but the UK civil aircraft register lists:

BA ATP = 17
ATR 42/72 = 8
Twin Otter = 6
Q400 = 45
Beech 1900 = 3
Saab 340/2000 = 30
Dornier 228 = 3
Dornier 328 = 5
JetStream 31/41 = 30
Metroliner = 1
Short 360 = 1
PC-12 = 1
Lockheed Electra = 2

Total Commuter type or large turboprops = 152

Then there are 40 Islanders, 38 Piper Navajos, 77 Cessna Citation, 8 BAE-125s, 16 Bombardier Exec jet, 10 Lear jets, 24 Beech 200/300, 12 GulfStream jets.....

In a few minutes of searching the UK civil aircraft register, I have listed over 350 UK registered aircraft that are flown by professional pilots.

There are also about 150 lighter commuter jets such as the Emb 135/145/175/195 and the CRJs.

That comes up to over 500 professionally flown aircraft without counting a Boeing or an Airbus. There are probably many others.

Not to mention that this is just the UK. All of the EU is open to UK pilot as far as I know.....

[Three Lions]

Ask yourself this. Will there come a point where rich and able candidates for p2f start to run dry, especially as the airline industry continues to lose its status? And the airlines are left to choose from the rich, but less able candidates. Will they abandon p2f because the standards of applicant have decreased? Or will they choose to lower their selection standards. After all, it is a very cheap way of getting pilots, and modern jets are really really safe and are difficult to crash...aren't they????

Paul Frank, good spot on my inherent rambling....

To answer your question relating to my own post.

I guess one option could be to expect the new low salary captains, who exercised their option to "buy a training role " via the "tagged trainer scheme" with the "preferred fto" could be expected to take up the slack.

Maybe I shouldnt have put that into print. Anyone know if I can patent that idea?

In fact on reflection wheres the delete button, forget I mentioned it.

[truckflyer]

Gilles Hudicourt - First I agree your experience and career progression is as it should be.

If you think P2F is bad and lacking experience, then you should review some of the new cadets coming trough integrated flight schools!

As some mentioned the market in Euro-Land is very different then other countries, GA is expensive, and there is no gentle progression trough various levels of jobs!

It's to expensive for the Lo-Co's to have experienced FO's working for them, only when they lacking Captains they discover this.

I talked few weeks ago with a line trainer who had a cadet with total time of 90 hours, from MPL course. Never one hours of Solo flight, and in few months he will be FO on the line with a major EU airline.

So in that context the whole discussion of the P2F's experience becomes irrelevant, as the P2F pilots will most likely have more experience and more diverse experience, as the entry level is normally higher.

Again I do not agree with P2F, however to say that these pilots are less able then a Cadet gone trough a big FTO and put direct into an airline without any outside experience is wrong.

The training in many of these companies are geared towards these Cadets, and I guess the accident history within EU does not really show any increase in incidents or accidents, that supports that this is dangerous.
Europe is probably the safest airspace in the world.

[Gilles Hudicourt]

The training in many of these companies are geared towards these Cadets, and I guess the accident history within EU does not really show any increase in incidents or accidents, that supports that this is dangerous.
Europe is probably the safest airspace in the world.

I hope it stays that way.

[captjns]

Test Panel says" If they need the money, make it somewhere else, if it is because they "love to fly", start flying doctors and food around in Africa!


Perhaps you should start your career in the same manner rather than bitching and moaning about those who are more qualified... Don't you think?

[captjns]

Trade Winds in under the impression that With regards to the likes of Eaglejet etc it is them whom chase airlines or whomever they can get to agree to take line training on.

They then market these schemes to the pilot community

They are without doubt the root cause of P2FI have to disagree with this statement... It's the pilot willing to pay to sit in the right seat that's responsible for the P2F programs. Imagine... if pilots with a sense of self respect... refused to pay for such schemes? Then there's a true level paying ground.


At the end of the day, however, the P2Fer is part of the problem and not part of the solution as far as raising the bar on terms and conditions and most of all respect that pilots deserve for the hard work they preformed in order to earn their positions with the airlines.

[JosuaNkomo]

"That is, with the greatest of respect, :mad:. All MPL courses include an element of solo flying. However, even if they didn't, I wouldn't be concerned. Bumbling around in a Cessna doing VFR navigation has precisely zero relevance to airline flying"


Agreed to a certain extent but the most valuable lessons about my personal limitations occurred by "pushing" it whilst solo. These lessons have given me a healthy respect for the environment we work in (terrain, weather and aircraft).


I don't believe these aviation lessons can be replicated in an airline environment where the captain "carries the can".

[Three Lions]

John Smith is correct in his post above. P2F is not more or less unsafe than any other career stream when comparing similar quality Ops and training depts.

The only relevant point for discussion is the effect that p2f (and again this includes the latter day version of the "over priced course under paid initial salary" pairing) - has had and is having on the industry as a whole

For sure in the British Isles the recruitment on jet fleets in the last decade has been unprecedented. There has been a huge recruitment onto huge expanding jet fleets. Yet using a wider view, the industry shows evidence of "career stagnation" and lowering terms and conditions whilst requiring a general increase in duty.

Jump onto a jet fleet at one of the locos. It is hard work, lifestyle affecting hard work. 4 sector days on one of the loco enhanced rosters, once the novelty has been sated and the feel for a move on to somewhere better with more of a work life balance, where are you going to jump to and how?

The need for cadets is essential for any industry, however the current high percentage cadet recruitment in the bulk of the industry, certainly the British Isles, is damaging the industry as a whole. Not from a safety perspective. But from just about every other employment and career perspective

There are winners. Unfortunately its not those at the pointy end.

in addition to that, some of the figures bandied about for the "linked courses" are a huge investment for a short term career

[truckflyer]

"Bumbling around in a Cessna doing VFR navigation has precisely zero relevance to airline flying."

I do not agree with this point, it's not necessary the flying skills, it's the experience you are faced when flying around X amount of hours in GA, real life experience when you don't have instructor in the right hand seat to guide you or take over when things go bad.

Your decision making becomes reality, not just a model that you practise and repeat again and again, until you know it by heart inside out.
There is a big difference from being alone with various factors such as weather changes, fuel, diversions etc - where not all is planned for you by Ops - where you actually have to make the decisions that might have a real impact on your life, not just you have failed a sim/training session.

90 hours total real flight time + XXX amount of hours in the sim of course. That for me can give you a good pilot on a nice day, when everything goes after plan. However I am sceptical how they will be in a real life emergency.
I can't imagine in those 90 hours, they have many hours without an instructor, have few hours solo is not going to give you much experience with real life decision making.

One of the misconceptions that some here have about P2F, is that there is no quality control of the pilots just because they have "paid their way in" - however that is not correct. Even though they P2F, they are normally put trough same training program as cadets are, and need to go trough the same hoops as everbody else has too.

For those who have done the P2F that I know about, there have many traps and dangers with this, it simple has not been easy going without any issues. And great risk is involved in it financially and the uncertainty before, during and after.

Some of them have lost much money, training has been hard they had delays for many months before completing sims, training etc.
A few I know managed to get proper jobs after this 300 - 500 hours experience. It varied a lot from what they managed to achieve, but it simply was not easy, and for some they have gained valuable life experience trough this.
For me this life experience helps develop future decision making, and is a useful for the future.
Much more then some spoiled child who gets paid everything by mummy/daddy to attend overpriced integrated flight school, who produces the next machine part for an airline!

All the ones I know from P2F, funded it themselves, in other words they did not have somebody giving them the money to do it, but worked hard and decided this is how they wanted to use their own money.

It is massively wrong for the industry, however if you want to look in these details, you must take look at many more aspects of the industry.

[Bealzebub]

90 hours total real flight time + XXX amount of hours in the sim of course. That for me can give you a good pilot on a nice day, when everything goes after plan. However I am sceptical how they will be in a real life emergency.
I can't imagine in those 90 hours, they have many hours without an instructor, have few hours solo is not going to give you much experience with real life decision making
It is the "XXX" that you gloss over. The simulator time is nearly all simulated "airliner" time. It is time where the majority of training is focused on real world emergencies. Decision making is at the very bedrock of these syllabi. This is why graduates of these courses ascend such a steep learning curve and why the airlines are so keen to acquire them.

I have been doing this job for a very long time now. I have flown with cadets for a long time as well. Recently I spent 50 hours in a simulator alongside a 500 hour cadet pilot. I have to say I was extremely impressed with the attitude, aptitude, learning curve, and decision making ability that I witnessed from the other seat.

Contrast that with the "it's everybody's fault but mine" whining, that is such a trademark of "one or two" people on this site.

The airline wants a high level of surety. What it doesn't want is captains (like me) complaining about the standard of the lady or gentleman sat in the other seat.


For me this life experience helps develop future decision making, and is a useful for the future.
Much more then some spoiled child who gets paid everything by mummy/daddy to attend overpriced integrated flight school, who produces the next machine part for an airline!

All the ones I know from P2F, funded it themselves, in other words they did not have somebody giving them the money to do it, but worked hard and decided this is how they wanted to use their own money.

What a blinkered viewpoint! "life experience"? I recently spoke to a cadet in his mid thirties who trained in accountancy. He had spent years in that role working in the UK and abroad and had saved all of the money he had paid out for his flight training. From the stories he told he seemed to have a lot of "life experience." Similarly I meet cadets who have had sureties and guarantees provided by parents or grandparents so that they can borrow the large sums of money they needed to complete their ab-initio flight training. I am sure there are individuals that have been gifted the money as well, although why this correlates to them being "spoiled children" I am not sure.

Over the last Twenty plus years, the airline industry has had a metamorphosis from being a difficult entry career with a limited supply of eligible aspirants, to being a relatively easier career with a tidal wave of eligible aspirants. The changes have resulted in a massive oversupply of "wannabes" Even if nothing else changed (and a lot has) that simple equation imbalance would drive both reward and opportunity levels through the floor. Indeed it has done, yet people still seem shocked by this, and believe that the world should facilitate their passage and then revert back to the realities of the last Three decades of the Twentieth century.

The stark reality is that most airlines survive in a "low cost" world. Passengers wont pay the fares they did in the Seventies and Eighties. Deregulation, free trade and competition, have revolutionized the landscape in many industries, but certainly in this one.

For an airline quality is cheap. Unlike the situation Twenty or Thirty years ago. You can still demand the best candidates from the best training backgrounds. You can demand they paid for every penny of their training. You can demand they pay or guarantee their type ratings and associated training costs. Even then, the crowds of qualified aspirants stretch over the hills and far away.

Is it unfair? Sure it is!
Is it expensive? You bet!
Is it high risk? For the applicant it certainly is!
Is it going to change anytime soon? Only if those crowds evaporate, and there is no sign of that happening!

[Bealzebub]

No, but did you read the first word in the title of the thread?

In any event it is erroneous since every aspect has a relevance.

[Gilles Hudicourt]

You seem to have some ingrained prejudice when it comes to low experience pilots flying jets. It just seems to me that you have a chip on your shoulder; perhaps because you were unable to get such a position when you were a low hours pilot, and think that everyone should have to suffer through the same hardships that you had to.

You have just clarified an important point for me, about your problem and the problem of those other low time guys that chase the big shinny jet dream right after flight school.

When did I ever mention anything about "hardships" ? I said I was PAID for every commercial flight I ever flew. Whenever someone paid me to fly an aircraft, any aircraft, I was in heaven. Those 6500 hours I did before joining an airline with large jets were the best years of my flying career. All my good stories are from that period. All my good souvenirs are from that period. Most of my flying experience was gained during that period.
I was not even thinking of flying heavy jets when I had 1500 hours, because I was following the normal path that everyone around me was following. At 1500 hours, I was looking up to become a Curtis C-46 pilot, a Douglas DC-4, a Douglas DC-6 or maybe an HS-748 pilot. My wet dreams were about flying a P-51, a Sea Fury, or maybe a PBY in the Caribbean. I knew the big jets would arrive later, naturally and in due time. And they did. Just like grey hair and baldness do.

Plus I never had huge flight school loans to pay back. I never had more than $10,000 USD in flight training debt in my whole life. And I paid all of my initial training myself. When I had 1500 hours, I read Flying, PlaneandPilot, Business and Commercial Aviation, and magazines about War-birds. Not about airliners. To me, transport category jets were boring buses in which one hauled people in a boring way when one got older. The pilot I admired most was my 30 year old Capt "Duke" who could three point our C-46 on Montserrat's 3300 foot runway (now buried under lava)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/W._H._Bramble_Airport

So you see, there are two kinds of pilots. The kind that live their dream, and the other kind, your kind, that think that those other pilots living their dreams have a chip on their shoulder and went through "hardships".....
Our very reasons for flying are so different.

I now understand your point of view very well. That statement was so eloquent.......

[maxed-out]

Gilles Hudicourt

I think you need to have it out with the senior pilots/training captains who are part of the problem (you do not have to look too far up) and the ones that set up the big training organisation in the first place and have pushed for the MPL schemes etc.

You may be surprised to find out a lot of them have climbed the same ladder you have and should really be more inclined to support your point of view. In the end however, this cannot be so, as it's not financially beneficial to take the moral high ground. Money talks, pockets need lining and palms need greasing.

At the risk of sounding cliché and repetitive, the fish rots from the head down!

[Bealzebub]

Yes, and what they will tell you is that the attrition rates are a tiny fraction of what they were in those days (I was there!) That the ab-initio training is something that they have an intrinsic involvement with. That the real world costs of putting a pilot in the seat mean that has to be done at minimum cost and risk. That has to be balanced against all of the other risks, but given the candidate is assuming the financial risk profile, those risks are already mitigated from onset. In other words, pick the best, it won't cost any more.

During the evolution of the last Three decades, the process went from selecting high time self improvers and military career changers, whose introductory training (type, base and line etc.) the airline paid for, to initially bonding the recruit for their training costs. The problem (certainly in the UK) was that it was difficult, expensive, and time consuming to enforce those contracts. You only have to look back to the early days of this website to find pages and pages of people posting threads about how they could successfully escape their obligations. The airlines found an answer!

The legal system in the US and possibly Canada may well lend itself to making enforcement of such contracts a cheaper and far easier process? Certainly in the UK (and probably other countries as well,) the evolution was brought about by some of the candidates. I remember reams of threads 15 years ago screaming about the unfairness of "bonding." It was slavery, servitude, and all the same terms you see bandied about today concerning modern candidate loaded costs.

There are very few airlines (or other businesses) where survival isn't measured by the size of the accessible cash pile. Businesses are simply not going to dip into that pile where they don't have to. They are not going to waste money chasing after broken promises or commitments (from their potential employees,) even if they have few compunctions about doing it themselves.

By all means sound cliché and repetitive, but navigating a passage through the realities of a potential career today or in the next decade, means carefully researching the history, evolution and realities of todays market, as well as the forecasts of what lies on the horizon for at least the next decade. It is astonishing how few people do! The directions have been loud and clear for a long time now, but an awful lot of people seem to smudge their keyboards with the earwax they have accumulated on both forefingers! You don't have to look (too far up) to find them either!

[-438]

P2F or cadet program's are not a problem if well managed with proper systems in place.
The problems arise when airlines cut corners in training for inexperienced pilots.
I would guess that the airlines that cut wages/employments costs are probably the same airlines that cut costs in other safety related areas.

I came through a general aviation background to end up in a major airline. The airline had cadet program's for many years & were able to select the best available candidates and give the best available training. The end product (cadet pilots) were generally excellent.

I have worked with other airlines that cut costs where ever possible & the end product (cadet pilots) are questionable at best. Fortunately, most of the Captains come from old school backgrounds & can keep the blue side up.

[despegue]

It seems a Pay-to-Work Pilot from France was killed this week during the Terrorist Attack on the Corinthia Hotel in Tripoli :(

[Greenlights]

It seems a Pay-to-Work Pilot from France was killed this week during the Terrorist Attack on the Corinthia Hotel in Tripoli

well...maybe next time, some guys will think twice before paying to fly and going in such country ? (who does not know the risks ? seriously...).

many seem to forget one thing.
P2F is not only about flying skills (safety), but it is about allowing anybody to be in the right seat....you what I mean... anybody who has a really bad intention, can be in the right seat and have controls of a big jet.
The door is open, just pay. :D

[Hotel Charlie]

Bumbling around in a Cessna doing VFR navigation has precisely zero relevance to airline flying.

What a load of crock!!

[Can737]

I had my first pitot failure when I was doing city tours with a 172, it was a fly in the pitot tube, right after takeoff and IAS went down to 0 mph.

Put it anyway you want, it was very instructive. Few years later when I lost altitude and airspeed indication right after takeoff, I knew what was going on.
Guess what, the 400 hrs FO froze and I was single pilot for a long minute....

Any experience is valuable.

[CONF iture]

You're aware, of course, that at least one of the FOs on AF447 (the one in the RHS) was a very active GA and glider pilot?
The report indicates that he had a "glider pilot's license issued in 2001" nothing more.

[Kirks gusset]

The original thread was about airlines that allow pilots to pay to fly, perhaps an attempt to " name and shame", however,now it's drifted into the normal "safety compromised" by these guys paying to sit in the RHS or LHS (AKA Command programs).
Perhaps we should consider some facts:

1) Not all PTF are low hours, many are very high hours and have age related problems with getting mainstream jobs, these guys are usually financially sound and can afford without any pressure to try and lift their career.

2) As a trainer I can tell you many ex military guys take much longer to adapt and their ability to "step in" is often much much lower than the average guy straight from flying school with no hours..part culture of not wanting to criticise the Captain, part inability to forget old embedded procedures. Often highly technically competent and knowledgeable but lacking in basic procedures. Over 50% of our " events" arise from these guys and their instinct to revert to "basic modes" rather than use the automatics, VNAV etc etc.

3) Recent risk studies show clearly, pilots with less than 300 hrs fall into the same operational risk category as those with over 10,000hrs, one group no idea, the other group too complacent.

4) In our company, of the last 4 intakes, each of approx 50 pilots, 95% of the guys with less than 200 hrs completed the line training with no problems within the allotted 40 sectors, 50% of the guys with over 1000 hrs took an additional 10 sectors and 30% of the guys with more than 4000 hrs took an additional 20 sectors.

5) Our internal safety risk reporting system shows 80% of all events occur with high hours FOs close to command upgrade (overconfident) and less than 3% occur with new FOs within 2 years of joining.

Real airline experience always prevails over GA flying, all tho stick and rudder nonsense teaches nothing about high altitude manoeuvring or high energy management. There is a world of difference between " decision making" in a C172 that can land on a cabbage patch and a medium airliner.

PTF is a regrettable development extension from the SSTR, but to a degree forums like this promoted it by preaching a SSTR " without hours on type is useless" . The SSTR is here to stay and PTF is gradually dying a natural death due to line training capacity. A quick look at the jobs forums shows many many instructor positions advertised with airlines associated with this system, so who's the real villain?
;)

[Trackdiamond]

Air Arabia...and they don't honour what yu pay either..I burnt my money with them.I wouldn't do it again!

[despegue]

Kirks Gusset,

As a Trainer, I am amazed that you critisize ex Mil. For reverting to Basic flying.

Luckily, in my company, we have a VERY IMPORTANT rule: If in doubt: Go down a level in Automation, if needed, automatics OFF and fly the aircraft...LIKE A BASIC TRAINER. This works with ANY aircraft.
No bull like reverting to Vnav etc. You just complicate things that way.
And guess what, we minimize our events thanks to this, but of course, we actually teach our crews how to fly their aircraft without using flight directors and automatics...:ok: and do this nearly every day.

[Kirks gusset]

Despegue, Surely you are not advocating disconnecting the automatics in a 777 and hand flying from 40000? VNAV is not a reversion mode, it is the normal mode. The types of events that catch these guys out are " direct to" without modifying VNAV path for MSA and the thing dives like a hawk, then they revert to VS, so we see VS-3000 with MCP 220 and the whole thing is a mess. Generally the ex military guys score well with raw data flying ILS and Visuals but just take longer to grasp the basic operating concepts. We do not teach anyone how to fly, we assume they can do that at the selection stage, we teach them how to operate the systems according to the manufacturers recommendations and company procedures. A quick review of both Boeing and Airbus FCTM will show that where possible leave the automatics engaged..the issue with these guys is always the same..they are not in their comfort zone..it takes time.. the debate on the thread extended to a reflection of hours versus safety, the point I am making is that they are not mutually exclusive

[PT6Driver]

As some have brought this up:
Having flown with MPL and straight from school sub 200hr fATPL pilots, in my experiance there is little too choose betwean them so long as the selection and training have been done to a high standard. The MPL pilots had been selected by the airline, who then kept a very close eye on the training.
When the training is not of a high enough standard then the end product suffers as a result. In both schemes the actual flying is so low and in particular the solo flying, that it is almost irrelevant. This is where the MPL scheme scores because the sim training is directly aimed at the next step ie line operations, decision making, failure management etc etc.

This is a completely different subject to p2f.

Giles has raised career progression and as a refute has shown us how many turboprop aircraft there are in the uk.
However until recently no one was moving from dash8 to uk jet employment. The airlines almost all preferred low hour cadets. Therefore as a career move, joining a turboprop airline was a dead end. The only way out for many was a move to the sandpit. It is cheaper and more cost effective for the airlines.
Is it any wonder that wannabees go p2f?

There used to be bonding, no cost to candidate so long as they met their commitments.
Then pay up front but reimbursed over time so after 3 years no cost if you stayed.
Now in many different disguises candidate pays for all training, including TR and either pays or has a reduced salary during line training, reduced cost for airline or in some cases profit.

Decision making ability is meant to be a pilot skill yet there are guys out there with over €130, 000 debt and no realistic employment opportunities! Good decision:ugh:

So back to topic.
Do we include 50% salary during training as p2f?

[Gilles Hudicourt]

The original thread was about airlines that allow pilots to pay to fly, perhaps an attempt to " name and shame", however,now it's drifted into the normal "safety compromised" by these guys paying to sit in the RHS or LHS (AKA Command programs).

The thread was an attempt to name and shame P2F airlines. But right away, people began to write about what was and what was not to be considered P2F, notably RyanAir and EasyJet. Others wrote that P2F and Cadet candidates were safe and that P2F was morally wrong but technically safe since it was almost like Cadet programs.

I think that making people pay for their type rating is P2F. Having a number of large airlines operating just one aircraft type is a fairly recent phenomenon, with most large airlines generally being made up of several types of aircraft. What about those airlines that operate several different types of aircraft, would they also expect the candidates to pay for their TR and have experience on type before coming on board? BA for example has six TRs. Thomson has 4 or 5. Air Canada has 6. What type rating should such candidate buy should they decide to join a multi type airline ? (assuming they also began this pay for your TR practice). Then what about changing types once you are in ? I have flown 4 different types of aircraft since I started at my present company. Not for fun but because the numbers of aircraft changed and the company's pilot's NEEDS of different aircraft changed. I had to change types to adapt to corporate decisions. Would RyanaAir and EasyJet have billed me for a TR every time I changed aircraft ?
I think TR should be paid by the employer and that having the pilot pay for his TR is "pay to fly". Imagine what will happen when RyanAir decides to purchase a fleet of 787s, or EasyJet a fleet of A350s?. Who will fly them ? Who will pay for the TR? Will the 787 and 350 positions be sold to the highest bidder ? They will probably start if off as a new company and make everyone pay to join.

Finally about the safety of low time pilots. If well trained low time candidates are just as safe as the others, why not put two low time guys together in the same flight deck? If that argument that they are safe was true, they would. But they don't. And never will.

The accident and incident reports that have involved P2F pilots and pilots that had entered the airlines as low time Cadets never mention this fact. There are no statistics about P2F incidents. As an example, I have already cited that the last three consecutive LionAir Accidents and incidents involved crews whose SIC were P2F. These reports do not mention this fact. So there are no statistics about it. When I wrote this, someone advanced that P2F had nothing to do with these incidents and that LionAir had other problems, not related to P2F which were at the root of these accidents and stated as evidence, that Europe, despite P2F and Cadets, had a safe record. AirAsia most likely had a P2F pilot at the controls. AF447's SIC and PF had "flown" about 6000 of his 6500 hours as SIC on A320/340/330. The SIC and PF in the Air France A340 that overran the runway and burned in Toronto in Aug 2005 was a Cadet, hired at zero time. After his muti-IFR CPL he was hired as SIC on A320 before moving on to the 340. There are probably many others, should one take the time to look.......

I think that there are many P2F and Cadet related incidents in Europe that are just swept under the rug because they go against the trend and because big money is involved.

I reiterate that I think that low time P2F and Cadet type programs by-pass an important part of a pilots flight training when they go straight to flying highly automated aircraft in a RADAR controller IFR environment. Granted they become efficient at operating the aircraft in that environment when everything goes as planned or as practiced in the Simulator, but often real life emergencies are not straight and forward and were never practiced in the simulator.
While I was at my present company, one A330 ran out of fuel over the Atlantic at night and a A310 lost his whole rudder in cruise flight. Both of these aircraft landed intact with no injuries. These are not things that one practices in the simulator.

How many times in accident reports do you read that the pilots had never practiced a particular event in the simulator ? There are many malfunctions that occur and that are not in the non-normal checklist and for which we have never trained, and that is when experience kicks in and often saves the day.

People here keep stating that anything that is not related to flying jets concerns Cessna 172s but that is not true. There is whole world of aviation in between the 172s and the airline jets which used to be part of a pilots' experience. If that part is to be skipped, it must me replaced by something substantial and that something substantial cannot and should not be 500 hours of PNF at LionAir. It has to be real flying.

Why is an ATPL issued at 1500 hours and not at 200 ? Because the authorities in every country recognized the EXPERIENCE one gains during those extra 1300 hours as valuable and necessary. If 1250 of those extra 1300 hours are done flying straight and level on autopilot, with the PIC doing most take offs and approaches, what experience is gained ? They are just lines in a logbook.

Edit: I just saw this new thread:

http://www.pprune.org/terms-endearment/555628-ryanair-non-rated-dec.html

Why does a company like RyanAir need to resort to Direct Entry Captains? What about its thousands of experienced SIC ? Someone is going to write that this has nothing to do with P2F.
Yet if RyanAir had been in the habit of hiring experienced 4000 hour Q400 captains as B737 SIC instead of 200 hour pilots, would this be necessary ? No because such a pilot would be ready to go left seat when needed at RyanAir.

[truckflyer]

There are numbers confirming that there has been increase of upgrade failures within some of the companies heavily relying on Cadet pilots.
We are talking substantial numbers, such that they now are getting experienced FO's and DEC's to fill the gaps.

I have heard about this happening with at least 3 major companies!

The failure is not on Tech or Flying skills, but rather No Tech issues!

So I guess maybe it would have helped them if they had some more "life experience" - even if that involved some C172 flying alone, personally I prefer the PA28 - and love taking it for a spin every once in a while!

It's an airplane, no matter if an airliner or C172, different size - but take away all the fancy bells and whistles, and they all fly the same!

It seems some people here rely heavily on the Cadets to assure their retirement package deal!

[despegue]

Kirks Gusset,

Nowhere in my books does it state that Boeing recommends to leave the automatics on whenever possible. Quite the opposite actually.

Furthermore, any Safe airline should have the following mentioned in their SOP: crews are encouraged to fly manually with or without flightdirector, both on departure and approach, whenever traffic and weather situation allows.

And yes, We often disconnect all below RVSM:ok:

[Gilles Hudicourt]

What's your point?

That I am bringing up a subject on which there is no data because there is a reluctance to look at this subject. We should go back 20 years and look at all accidents in which it was determined that the crew had some blame and look at what kind of flying background the crews had. Only then will we be able to determine if there is a correlation between crew experience and accident data.

The KLM pilot that you mention is the unwilling and posthumous father of modern day CRM by the way. He didn't lack experience but did lack much else....... That was a case where a great lesson was learned from an accident from which we all benefited, although there was initially a reluctance at KLM, to accept the report's conclusions about their poster boy captain.

Aviation arrived where it is today by learning from mistakes. Many mistakes have been made in the past, more are being done today and more will be made in the future. We must be ready to identify the mistakes, analyse them and take corrective action.

I think P2F is one such mistake......

[JW411]

Truckflyer:

A quick question; do you really spin your PA28?

[Deep and fast]

Experienced pilots come with pre conceptions about how we should be treated and the terms and conditions we should work under. The 200 hr 20 year old up to his neck in dept is just happy to be earning something and fly the shiny metal.
We are moving back to Victorian times, except it's not the mill house owners wearing posh clothes and drinking port, it's the company CEO and shareholders skimming he cream at the expense of the staff.
Does Dave and shazza care about 5 euros on a ticket price to pay for good training, experienced and well rested crew? I'm pretty sure they wouldn't notice, In fact, if my 6 hour experience trucking back on a Lo Co mob from sharm yesterday is anything to go by, all the want is to buy cheap fags and get pissed and sunburnt!

Experienced pilots, even if not on the type have capacity in the air in that cannot be earnt anywhere else. It's just companies would rather pay less and take the insurance claim when it comes, and why should a ceo care? Well they have spent the bonuses, taken the share issues and have a fat pension fund contribution, so as long as they can distance themselves from corporate manslaughter charges (which is why there are many layers to the post holder corporate onion) then why should they care? Well you don't expect them to have a conscience do you?

[Gilles Hudicourt]

The 200 hr 20 year old up to his neck in dept is just happy to be earning something and fly the shiny metal.

The 20 year old 200 hour pilot should owe no more than his CPL Multi IFR (no TR debt) and get PAID to fly in a smaller aircraft.

[Deep and fast]

I hear you brother!

[Kirks gusset]

Despegue, regretfully I must completely disagree with your stance. We are not talking about erosion of basic flying skills and the need for occasional manual flying but normal day to day operations. Hand flying from LHR! Boeing FCTM section 1.34 777 deals with the advised use of automation whenever possible, I am unsure what books you are reading.. out of RVSM.. well, we often are below 290 for more than 25 minutes, not sure about hand flying a triple for this long... scary stuff.. keep it for the sim!

[Gilles Hudicourt]

Automatic systems give excellent results in the vast majority of situations. Deviations from expected performance are normally due to an incomplete understanding of their operations by the flight crew. When the automatic systems do not perform as expected, the pilot should reduce the level of automation until proper control of path and performance is achieved. For example, if the pilot failed to select the exit holding feature when cleared for the approach, the airplane will turn outbound in the holding pattern instead of initiating the approach. At this point, the pilot may select HDG SEL and continue the approach while using other automated features. A second example, if the airplane levels off unexpectedly during climb or descent with VNAV engaged, LVL CHG may be selected to continue the climb or descent until the FMC can be programmed.
Early intervention prevents unsatisfactory airplane performance or a degraded flight path. Reducing the level of automation as far as manual flight may be necessary to ensure proper control of the airplane is maintained. The pilot should attempt to restore higher levels of automation only after airplane control is assured. For example, if an immediate level-off in climb or descent is required, it may not be possible to comply quickly enough using the AFDS. The PF should disengage the autopilot and level off the airplane manually at the desired altitude. After level off, set the desired altitude in the MCP, select an appropriate pitch mode and re-engage the autopilot.

[Avenger]

Gilles, do you have any hard evidence, other than speculative, that the PTF incident rate is higher than non PTF guys with the same experience in the commercial airline environment. The last study by the Australian authority did not support your claims and as far as I can see, there is no evidence that PTF represents any greater danger, other than on the wallet..

Finally about the safety of low time pilots. If well trained low time candidates are just as safe as the others, why not put two low time guys together in the same flight deck? If that argument that they are safe was true, they would. But they don't. And never will.


I have been a commercial pilot for more than 21 years, well before PTF, this cockpit experience rule has always been there, I am not sure of the point, flight two crew decks have always had Captains and FOs??

Basic question.. why Name and Shame? what's the goal here?

[Kirks gusset]

Correct!! perfect.. Automatic systems give excellent results in the vast majority of situations. This is the whole point, the FCTM advises actions when the automation is not doing what you want it to..:)
Airbus:
X Recommendations for Optimum Use of Automation
IX.1 Using Automation - General
Correct use of automated systems reduces workload and significantly improves the flight crew time and resources for responding to:
An unanticipated change (e.g., ATC instruction, weather conditions, ...); or, An abnormal or emergency condition.
During line operations, AP and A/THR should be engaged throughout the flight, especially in marginal weather conditions or when operating into an unfamiliar airport.
When operating in fair environmental conditions and at low-density airports, flight crew can elect to fly the departure or arrival manually to maintain flying skills.
Using AP and A/THR also enables flight crew to pay more attention to ATC communications and to other aircraft, particularly in congested terminal areas and at high-density airports.
AP and A/THR should be used during a go-around and missed-approach to reduce workload.

[Gilles Hudicourt]

What I am stating is that a study should be done about all accidents in the last 20 years in which pilot error was a factor and look at what kind of experience those pilots had, and by "experience" I do not mean hours. Looking at recent random accidents and incidents (the last three LionAir, the AirAsia, the last RyanAir, AF447 and the Toronto AF crash, all involved pilot error (or so it seems so far for AirAsia) and all involved P2F or Cadets.

In light of this, I think a study should be done to look into the matter........

I just looked at your Australian study. This study compared lower time and higher time pilots in flight during the course of 287 flight sectors.

First officers were grouped into those with more, or less, than 1500 hours. For captains the divide between experienced and less experienced was set at 5000 hours. The study resembled a line-oriented safety audit (LOSA), where trained observers in the jump seat record the actions of the flight crew.

The study assessed pilots in technical skills, involving stabilized approach criteria, and non-technical skills, such as communication, situational awareness, task management and decision making.

This study does not touch at all at what why I am stating. What I am stating is that a pilot who spent 4000 hours flying several smaller/medium types including some as PIC, will generally turn into a better B737 or A320 pilot and will generally be able to make captain before another 4000 pilot who got hired at 200 hours straight into an A320 or the B737.

Why name and shame P2F airlines ? Because except for maybe a person or two whose motives we can only guess, I haven't found anyone that thinks this system is good and ought to be pursued. This practice is a threat to the pilot profession as I see it and needs to be stopped before it spreads to other airlines.

[Bealzebub]

Go back Twenty years, Thirty years, Forty years..... You will find accidents in their droves. In the Fifties, Sixties, Seventies etc. These accidents were happening to usually very experienced crews. That is because the flight decks of airliners of those eras only had very experienced crews for the most part. As an evolving transport science, a lot was learned through this era. Most of the common failures have been incorporated into modern methodology, even though (sadly) they are still often misunderstood and very often misquoted particularly here on these type of threads.

When I was growing up through this era is often seemed that not a Sunday (always seemed to be a Sunday for some reason?) went by without the TV news headlining the burnt out wreck of an airliner somewhere around the world. Even though air transport has grown Tenfold, the absolute rate of accidents has shrunk markedly. Improvements in our understanding of many things, not least our own behaviour, has been vital to that advancement. It continues and likely will for a long time, to be something we tweak, modify and overhaul as we progress.

In the first two decades of the Twenty First century there has been a much greater focus of looking at what is being trained into airline pilots at the basic level. The regulatory authorities, the training industry, professional pilots, and "the airlines," are looking at what is happening at the most basic level, and better adapting that training to what is relevant today rather than what seemed relevant 50 years ago.

What I see is a much better ab-initio pilot. When I first flew with new cadets some 15+ years ago, the very first thing I noticed (and I was very sceptical at the time) was the complete sea change in CRM (non-technical attributes) that these new trainees brought with them. These were pilots whose selection, training and attitude meant they listened, learned (quickly,) weren't afraid to challenge when necessary, and progressed far more rapidly than had generally been the case historically. Nothing that has happened in the last 15+ years has caused me to change that observation, other than it is now taken as normal.

The people who trot out "life experience" as some sort of alternative for selective and improved training are frankly deluding themselves. In fairness there aren't many, and they can usually be defined as the "late starters" who resent the situation they find themselves in. At my age I think I have "life experience" in abundance, although quite what that will bring to the table on tomorrow's Tenerife I have no idea.

"Pay 2 Fly" has also become one of those terms, perhaps not like "beauty," but certainly in the eye of the beholder. I used to assume it applied to some dodgy company in Miami that was flogging a few hours experience in a jet to the "vanity publishing" brigade. These days it seems to be applied to anything and everything connected with an individual putting their hand in their pocket. To that end it is almost meaningless.

My career path, rather like Gilles Hudicourt's, has never involved paying an employer for a type rating or indeed anything else, but times are changing. I have little doubt that a change of company now, would very likely involve facing those type of costs, simply because that is the way this business has evolved. If cadets (apprentice airline pilots) are not being paid a full senior F/O's salary, or indeed any salary is that P2F? I guess so, but there are very few apprenticeship programmes in any industry where this isn't the case.

It is human nature (and we all do it) to want a situation that favours ourselves. Often that is buried in a cloak of mutual altruism, but is a cloak that tears easily. Nevertheless, survival is usually about adapting to your environment rather than fighting an inevitable losing battle against it. The nature of the business has changed and evolved. The nature of the training has changed and evolved. The financial realities have changed and evolved. The survivors are likely to be those individuals who can also change and evolve. The successful are likely to be the ones who stay one jump ahead of those changes.

In the Sixties, Seventies, Eighties and perhaps the Nineties the job of airline pilot was often well paid, certainly well respected, had a certain cachet and romance in the mind of the general public, and very often had its own intrinsic perks and rewards. It was a difficult and busy career path and there was a lot of intense competition to climb the ladders that were available. Apart from a very, very, few "approved" courses, the entry requirements to climb onto these ladders were such that attrition was progressive. In the last two decades it has simply become " generation x-factor" where everybody thinks it is their right to join a big queue and become a star. The entry requirements have become cheap and easy. As a result, there are tens of thousands of hopefuls who believe that simply meeting the entry requirements should be enough for their big break. Worse still, they believe that if they get to the top of the ladder they will find a world of respect, kudos, adventure and high remuneration a la nineteen sixties.
Inevitably they won't!

Given the change in the requirements of airlines for the reasons given, and given the need for potential aspirants to generally find the best remuneration in the shortest possible time, it is very difficult to advance the idea to a serious wannabe that they should work there way up through a series of third and second tier jobs, as indeed many of us did in days long gone. Those jobs are simply not there in sufficient or even relative quantity, to provide a meaningful and workable career path for most people.

I think listing every airline with "P2F" is fine once you have defined what "P2F" means. However, I fear it will be an ever growing list that will even extend to Canada one day, if it hasn't already.

It seems some people here rely heavily on the Cadets to assure their retirement package deal!
Do they? I have read the thread again and haven't seen any evidence of that. I can tell you that cadets have done nothing to enhance my retirement package. In fact, rather the opposite, but that isn't their fault. Perhaps my "life experience" has been deprived of the "joy" of somebody like yourself sat at my right hand side for the last 27 years? I guess we will never know. :)

[Aluminium shuffler]

Giles, I don't know how wide and varied your experience is, but over the last decade I must have flown with a couple of hundred different FOs, albeit some of them just a few times. What I can tell you is that there is no discernible pattern of who is good and who is bad based on experience. I have seen some very poor high experience guys and some excellent cadets, as well as vice versa. The one reliable factor is attitude - there is a specific demographic that has an arrogance issue associated with low experience (with exceptions of course), and they are the ones that can cause the most problems through distractions and frustration of other crew members. It's not that they're cadets that creates the problem, but a problem with their earlier training and also their culture and motivation in become a pilot in the first place (prestige and show boating rather than a love of flying).

[JB007]

Do we include 50% salary during training as p2f?

Included in P2F or not, on revenue flights for experienced pilots, it's very low of a certain airline...

[Deep and fast]

Very experienced friend of mine joined easy as a second officer on a reduced salary, no duty pay and having paid over the odds for a 320 rating to then be told after 6 months that he would become a first officer after 12 months as per contract but now only on 75%

These sharp employment practises place an unacceptable strain on PEOPLE!
We all have debts to service, be it the mortgage, car loan, ex wife etc and the flight deck of an aircraft can be an unforgiving place when the brown smelly stuff hits the fan(or fan blades) when exposed to personal issues. It should not be unreasonable to expect a level playing field in a company, we are not talking about a foot ware company with zero hour contracts, this is a huge and profitable organisation.
We are professional people who work hard at safety and if there are guys in the industry that don't cut the mustard then there are enough processes and checks in any company to weed them out. The shear number of low housed guys entering the system is purely to keep wages low and oppress any general decent amongst the ranks.
Employ the best available candidates based on experience and suitability. The student cadet with a big wallet may be the best but I have to say I doubt it.

As for me, I don't fancy 4 sector days with 900 hours a year. I may not have a big pension Pot when I retire but I still think I will have some life left in me to enjoy it. I was told of one company with 4000 crew that 100 are off with cancer of various forms. Connected? I don't know but sobering none the less!

[PPRuNeUser0190]

Gilles,

Although I do agree that your time on other types before getting on the airline jets is a very good experience you must also consider the most logical option in some of the non-aviation minded countries.

If you, for example, look at my home country Belgium. There is no air taxi, there is no turboprop job, instructor jobs are very limited. Corporate is possible if you know someone in the company... When you get out of school and you are offered an Avro or A320 job (TR paid by the company), would you say no? Would you say: "Thanks for the offer but I'll go abroad for some years first to have some experience on other types of aircraft?" I think the most logical thing for a person to do is to take the job.

Should a Dutch cadet refuse a job offer from KLM (one of the best paid jobs in Europe)?


Pay2work is a disease not just limited to aviation and should be prohibited.

[Gilles Hudicourt]

No I do not think I would have turned down such an offer when I was a low type pilot if it fell on my lap. But I would have NEVER gone into debt with TR and Line flying in order to chase such a job.

I am not attacking any individuals pilots here, and I am ready to accept that cadets and certain P2F pilots are capable of doing a fine job.

Someone stated that the French pilot that was killed in Libya was a P2F. I Google him and found he was a 48 year old French Air Force pilot who had recently retired after more that 25 years in the Air Force. He had flown the Alpha Jet and the Mirage F1. If such pilots have to resort to paying their own type ratings and then going the P2F route to secure employment, something is very rotten in the system and it needs to be fixed.

[Bealzebub]

D&F

I have a lot of sympathy with what you say, but unfortunately the reality is that when you say:
It should not be unreasonable to expect a level playing field in a company, we are not talking about a foot ware company with zero hour contracts, this is a huge and profitable organisation.
It would appear that is no longer the case more and more.The worlds most iconic and profitable foot ware company (tick) aren't putting those expensive trainers together in Oregon, they are using factories in South East Asia that don't appear to be given great prominence on their corporate website. Similarly, those expensive (fruit logoed) communicators of universal desire, don't appear to be assembled in the colourful corporate palaces depicted in California.

Companies these days are driven by "cost" and that is what we are. Their idea of a level playing field is to level that playing field with the cheapest "cost" base to be found in their competitive neighbourhood. Neither can they rest there. In order to find an advantage, the necessity is to undercut the competition. Obviously the laws of supply and demand won't permit that if there is a labour shortage, but of course the reality is that there is no shortage at all in all but a few highly selective markets.

The cadet pilot doesn't remain a cadet pilot. End of year 1 (1000 hours).....year 2 (1800 hours).....year 3 (2700 hours)..... year 4 (3500 hours)..... and now they are in command territory! Either that, or 12 months previously they packed their bags for the sandpit.

As for pensions? There is a pot of coffee few people have woken up to smell. For todays young cadet in their early twenties maximising their pension savings and life time allowances, they are looking a potential top tier (for them and their partner) of little more than £3000 per Month in todays money. For those people that think "well that doesn't sound too bad" start now! Because those figure fall sharply if you put off saving early and probably well in excess of 10 % of your net earnings, and on the assumption that your employer contributes at least as much.

Of course this isn't simply commercial aviation, it is nearly all businesses. When I look at my kids on zero hour contracts, falling wages, or on wages that will never buy a house anywhere South of Lincolnshire, or unemployed. It is ugly, and I worry that is only going to get uglier!

[Deep and fast]

Beazebub, I do agree with you but my problem is that corporate management greed has become endemic. How much is Caroline mcwhatsherface earning, share and dividend payouts?

There is a new greed that has taken over and it's not about profitability in a difficult market place. It is a white collar/blouse greed based on :mad: over the staff.
As I said on a previous post, victorian practices have returned and a union of almighty proportions is needed to swing the pendulum. I am not a union fan and found my Balpa subs to be a total waste of cash.
Maybe the answer is a totally new pilot Union with 100% of UK pilots as members for lobbing purposes and group action. Bonding pilots or even making them pay at cost only would seem a minimum but huge sums for the profit of a certain training provider, not on I think. Again it's all about a feast at the trough and the piggies remain hungry. And the stupid, rich or just desperate are easy pickings. Any one remember Fred the Shread?

Interesting program on BBC The super rich and us, about how we don't tax the mega rich too much as they are perceived to create drip down of cash into the bigger society. Well it seems the cash drips more sideways than down. The rich are getting richer and the poor poorer. Middle class was the driver of society due to the large numbers of reasonably good earners paying a large amount of tax.

Low cos are making money, the profits are tangible and not wafer thin. This is accountancy. Find a cost and then find a way to cut it to the bone.

If you want a career in aviation, then the tide of fresh meat has to be stemmed. It's not about pay to fly it's about pay us and stop lying.

Jeez I've gone right off on one tonight!

[JaxofMarlow]

Whilst John-Smith is not wrong in that he describes it as it is, this does not take away from the fact the process is rotten to the core. Deep and fast identifies the issues well and it is difficult to argue, and we shouldn't. I referred to RBS in an earlier post in this thread and D and f does the same. This is a company that put profit as its sole agenda item and the way Fred did that was by buying his exec team with huge bonuses. He was protected from the realities of the world in the knowledge he had a layer or two of greedy bast**** to buffer him. That company paid no attention whatsoever to employment and consumer protection legislation and is now paying the price. It only exists because of you and me. They have moved all their IT work to India when the expertise is here. Why, because it is cheap. Result, regular service failure. Some/many airlines are following the same path. John-Smith is right when he says they are putting profit as their only driving force BUT is wrong when he says this is their only obligation. They have obligations to staff and customers that is enshrined in legislation and will one day pay the price if they take their contempt for it too far.

[Deep and fast]

Company executives have one duty only: to maximise profit for the company (and by extension the shareholders). They can do this through any legal means available to them. Morality doesn't come into it. If I were an airline CEO, you can be damn sure I'd be paying pilots a hell of a lot less than we are currently paid. There'd still be a herd of 18-25 year olds queuing round the block for a shot at a job, so there'd certainly be absolutely no problem filling the seats.

Quote:
These sharp employment practises place an unacceptable strain on PEOPLE!
Why should the company care? It's simply not their problem. It is called free market capitalism. Everyone has the option to work hard, go off and get an MBA, and try to get a job making megabucks as a CEO, and join the gravy train.

Nobody is forcing anyone to be a pilot. If someone feels that the employment practices will place an unacceptable strain on them, they are quite within their rights to find another career which doesn't present such a problem.


Well if the ceos want to b so militant in the treatment of their staff in an unionised industry then I guess we have to be militant in return.

Industrial action is the answer if john smith is correct Ian's the constant attack is to be stopped.

[Can737]

It always amaze me, many pilots have a university degree, some are engineers, lawyers, teachers, some have a business background and most can work in difficult conditions and adapt to the needs of industry.

But, when it come to all get along an find solutions to actual work conditions, we say it is capitalism, short term profits and we are the victims of the system. :{

Multiple internet groups have started lately, pilot organisations are growing in many countries, petitions/letters to the politicians, many resources are available to the pilots. Last time I checked we are still living in a democracy. (Excluding Asia).

Airlines that perform the best on long term, are those who accept that employees are part of business success.

[captjns]

-438 posts: P2F or cadet program's are not a problem if well managed with proper systems in place...:}


And there you have it folks... another individual who is part of the problem rather than part of the solution. -438 is OK with lowering the bar.:=

[Gilles Hudicourt]

Very experienced friend of mine joined easy as a second officer on a reduced salary, no duty pay and having paid over the odds for a 320 rating to then be told after 6 months that he would become a first officer after 12 months as per contract but now only on 75%

From Wikipedia

A second officer usually refers to the third in the line of command for a flight crew on a commercial or non-military aircraft. Usually the second officer is a flight engineer who is also a licensed pilot. A second officer on some airlines is part of a relief crew. Rarely, such relief pilots are called third officer. The title derives from the nautical title indicating a third in command officer.

In some airlines, the second officer is a junior officer, acting as first officer but still undergoing training and supervision from a training captain (Swiss, Lufthansa, among others use this denomination).

What exactly is an experienced second officer at EasyJet ?

[Deep and fast]

A second officer at Easyjet is a first officer who is paid less than a first officer.

As for an investigation into the safety record of P2F pilots, to do this you would need access to all participating companies ASR and flight QAR data and I'm sure as hell they would not give access to this.

[Gilles Hudicourt]

Despegue, regretfully I must completely disagree with your stance. We are not talking about erosion of basic flying skills and the need for occasional manual flying but normal day to day operations. Hand flying from LHR! Boeing FCTM section 1.34 777 deals with the advised use of automation whenever possible, I am unsure what books you are reading.. out of RVSM.. well, we often are below 290 for more than 25 minutes, not sure about hand flying a triple for this long... scary stuff.. keep it for the sim!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pN41LvuSz10

[bringbackthe80s]

Wake up guys, don' t you understand that this is plain and simple capitalism? Honestly, once you base a system with profit being king, what should stop a company to hire people on internships instead of payed contracts, and why should an airline not have pay to fly if that increases profits?
It' s a lost battle, a waste of time, all these discussions, all these groups. You have to look at the problem at the source, and that is the system we are living in. We are all part of it when we take up a mortgage, when we buy a useless new car, or an even more useless hi tech gadget.
I'm sorry to say that all of this is a logical consequence of a well estabilished system, and we are in no position to change it.

[Fair_Weather_Flyer]

Well it's a version of capitalism. Left on there own without interference, markets will come up with all sorts of perverse and self destructive schemes; look at the collapse of the banking system. Not exactly a great ad for unrestrained markets.

P2F is not as great an idea for the airlines as they think it is. Not all have a job that pilots want to buy. Worst of all (for the airlines), if the aim is to get pilot income levels down, P2F schemes would not be viable as there would be fewer pilots willing to pay through the nose if peak Captain earnings were £40k

[Deep and fast]

Bringbackthe80s

Maybe it's time to bring back the 70s. Strikes and militant buggers like red robbo and Bob Crowe

Physics, for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction.

[JaxofMarlow]

Bringbackthe80s. It is not capitalism pure and simple. Every company in every industry in the western world is working within a capitalist system but they do not all screw their workforce to maximise profit. It is airlines with their partners who have deliberately created an over supply of pilot fodder whilst making a profit doing it then using that over supply to screw the rest. That is market manipulation and is exactly what did for the finance industry in the end.

[Deep and fast]

30k for an embraer145 type rating, you would need to be smoking crack to think that's a good investment.

Ryanair is starting to look like a reasonable option now and I never thought I'd say that!

[bringbackthe80s]

Bringbackthe80s. It is not capitalism pure and simple. Every company in every industry in the western world is working within a capitalist system but they do not all screw their workforce to maximise profit. It is airlines with their partners who have deliberately created an over supply of pilot fodder whilst making a profit doing it then using that over supply to screw the rest. That is market manipulation and is exactly what did for the finance industry in the end.

Really? oh so I' m sure the jeans or the t-shirt you are wearing were made by happy workers on a really nice contract with good pensions waiting for them in a few decades. Not by overworked, rightless south asian possibly underaged poor people. But sure plenty of company in the western world wouldn't use such factories, they wouldn't shut production in the west to maximise it in 3rd world countries. And surely the system we created doesn't allow it does it.
And frankly, when you have a little glimpse at these realities, then pay to fly as bad as it is, comes at least well after other problems doesn't it...And like I said before all of these things are a consequence of the same source, they are all connected. You can't fight pay to fly under the very system that encourages it.

[PT6Driver]

Firstly low hour pilots.
BA for many years sponsored and then employed cadets without any problems at all. These cadets finished integrated courses with a fatpl and sub 300 ( now I belive sub 200) hours. They went on to be employed as fo on potentially any of the ba fleets, eventually gaining commands all without any problems.
Low hours by itself is not the problem, its the training environment and the company culture that counts.
Giles - single pilot commercial operations are inevitable a higher risk, possibly streaching it a bit, but like natural selection, the survivors have good skills and luck those who don't generally die out.

Sadly the opportunities for getting on such schemes is minimal, the traditional routes in Europe are now dead ends and so the only practical way into aviation is through the various schemes operated by the schools and certain airlines. That many of the schemes are ripoffs and exploitation, that the majority here disagree with, is immaterial. They are here to stay barring legislation forcing companies to change their hiring policies.

P2F - are we able after X many pages able to agree on what is p2f?
For all these paying means candidate buys product paying full fees themselves through cash or loan with no money returned after completion. Salary does not count as mon3y returned.
Paying for initial training to FATPL level?
Paying for type rating?
Paying for line training?
Paying for 500 hours?

Paying for type rating but refunded payment after a period of time eg 3 years?
Reduced salary during training?
Short term contracts for non type rated fo's? Eg 6months usually in combination with most of the above!

Thoughts ideas welcome.

[Tankengine]

The problem is not exactly PTF.

In the "good old days" only 1 in 7 (for my company) or 1 in 10, or whatever, of finalists in airline interviewing got a job!:ooh:
(Maybe 1 in 50-100 of initial applicants)

The others flew for "lesser" carriers or gave up and became lawyers, bankers etc.

These days anyone with the money and a pulse can get a job.:hmm:

Hopefully the rash of "just cannot fly" accidents around the world will gradually bring change.:ok:

[Deep and fast]

PT6
Firstly low hour pilots.
BA for many years sponsored and then employed cadets without any problems at all. These cadets finished integrated courses with a fatpl and sub 300 ( now I belive sub 200) hours. They went on to be employed as fo on potentially any of the ba fleets, eventually gaining commands all without any problems.
Low hours by itself is not the problem, its the training environment and the company culture that counts.
Giles - single pilot commercial operations are inevitable a higher risk, possibly streaching it a bit, but like natural selection, the survivors have good skills and luck those who don't generally die out.

Sadly the opportunities for getting on such schemes is minimal, the traditional routes in Europe are now dead ends and so the only practical way into aviation is through the various schemes operated by the schools and certain airlines. That many of the schemes are ripoffs and exploitation, that the majority here disagree with, is immaterial. They are here to stay barring legislation forcing companies to change their hiring policies.

P2F - are we able after X many pages able to agree on what is p2f?
For all these paying means candidate buys product paying full fees themselves through cash or loan with no money returned after completion. Salary does not count as mon3y returned.
Paying for initial training to FATPL level?
Paying for type rating?
Paying for line training?
Paying for 500 hours?

Paying for type rating but refunded payment after a period of time eg 3 years?
Reduced salary during training?
Short term contracts for non type rated fo's? Eg 6months usually in combination with most of the above!

Thoughts ideas welcome.

Agreed, BA have had cadets and all was well. But BA have an excellent training department and also the cadets were of small numbers mixed in with DEP from civil and military. The current trend is to solely recruit cadets.

As I said, any statement regarding them as safe can only be made when a full,audit of ASR and QAR safety data confirms this. How many issues/incidents are put into the ongoing training to final line check or flight ops errors that are headed off by the experienced captains.

Just because we don't here horror stories doesn't mean all is perfect. For balance I will say that experienced guys may well have issues as well. Only the data knows the full story.

[stn]

These days anyone with the money and a pulse can get a job.:hmm:

Apparently there are thousands of medical 1 owners without a pulse out there - maybe some compulsory EKG tests should be made when issuing medicals :rolleyes:

[Aleboni]

C195 in air baltic is 8 months contract not 6

[Bengerman]

Point of order Mr D & F,

Agreed, BA have had cadets and all was well. But BA have an excellent training department and also the cadets were of small numbers mixed in with DEP from civil and military. The current trend is to solely recruit cadets.


Whilst BA is, indeed, recruiting cadets they are not SOLELY recruiting cadets. New DEP's are currently undergoing conversion courses at BA onto B747-400.

[Deep and fast]

Bengerman, maybe English isn't your first language or you have drinking, but point of order, I never said BA exclusively took cadets. Only that they have taken cadets.

I know many who have gone there.

Got to love forums.....not

[PT6Driver]

D and F
You said
Agreed, BA have had cadets and all was well. But BA have an excellent training department and also the cadets were of small numbers mixed in with DEP from civil and military. The current trend is to solely recruit cadets.
Then you said
Bengerman, maybe English isn't your first language or you have drinking, but point of order, I never said BA exclusively took cadets. Only that they have taken cadets.*
I think you owe Bengerman an apology as your first statement reads that ba is only currently taking in cadets.:hmm:

If we agree that it is ok for cadets to be recruited by organisations with high standards then presumably we are in agreement that the likes of lion air do not meet the same standards? The Indonesian authorities dont think so either as they now ( I belive) insist on 1500 hours experience.
The Air Baltic scheme certainly ticks all the boxes for p2f in my book.

[Bealzebub]

Agreed, BA have had cadets and all was well. But BA have an excellent training department and also the cadets were of small numbers mixed in with DEP from civil and military. The current trend is to solely recruit cadets.

As I said, any statement regarding them as safe can only be made when a full,audit of ASR and QAR safety data confirms this. How many issues/incidents are put into the ongoing training to final line check or flight ops errors that are headed off by the experienced captains.

BA (BOAC/BEA) have been taking on ab-initio cadets since 1960 when they set up their in-house training school at Hamble (Southampton). Later they contracted out to a select few commercial flying schools, and indeed they still do today. Other airlines also source cadets from these same flying schools. Will your "full audit" take long? I only ask because this has been going on for 55 years now!

[Gilles Hudicourt]

http://www.faa.gov/about/office_org/headquarters_offices/avs/offices/afs/afs400/parc/parc_reco/media/2013/130908_PARC_FltDAWG_Final_Report_Recommendations.pdf

Other factors relating to design process considerations involve the changing pilot force. For example, operators and manufacturers believe that pilot experience and proficiency are declining globally. Worldwide, ab initio pilots are being introduced into transport category flight decks more frequently and operators report increased training loads and dropout rates. Operators report that the pilots entering the workforce have high levels of computer skills but some may not have the robust aviation background and aeronautical experience that current pilots have from actual flight experience. The manufacturers understand the changes in the pilot workforce but may not yet assess their flight deck designs to address these changes. In the interim, some of the proposed mitigations include proceduralization (by some operators or manufacturers) and increased automation of tasks and functions (by some manufacturers). Each of these mitigations has potential for unintended consequences.

Changes in new-hire pilot flight experience and training background from military and
civil aviation to collegiate level programs that overall has reduced the average flight time
but has increased the number of new entry pilots that have completed comprehensive,
highly structured programs that often includes experience in the advanced flight deck
technology.
 Global aviation expansion and growth have resulted in a high demand worldwide for
pilots, producing a perception that overall aeronautical flight experience12 levels for
entry-level pilots may be decreasing in some high growth regions.
 Modern aircraft system capability and reliability have contributed to a significant
reduction in commercial aircraft accidents. Commercial aviation is the safest it has ever
been

The demographics and experience of the aviation workforce will also change considerably.
Retirements and attrition in some regions and growth in others will strain the available talent
pool and challenge normal recruiting practices. In addition, concern was expressed that aviation as a career field is not as appealing as in years past. These factors are leading to a concern that a significant pilot shortage is imminent.
When entering their aviation career, the new generation of personnel is expected to bring high
levels of computer skills but some may not have the robust aviation background and aeronautical experience that current pilots have from actual flight experience. However, great improvements have been made in collegiate and academy training programs which include comprehensive, high quality, and structured training that help develop aeronautical experience. Future pilots will require improved computer aptitude suited for many advanced operations and automation tools, as well as a broad aviation experience and fundamental knowledge and skills, including manual flying, spatial awareness, decision making, and understanding of aircraft performance.

When these complex procedures are combined with policies that encourage use of automated systems over manual operations and monitoring of pilots to ensure that they comply with those policies, it may encourage pilots to over-rely on those systems. When there is insufficient training, experience, or judgment, this reliance on the automated systems can aggravate and adversely affect the situation.
One important potential consequence is that pilots may not be prepared to handle non-routine
situations, such as malfunctions or off-nominal conditions.

There are open questions about the appropriate level of proceduralization, including how prescriptive and detailed the procedures are, and how comprehensive they should be. Sometimes procedures are used as mitigation for insufficient pilot experience, knowledge and skills. As a result, vulnerabilities may occur because procedures cannot cover all possible operational situations and circumstances. If the operation is excessively reliant on procedures, the pilots may not be prepared for unexpected or non-routine situations. In addition, the LOSA data and interview feedback suggest that overly prescriptive SOPs may be less likely to be followed.

[Deep and fast]

No, I said that they have taken cadets. Where did I say they only took or have only taken cadets in the past? To make things simple for you, for instance, take the statement "I have drunk wine"
But this doesn't mean I've never had, don't currently and never will drink beer. God knows you two are enough to drive anyone to drink!

To put my original statement back in context as it was made, the discussion was about the risk of 200hrs pilots and I made that statement as a point of balance that its not just the low cost companies that take low hour pilots. And it can be done in a way to mitigate risk factors

Maybe he owes me an apologee. If your still unsure there is some bedtime reading below for you.


Definition of have
have - Wiktionary (http://en.m.wiktionary.org/wiki/have)

Bealzebub, I have never criticised BA cadet training. If anything it was a model to be followed. But not exclusively. Choose the best and give them a career in return. The curent low co model is see who can pay and offer them a sub standard contract and see who is left.

[Bengerman]

PT6 Driver, thanks for trying!

D & F. We'll take it one step at a time so that my English is not too difficult for you.

All from the same paragraph..

Agreed, BA have had cadets and all was well.

Correct, no problem with that.

But BA have an excellent training department and also the cadets were of small numbers mixed in with DEP from civil and military.

No real issue there although it could be argued that, particularly in the Prestwick years, the cadets were actually a large force.

However,

The current trend is to solely recruit cadets.


Wrong, and that was my initial point, you clearly stated that the current trend is to solely recruit cadets.

FYI English is my first language, unfortunately I had not been drinking and your manners are appalling.

[Three Lions]

BA Take a proportion of their intake as cadets. I understand the selection and screening procedures to be such that the attrition rate is very high. In a similar vein to the cadet schemes successfully run by Aer Lingus for decades both the BA and the Aer Lingus schemes have been the bedrock of these airlines recruitment for years. These are the cadet schemes that any right minded youngster should have on the top of their priority list

Lets not start to pretend that the loco en masse path of over paying and starting on reduced wages is the same. Its not.

Plus BA and Aer Lingus havent shoved droves of low hour guys into the mix on low pay. They tend to act with more responsibility with respect to the wider industry.

[Deep and fast]

Incorrect. My reply was to pt6 post regarding low hours pilots in the industry and the fact that BA took low you hours cadets.

For utter clarity I could have put "industry" in that sentence, but even then some one could have taken the super literal meaning that BA are in the industry, they are doing this as well.

Info find it highly amusing that the industry, terms and conditions and lifestyle of pilots are disappearing down the drain at Mach .95 and people want to have an argument about how a post is written.

Company CEOs if they read this will be laughing all the way to the bank.


Definition of Point of order

A point of order is a matter raised during consideration of a motion concerning the rules of parliamentary procedure.

In organizations other than legislative bodies, the ruling of the chair may be appealed to the assembly in most cases. Unless the chair's ruling is overturned by tie or majority vote in the negative, it stands. (The vote that is taken is a vote on whether or not to uphold the decision of the chair, so if the motion fails the decision is overturned.

[bringbackthe80s]

The cadet scheme run by many major airlines for decades has nothing to do with anything. These are people who pass many stages of rigorous selections, and are checked closely during all phases of training. They are not comparable at all to pay to fly, the same way as a 300 hrs pilot flying a Tornado isn't.

[PT6Driver]

D and F
Lets put this to bed
The context in which you put
The current trend is to solely recruit cadets.
Was immediately after the comments about ba, hence myself and others took this to mean ba was currently only recruiting cadets.

You have clarified that you meant the industry in general and barring a few good airlines I agree with you.

How a post is written has a big impact on what the reader understands you meant as opposed to what you meant, as we have all just re learned:hmm:

Safe to say pt6, b,d and f are in agreement about p2f being undesirable to say the least. Regarding attitude agreed I have come across a number of new fo who firmly believe the threat is the captain! This being on day 1 released to the line:ugh:

[Deep and fast]

Agreed.

My manner may have been taken as rude, but I am passionate about this industry and although I doubt PTF or airline aircraft type ratings will be a part of my remaining career, I don't want this industry to become a mediocre existence for my industry colleagues cabin or flight deck.

Low cost airline have saturated short haul and it is only a matter of time before they get longer range aspirations and companies such as BA have seen a reduction of profits on short haul which could and I believe will impact long.
Easy took the bmi Moscow slots, already do sharm and tel aviv. A321 would I guess give them access to the sort of range flights bmed did or even a330 without a huge training cost.

but I guess if you work for orange and have served your penance, then you may see this as a good thing.

[airlineexec]

Why not we reverse the table and see the picture on the other side.

Airline used to sponsor pilots for the entire training in return hoping that they will stay and finish their contract and finish paying their bond.

But guess what and especially the expats/foreigners, once they have the hours and experience, grab their passport and leave the country and go back to thier own country or other airline.

Airlines end up losing millions and end up becoming a free scholarship training school for those who think the world owes them a job and everything should be free of charge.

So reverse role, imagine you are the boss of an airline, are you setting up an airline to make money or love burning cash just to train pilots who run away?

That is why it is less risky to hire local pilots and not get them upset for having foreigners stealing their jobs.

So who is the culprit for pay to fly? It's the senior pilot who are most of the time critical of p2f and could not care less those new CPL 200 hour pilots whether they get a job or not.

Who is there to protect the airline? Has to be a win win situation. Airline don't risk training fee training runaway pilots, while foreigners get hours and experience plus grabbing slots from locals.

But of course, there are huge success for those who got the hours/experience and are currently flying for major airlines in the world.

[Deep and fast]

Herb Kelleher did ok, lots of the pilots made a million also.

Treat em well and employ those who will be based where they want to be on good terms and conditions and I think you would see very few leave.

The bond system was fair and let's face it, Most airliner type ratings are not that expensive. A gulfstream G650 is $100000 apparently.

Corporate greed and mis management has caused most of these problems


I am sitting in a hotel surrounded by 12 MPL students from Lufthansa, all had their training paid for and even though there are no positions for them at the moment, they are being seconded to a partner airline while they wait. All nice guys and girls with solid educational backgrounds. Mostly engineering/science.
So it can be done properly if you take greed out of the equation.

[RAT 5]

Are there any other comparible industries where basic company introduction training costs are similar and where the trainee shoulders the costs: as bond or pay up front?

[Starfox64]

Can't think of many off hand, however many parallels can be drawn against competitive motor racing - namely F1.

The similarities are huge. Genuine well respected drivers in the top teams making the big bucks, however, down the grid many drivers actually paying to drive! P2D! Huge private investment required to make it to the top level, many never make it. Sometimes (but not always) better drivers being pipped to the job by those with the ability to pay/bring sponsorship money to the team.

Sound familiar?

[PT6Driver]

P2F has nothing to do with replacing bonds.
Airlineexec companies that found expats leaving had quite often other reasons why pilots would leave "utopia".
European companies found that some pilots would renege on bonds. They therefore introduced upfront payments, which were REPAID over say 2 of 3 years. All the time the pilots would be on full time employment and paid a full salary. This is completely different to P2F schemes such as:
Getting v low hour pilots (including locals) to pay up front for a selection procedure, if successful to pay for the type rating and line training, with reduced salary for 6 months. At the end of which the pilot has 500 or less hours on type no job and is virtually unemployable! Oh and still has € 200, 000 debt after paying for initial training plus all the above.

Reducing the risk for airlines has changed into a revenue stream!

[PT6Driver]

David Coulthard's dad paid for, if not the full cost a proportion of it, almost every race prior to F1.
So yes it does sound familiar!

[Deep and fast]

F1 doesn't really equate to flying, it's a sport with huge returns for the drivers if they make it and last time I watched, they weren't carrying fare paying passengers.

Also, many find rich sponsors who cough up for the prestigious paddock passes and thrill of being part of the team, although in reality they are just cash cows.:}

Also, as I understand, Easyjet don't pay dividends to the shareholders as the profits that are left after management have taken their huge bonuses and share options are put back into expansion. Stelios wanted div payments as I remember. So the management team seem to be the only ones sucking the profits if you disregard the share price, but as they say... Shares are a gamble and the price can go down as well as up. If for instance there was a big hull loss in any company and lawyers could pin it on recruitment, training or fatigue then you can imagine what would happen to the share price! And those responsible would have taken the cash, shares and pension contributions and move on. Again think Fred the Shread.

I guess we will have to see how it pans out.

[Deep and fast]

I sorry if my info was out of date as I didn't check the date on the article but they started in 2010, I don't have or trade shares. I do forex.

Still any comments on the rest of the post? I guess we can now see how your bread is buttered from this and previous posts.

As for ignorance, well by definition as a lack of knowledge, we can all suffer that sometimes but if memory serves, your posts are about dumbing down the career and terms and profitability, then one catastrophic hull and passenger loss will teach you a lot about economics of airline shares if you do indeed hold them.
TBH I'm sitting in one of the major capitals in the world waiting for my table for dinner so I will have to catch up with your posts tomorrow to be utterly informed of the content.

Life's a beach )

[PT6Driver]

Starfox
I think we are getting to the heart of the debate:
What constitutes P2F?

For example you say that paying for a type rating doesn't count. However I have a totally different view that unless you are repaid the cost of the type rating then it is P2F, or at least pay to gain employment.

I posted a list of aspects that could be considered examples of P2F, as yet no one else has commented on this.

Perhaps others would like to reiterate what they consider P2F?

[RAT 5]

Do train drivers pay for their type rating? Do HGV/coach drivers pay for their type ratings? Do oil tanker drivers pay for their type ratings? Did the Overspeed drivers pay for theirs? No idea, just asking. How did/do these industries deal with this aspect of employee training?If easyjet ask you to pay for an Airbus rating what happened to the B737 guys who had to change type within the company? Did they have to make a contribution? What do you think would happen if RYR bought B777, as rumoured? Would they ask for volunteers to move across and then charge them for the privilege?

[Deep and fast]

Also the costs charged to people for the ratings are hardly what you could call competitive :ooh:

[bamboo30]

CPL ATPL = PTF one can pay till he/ she passes
Type rating = PTF
LT = PTF

Too many people wants to be a pilot.

[Avenger]

At the risk of being stoned to death! what's wrong with paying for your training? The scenario now is: You want to be a pilot, OK we screen your aptitude i.e reduce the risk of the no-hopers, here's the deal, you pay for the training, if you pass you get to fly one go our 65 Million pound jets, on the other hand, you can pay your training and buy your own jet!
Of course, I am not supporting the issue of getting no salary while flying, that is completely wrong, but during the " training phase" it is reasonable to have a reduced salary.
Training is continued assessment and guys can expect to be chopped at any stage if they don't make the grade. It is impossible for an airline to justify keeping marginal people flying at the risk to the public. Of course, some guys are slow learners but this is reflected in the accrued debt and the mind set " i've come this far I may as well continue". All this spouting that " proper companies" pay for everything " in my days".. let's move on and accept how it is. Take a long hard look at the " proper companies" and evaluate firstly how difficult it is to enter and how much the real cost of getting to their standard is. 10 Years ago Oxford students were paying almost 3 times as much as modular for the same CPL ticket, but then they could " fast track" to the majors..this was the real start of PTF at grass roots level. The likes of Eaglejet spurned a whole new avenue of progression for the marginal students and the rejects and this culture has prevailed ever since

[bamboo30]

Unfortunately on the regulators have the power to stop P2F. Seems like most PTFers are Europeans so maybe EASA can do something first

[PT6Driver]

Avenger,
Come on Brian lets go to the stoning! Avenger you have been found guilty of blasphemy, no women here are there? :)

Paying for initial training up to FATPL has been here for many, many years and this will not change, I personally don't count this as P2F.
Once a pilot moves into an operation which is plainly commercial the customer should not have a pilot who is paying for the privilege of being there.
Therefore I would count reduced salary during training as a form of P2F. If the selection procedures have been rigorous enough then there is a big reduction of risk for the company and no need for this!.
Likewise paying for the type rating with no repayments (to reduce the risk of absconders) is a form of P2F.

Bamboo.
Interesting point about Europeans. America seems to have taken steps to prevent this. What is the situation for Chinese trainees, asia in general etc?
Chances of EASA doing anything that is not in the intrests of the airlines? :ugh:

[bamboo30]

P26
Chinese if you are referring to China and asia are still mostly fully sponsored by the airline as of now. I was fully sponsored and being paid salary during CPL. However i do see that unfortunately P2F might be taking over in the near future as many are going P2F route having not being able to get entry to fully sponsored scheme because they think they can be n airline pilot having being rejected in the first place.

[Bealzebub]

The regulator only has the power to regulate what is already enshrined in statute. Avenger has already touched on the reality. The evolution of the training industry, and the transition of those trainees into limited high tier employment, has been visible and obvious for some considerable time now.

Over a period of twenty years, the changes that have facilitated that evolution have been glaringly obvious. Some of us have pointed out those reasons time and time again. Nevertheless, there are a lot of people that simply ignore or choose not to believe the blatant realities of the evolution of that marketplace, and what it is today. I am not sure why that should be a surprise.

The burden of "training costs" was one that Twenty years ago most airlines were happy to shoulder on the basis that it was an investment they themselves were going to benefit from. The problem came (and I worked through this era) when individuals decided to avail themselves of that investment and then jump ship for their own benefit. The response to this, was to contract those employees, "bond" them for that training. That didn't solve the problem as the airlines still had the expensive (and sometimes hopeless) task of enforcing those contracts when the employee defaulted by choice. The answer to that was to shift the upfront burden from the employer to the employee. In other words you pay for the costs that put you in a position to do this job. If the employee then chose to default, it was only a minor inconvenience to the employer. This proved sufficiently successful to see it spread back down through both the employment ladders and the training ladders.

Airlines, that had traditionally recruited from military career changers, self improvers, and to a very limited degree cadets, also found themselves evolving into an era of new realities. Economic cycles rotated as they always had, but deregulation in the latter two decades of the Twentieth century, took hold as new, determined, and very serious operators attacked the underbelly of a very entrenched and established cartel. This happened as statute also swept aside a large portion of the working age and working time regulations. Senior pilots (usually captains) found themselves able to work anything up to a decade longer than had previously been the case. Growth notwithstanding, this allowed a large margin of breathing space to bring about a revolution at the other end of the pilot career market.

That growth came in the form of a massive expansion of ab-initio cadet programmes. Both the established players in this previously limited market, and new entrants provided a cost effective, monitored, and tailored product for the right hand seat. The "experience gap" that might ordinarily have put a natural brake on this expansion, was negated by the fact that those who would once have retired at 55 could now go on to 60 and later 65, thereby providing a decade of growth at the other end of the career chain. That was all the industry needed to revolutionise this aspect of the marketplace.

The cadets themselves proved to be very able and very cost effective for the industry. The attrition rate was tiny compared to the attrition rate for self improvers. For an industry now driven by cost, the writing was not only on the wall, but it was there in very large and very bold letters!

The squeeze was always going to be in the middle of the market. The ex-military and the ex-civil career changers/improvers, found themselves in a marketplace being increasingly dominated by ab-initio cadets at one end, and by experienced pilots no longer forced into early retirement at the other.

As the supply realities changed, so indeed did the reward (remuneration) realities. Another regulatory change that broadly coincided with these industry evolutions was the change to licensing requirements in some countries (notably the UK). A massive reduction in the requirements for a basic CPL (to recognise its aerial work role rather than airline requirement) saw floodgates being opened to a world of people that believed (and still do) that a CPL was their golden ticket to the right seat of an airliner, no matter how they acquired it. It never had been, it wasn't, it isn't, and it is highly unlikely it ever will be! However that is a reality that is lost to many people who simply close their eyes, stick their fingers in their ears, and simply refuse to believe it!

That is the potted history. The future is always by definition speculative. However, the current flow of the evolution (which has a huge mass of momentum,) shows no signs of changing course or slowing down. Airlines (employers) are increasingly driven by cost reductions. The transposition of training costs increasingly moves from the employer to the employee, particularly where those costs put the (potential) employee in a position to actually do the job. Employment opportunities (even at the upper tiers) are becoming significantly less well remunerated and increasingly seasonal in scope. The top tier airlines are finding themselves increasingly "at risk" and threatened by cost advantages available to their competitors. The supply of quality candidates from the airlines perceived quality sources of supply continues to grow year on year.

For a potential pilot coming into this extremely difficult industry today, the reality is finding an acceptable risk profile route that is likely to mitigate the huge costs involved with training. That is the reality for most, and the choices are fairly limited, extremely expensive, and not without significant risk.

However you elect to define "pay to fly," the reality is that you are almost certainly going to pay for your training one way or another. You are almost certainly going to find costs involved in your intermediate and advanced training. You are almost certainly (even if successful) going to find reduced rates of remuneration, reduced terms and conditions, and increased productivity requirements.

For the unsuccessful there is always likely to exist a "vanity publishing" market of "type rating" and "line training" programmes for sale, in order to satisfy that segment of the market. Pay to fly? certainly! But one created by a customer need as indeed most successful businesses are.

If you are lucky, and you have the resources and determination, there are still reasonably good career paths available. They are however few and far between, and usually expensive and not without significant levels of intrinsic risk.

If you are not lucky, made the wrong choices, or simply failed to research properly, you can always sign somebodies petition?

[JW411]

Bealzebub:

What an excellent post; that is exactly the way I remember it. In particular, I have bad memories of those who accepted the free training and then did a runner at the first available opportunity. A very good friend of mine was FOD in a large UK-airline. He would not hire anyone who had a dozen types on their licence for that usually meant that they could not even begin to spell the word loyalty. He would much rather hire someone of good character and spend money on training them. The type-hunters in the past have a lot to answer for.

[wiggy]

Beazlebub,

If Carlsberg did Pprune posts.....:ok:

[ESQU]

In reality, industry wide, I suspect that those walking away and not repaying bonds was in fact very small when compared to those happily staying in jobs but nonetheless used as an excellent excuse to end the practise of bonding.

[JW411]

In my last company, we lost just over 100 pilots in a 14 year period. I think that adds up to a hell of a lot of training costs that went down the drain.

I wonder how many of them would still have walked if they had had to pay for their rating?

[Deep and fast]

Actually, if you have paid for your training then you are more mobile as you have nothing further to pay.

We must remember that companies do earn a crust from us coming to work, we are not just a perpetual drain on financial reserves for no reason.

How about the poor excel folk who took a loan paid monthly by the company for ratings and then went bust leaving them with no job and a loan. It cuts both ways.
Pilots have to put up with a lot of hit also. Basing, redundancy, shift work patterns blah blah. Sucking thin air from the engine bleed for 900 hours a year isn't ideal either. Glad I don't even do half that a year!

Oh and ask a few ex bmi and monarch guys about pensions......

All in all, you'd have to be mad to stump up 130k or whatever it is now.

[Private jet]

I've enjoyed reading through this thread, reminiscent of the quality of discussion that used to prevail on prune 15 years ago.

There's little I can add to all that has been posted already, suffice to say that the singular root cause of all this is that there are simply too many fresh new professional license holders every year. Its like musical chairs, except they are adding bodies instead of removing seats! Until numbers are artificially restricted to match the positions available then nothing will ever change in terms of T&C's. But no organisation can do that, the regulators are only interested in operational safety and quite rightly so and all the others involved (airlines, FTO's etc) have a vested interest in maintaining the status quo. Pandora's box was well and truly opened in the UK/Europe with the start of JAR (although I was no fan of the then antiquated mindset of the CAA) and the situation is now like toothpaste; its damn near impossible to get it back in the tube. It will be interesting to see what happens when MPL becomes the norm.

[JW411]

Deep and fast:

"Actually, if you have paid for your training then you are more mobile as you have nothing further to pay".

That is precisely my point. If you pay for your own rating and then get a job on the basis of that, then you owe the company absolutely nothing. It's your rating and you can go anywhere you like, when you like.

But that is not really what we are discussing here. We have a bunch of would be pilots who would like to have a career in aviation but they either cannot afford to pay for a type rating (P2F) but would like to have the opportunity to join an airline that would pay all the bills for them.

Now that was the system in the old days. The company hired them unrated and spent a lot of money training them for free. So how did that go?

100 of them in my company walked out of the door in 14 years with a type rating and with no obligation to repay a penny. That is a pretty good illustration of how some pilots see loyalty versus their own desire to do what they want regardless of the consequences.

So, we lost 100 pilots at (in those days) an average of £15,000 each in direct costs which (even a thick pilot will realise) was a waste of £1,500,000. How can you blame an accountant for hiring someone who already has the type rating?

From a personal point of view it was not really my problem. As a dedicated training captain throughout most of my flying career. I always wished them well and hoped that they would have a good future (most of them did). In fact, for 7 years I was the union guy but even then, I could not believe how selfish a lot of them were.

My favourite was a young man who was a DC-10 F/O. The company that we were flying for did not spend money training pilots to do new things. You either had the rating or you didn't get hired. We persuaded the management that this guy was worth the effort and were eventually given clearance to spend money and put him through a DC-10 command course. I put a lot of effort into him and did his final line check in the presence of the FAA. Two weeks later he did a runner and joined another airline and left a lot of us with severe egg on our faces. Are you going to tell me that he didn't know he was going to go elsewhere in 2 weeks time?

So, that is where Deep and Fast makes such a valid point. The pilot pays for his rating (just like an HGV driver) and he can bugger off whenever he likes. That way, he is happy and the accountants are happy. Is that not P2F?

It's a bit unfortunate if you can't afford the rating but if your predecessors hadn't screwed the system, you would have got the rating for nothing.

By the way, I don't know if you have ever heard of the collective noun for a bunch of pilots sitting in a crewroom? I was once told that the correct term is a "whinge of pilots".

[RAT 5]

We must remember that companies do earn a crust from us coming to work, we are not just a perpetual drain on financial reserves for no reason.

Every other industry I can think of sets their prices according to their costs and expected reasonable profit. It's called a business model. Training costs are part of that model and are taken into account when setting prices. It is well understood, in the airlines I've been involved with, that a 10% per annum attrition rate is the norm. This is based on retirement, medical and 'moving on'. It is budgeted for in the training/recruitment model. What has happened is that the rapid vast expansion has been based on low prices. It could be discussed that it has been a price driven expansion not a demand driven one. It has become so cheap it is too good to miss. Rather than drive to the local beach let's go to a foreign one; or foreign mountains. To maintain this profit driven, rather than service driven industry, costs have had to be driven to the lowest. Think Tescos/Liddle/Aldi of the airline world. The start point is training costs. The next point is keep everything as basic as legally necessary and make it as safe as possible. (I still say this model would not have been possible in B727/737 days. SOP trained monkeys wouldn't have cut it.) Now the public are so used to cheap everything, they'd even load their own bags if they had to. I remember a time in 80's where charter pax picked up a lunch bag as they boarded the a/c instead of catered food. It was too expensive to serve hot on board. The genie/toothpaste can not be put back in the bottle. I still fly national carriers, often at cheaper prices than the local LoCo. The market has caused a response and the nationals have responded. They still make profits; might be cross-subsidised, I don't care. I get national carrier service (sandwich only) at LoCo prices. Salaries have not been slashed across the more realistic flexibly minded nationals. They are expanding and profiting. LoCo is not the only way to go. And I don't think the nationals have gone down the P2F route, yet. So there is another way. Let's not just assume there is only one working model. Tesco is no longer the only market leader.

[JW411]

I had it in my mind that a BA cadet had to put £94,000 up front?

[Deep and fast]

JW, my comment about mobility was in response to the comment about 100 pilots leaving. If company don't want em to leave then tie em in. Chinese airlines have lifetime bonds :}

Got to laugh really.:p

[GlenQuagmire]

I am being put in a postion where I am being forced to bond for a renewal which is $40,000. Or no job. Never been bonded in my life before. What am I supposed to do now!!

[Deep and fast]

Companies only rid themselves of profitable practices if the PR is likely to make the practice unprofitable.

It's not what they do, it's what they are seen to be doing that counts.

[masalama]

Here in India , paying for your type rating or the company asking candidates to pay bank guarantees after selection towards training ("type rating costs") has become the norm.Paying for Line training hasnt caught on yet but there's a startup FLYEASY advertising the same for their Embraers.

With the huge glut of unemployed CPL holders( around 5000+) with no viable GA or other options for employment , they have become the cash cow airlines within India and outside are looking at greedily. Lion Air did have an Indian rep to recruit P2F candidates specifically from India .Many of these pilots have now returned with 1000 hrs P2 experience on the B737 to be hired by airlines like ours (Jet Airways) as P2's.

I flew with one of these P2's recently , a cheerful guy and we were paired on a few layover flights together.The stories he had to say about the Lion Air experience was shocking to say the least. Abuse of employees by the middleman contractor from India ( Lion Air paid the contractor x and they got 50% x ) , training and safety standards were basic to say the least and they had to fight their way out of the middleman's clutches to return from the "contract".It's like slavery .

Although I'm totally against P2F , I can see how candidates get attracted to these outfits, this P2 would otherwise be twiddling his thumbs at home had he not taken this drastic route , of course he had the support of his parents as do most Indians :bored:

The way forward is for airline pilot's bodies like ALPA worldwide in co-ordination with airline unions take a united stand against P2F .They can make media campaigns on the same to educate the public too on the hazards of P2F for their safety and believe me , today passengers do care with the rash of incidents that have happened, not that every one of those can be attributed to this menace.

let's say no to P2F :=

[Gilles Hudicourt]

Here is Canada, the practice of paying for your own type rating has not been imported yet, just certain companies have new pilots sign bonds.
There were cases where the pilots were made to take personal loans which were co-signed and re-paid by the airline, as long as the candidate remained employed.......

The practice of getting paid less does not exist. After the type rating, new pilots have to do 25 of line indoctrination if they have flown similar aircraft and 100 hours if the pilot is for example new on large jets. Sometimes he/she is paid less during that period because he/she has to fly with a check pilot who is paid extra do do that job, but once the pilots is released after his 25 or 100 hours, he/she goes on regular pay for he now flies with regular line captains on regular revenue flights. What justification would there be for him to be paid less ?

The concept of second officer on aircraft which have no first officer, or of junior first officer does not exist in this country.

[Zephyr1977]

Giles-hudicourt,

I Support any word you just said... I wish people like you are on management positions such as head of training or head of operations..chief pilots..

Usually these functions are given to top management marionettes, people who are on those positions for ther own gain.. Unfortunately not collective gain.

Luckily, they dont last that long, but anyway make a lot of damage in interpersonal relations within their sector that manage.

[Zephyr1977]

I have talked to some pilots from Lufthansa. Please LH people correct me i i have misinterpreted what they have said to me.. Anyway, this is pretty much moddel in Lufthansa a.g.

They have opening for cca 200-300 hundred fos every few years.

Requrements is to pass all the test (dlr, general tech knowledge, medical...)

After that, if you succeed, they send you to LH interkokpit for integral flight training to gain ATPL (f) CPL ME IR, than you get MCC and JOC on CJ2 (sym and aircraft).

After you have finished all of it (cca 2 years or less) you wait for your type rating on A320 (before was either 320'or 737, but 737 is in phase out).

After you finish your type rating you start flying and getting your fo salary.. Withing 2/3 years you are on 330/340, later on 380, 747..

After maybe 8-12 years, you switch to left seat from 320 and climb all that leaders again from the left side.. By the late 30ies or early 40ies you are cpt in widebody in a magnificent company.

And now price tag of that? 180.000 euro.

After you are accepted, before atpl (f) cpl me ir mcc joc training, you have to pay 1/3 which is 60.000 euros. Lufthansa covers 60.000 euros. Rest of 60.000 is coverd by pilots after he or she gets release and starts geting his/her salary (through 5 years).

Any type change is of course coverd by the companie (there is bond of course).

Similar is in Swiss.

I beleive thats good story.

[lederhosen]

The other point with LH is that a very large number of young pilots were hired into the group over the last ten years. If you combine that with hundreds on the waiting list and current management's strategy of moving flying to cheaper parts of the organisation or even outsourcing then career prospects look a little less optimistic.

[Deep and fast]

But a career in Lufthansa offers various types of flying from short haul to long and aircraft types from 320 up to 380 etc. this gives options and the ability to create a change of working scenery. All a bit different to constant four sector days in a 320 or 737 to the same destinations till you either die of boredom or just die from fatigue aerotoxic syndrome brain tumour or any other one of the things that seem to kill off pilots!

The current low cost business model of companies is based on greed and funnelling the money to the top management and to a lesser degree shareholders. The legacy companies are having to cut costs to try and keep up. We shouldn't let these airline bloodsuckers champagne it up on our expense.

Watch the BBC program "The super rich and us" episode 2 just about sums it up!

[lederhosen]

For anyone with a foot on the LH ladder it is certainly good. But the signs are that for everyone else it will be at best a longish wait at Eurowings as it is called this week and that certainly involves 320 multileg days for the foreseable future.

[Firestorm]

Here is a link to Baltic Aviation Academy's website, and this how they justify P2F. In my opinion it is absolute unadulterated rubbish, and how and why people believe it is beyond me.

Line Training: to pay or not to pay? (http://www.balticaa.com/line-training-to-pay-or-not-to-pay/?utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_term=2015-02-27&utm_campaign=Your+Latest+Aviation+Training+News+-+BAA+News)

[kalimdetanger]

Hi, I'm a Moroccan student pilot and I'm very upset with this situatio because I can't work in my own country. Royal Air Maroc imposes very hard requirements to Moroccans candidates and many pilots are sitted waiting to have an opportunity in Air Arabia. However, RAM have a lot of foreign F/O in their 737 and ATR who paid for a Line Training !!

I can't understand this situation. I'm afraid to leave my country forever.

[papazulu]

I can't understand this situation. I'm afraid to leave my country forever.

First thing first: welcome in the club. Now move on and join the cue.

Royal Air Maroc imposes very hard requirements to Moroccans candidates and many pilots are sitted waiting to have an opportunity in Air Arabia. However, RAM have a lot of foreign F/O in their 737 and ATR who paid for a Line Training !!

Who do you thing should carry the can for having induced the situation you are in?

[Greenlights]

Kalim, it is the same situation in others countries.(except North America)
In Asia for exemple (Vietnam, China...), you would pay money to fly or even to upgrade from F/O to Captain.
Just yesterday, I received a resume and letter (actually it's not the first time that I read such propositions ),
a guy wrote that he does not have money to pay the LT however he is ready to fly without income in exchange for a few months or so according to the amount of the LT.
He is not even interesting for us since we still have others pilots willing to pay.
I do not really approve the P2F but as I notice from there now, pilots are their own ennemies after all...so... when you read cover letters, your first face would be then and when you get used to it :

[linmar]

Eaglejet are currently offering pilots to pay for 1000 hours + on the CRJ900. It's an EASA airline.

Does anyone have an insight on which airline that is?

[NephewBob]

Gilles,

You wrote:

In the 17th and 18th century, many armies were led by officers that had not gained their military commissions through merit and experience, but paid for them. There was a price to become a Lieutenant, a Captain, a Major, a Colonel, not only to join the military, but also to get promotions once you were in. The richer people were always in command of the poor. This practice of selling military commissions has ceased in most modern countries now. Anyone care to take a wild guess on why this practice has ceased ?,

Wild guess? Well has it ceased? In 'modern' countries? For my money, any one that pays for a battle commission is welcome to the fate of their decision, though George Washington did get to keep the farm at Mt. Vernon.

During the period you mention, there were no standing armies. Company officers recruited private (for pay) soldiers in times that required "defense". Voluntary milita was largely without stipend. Today, however, every 'nation' seems to have one ...i.e. standing military force (Costa Rica is now one notable peaceful exception)

Today we (the poor taxpayers) pay an exorbitant amount for initial (even more for advanced) training for military pilots, and yet you seem to suggest that any young inexperienced guy or girl who wants to pay the market rate to change his or her profession voluntarily should be excluded from the industry by forceful regulation? That did not even work in 'modern' times. Former USSR springs to mind.

Governments will always distort markets, and as you know airlines love military pilots, who of course are extremely well trained. From an airlines point of view government training is simply a most welcome "P2F" taxpayer subsidy.

On the military note, now that almost every country has a permanent big swinging d..k..one, ..oddly enough......we seem to have a lot more wars.

[KRKA]

has Anyone knows last Eaglejet program for B737cl?
which is the company? Europe base state!

[JQKA]

IS GRan Cru Airlines, in Vilnius Lithuania, just 3 A/C, 1 -300 and 2-400,
If I was you, I will stay very far away from this crap!

[LlamaFarmer]

How exactly are the airlines responsible for this, they are not forcing anybody to do anything.

The people responsible for this are the people who are stupid enough to pay for working, if everybody stopped paying this would simply come to an end.

I would never pay to work, I get paid well for my time on the job.

Unfortunately there are too many people in the world willing to pay for it.

And as long as there are, they ruin Ts&Cs for the rest of the industry.

The airlines are businesses and businesses tend to lack ethics, they're very short sighted when it comes to "the right thing to do" and instead get distracted by money.

[zzt0117]

vietjet, their agent n staff asked 110k usd for sucessfully enter the cadet pilot programme.

[Direct Bondi]

Pay2fly schemes have been recognized as having an adverse affect on aviation safety in an EU Commission funded, 310-page report on Atypical Employment in Aviation (large file) – Link:

https://www.eurocockpit.be/sites/default/files/report_atypical_employment_in_aviation_15_0212_f.pdf

Currently no British airline offers P2F contractsIncorrect. Unless you hold the applicable type rating you will not fly for Norwegian unless you hand over 30-40K. No pay, no fly, i.e. a pay2fly scheme - and who benefits from the interest on the 1.2 million Euros being held from such payments to fly for Norwegian?

The airlines are businesses and businesses tend to lack ethics, they're very short sighted when it comes to "the right thing to do" and instead get distracted by money
Correct. This is why the Air Transport Agreement (Open Skies) was negotiated to include a ‘social clause’ - Article 17, which states labor rights and labor principles shall not be undermined by the participants. A petition on these grounds is has been filed in the Washington DC Court of Appeals against the DOT and its egregious decision to award Norwegian a Foreign Air Carrier permit.

[RAT 5]

Does paying for your own type-rating with no guarantee of a job count? You could scrape past the LST at your own cost only to fail the base training within the allocated time and end up with no type rating or job. If you do pass these hurdles does working on a reduced salary during line training, and having to pay all your own expenses, count as paying to fly.
If so I think you'll find the net is wider than you surmise, but stealthily.

[Avenger]

Bondi, NAS is NOT PAY TO FLY and never has been.. PTF mean you pay them to fly the a/c and they give you nothing in return.. unless I'm mistaken NAS crews have always received remuneration.. whichever source it comes from. Paying a bond or type rating is not regarded as ptf

[Officer Kite]

Unless you hold the applicable type rating you will not fly for Norwegian unless you hand over 30-40K. No pay, no fly, i.e. a pay2fly scheme

Using this argument it can be said that nearly every pilot in history is pay2fly then. Why? well most paid for a ppl, paid for the hour building, paid for the IR etc.

We all know that is not what pay2fly is.

It is specifically paying for your line training or paying to fly a set number of hours with passengers onboard. Let's not muddy a very clear boundary.

[Direct Bondi]

Pilots pay for necessary qualifications via an ATO or similar. No commitment to the training organization is required.

Possibly not pay2fly as known. The Norwegian scheme is effectively a 30-40K indentured servitude from the non-rated. Do the indentured receive interest over the 3-year repayment period or nothing in the form of interest in return?

Rishworth currently holds Euros 1.2 million in ‘pay before flying’ payments on behalf of its West Sussex village subsidiary, Global Crew UK – read Full Accounts up to 31 March, 2016, Section 9 - Link:

https://beta.companieshouse.gov.uk/company/09543804/filing-history

Once again, who benefits from the interest on the 1.2 million?

[Avenger]

Bondi, although in the past you have made some valid observations I think this "interest " issue is diluting your credibility somewhat, if 1.2M euros is held in a " Client " account, as legally required in EU, at current interest rates of .05% that would yield 600 euro a year interest. Divide that by 40 pilots is 15 Euros a pilot, lee the cost of a bank transfer to get it.. If you examine the accounts in detail you will not there is no mention of interest received.

[Direct Bondi]

Bondi, although in the past you have made some valid observations I think this "interest " issue is diluting your credibility somewhat, if 1.2M euros is held in a " Client " account, as legally required in EU, at current interest rates of .05% that would yield 600 euro a year interest. Divide that by 40 pilots is 15 Euros a pilot, lee the cost of a bank transfer to get it.. If you examine the accounts in detail you will not there is no mention of interest received.
The credibility of an airline is diluted when they sell a dream career in aviation while requiring a 30-40K training payment to prevent pilots escaping the nightmare of its job security fear culture.

The “interest” is indeed an issue, particularly for those paying rather than receiving interest.

The vast majority of pilots will not have 30-40K readily available for Norwegian’s ‘pay before flying’ scheme. Several UK banks currently offer a 35K loan at 7.3% interest with GBP 1,081 monthly payments (x36 months, 40K total repayment).

The Global Crew declared 1.2 million in ‘pay before flying’ cash may not be held the EU. If so, it is not subject to EU regulations:-

https://beta.companieshouse.gov.uk/company/09543804/filing-history

Global Crew Filing history – 4 August 2016 - Section 9 states:
“These funds are held by the Company’s parent undertaking, Rishworth Aviation Ltd, on behalf of Global Crew UK Ltd.”

Section 14 states:
“The Company [Global Crew UK Ltd.] does not have a bank account, therefore, all income and expenditures are collected or incurred by other group companies”

The person having “significant control” of Global UK Ltd, is located in New Zealand:

https://beta.companieshouse.gov.uk/company/09543804/officers

So, while “someone” may be collecting huge amounts in interest on over a million in ‘pay before flying’ payments held outside the EU, the chumps that handed over 30-40K receive no interest whatsoever, but have GBP 1,081 monthly payments for three years at 7.3% interest – with no direct employment relationship and associated labor rights with the airline!

[back to Boeing]

At least try to get some of the facts right Bondi.

It's 30000 euros not pounds. So about 26000 pounds.

And you're doing really really badly if you're only able to get a loan at 7.3 percent. I did a very quick search and 3.3 seemed to be much more representative.

But hey never let the facts get in the way of a good story.

And no I don't work for Norwegian or Rishworth or OSM. Never have. But the picture you try to paint is very different from the one my friends who do actually work there. No it's not perfect but it's not Pay to Fly.

[Denti]

Well, if you have to give the company that "hires" you money, it is pay to flay, after all you have to pay them first. Real employers pay you first, they still might insist on a bond, but that is not money up front, only have to pay that if you leave earlier than the bond expires. Over here more than 12 months would probably not hold in a court of law, although some CLAs have 24 months in them.

[FlipFlapFlop]

Sorry, but what is not Pay to Fly about paying £26000 up front to OSM/Norwegian.

[back to Boeing]

Because a) you don't have to if you can get a bank guarantee and b) you get the money back including interest (an addmitedly measly sum but so is all interest).

It's not ideal. For some it's a stepping stone, for some it's a way home and for others it's a way out of where they are now.

Personally unless necessity dictates otherwise I wouldn't go there. But I know several people who have and none of them have regretted it.

Although the real argument I wanted to make is if you're going to use figures to bolster your argument at least make sure they're accurate.

[wassupman]

confused, is paying for your TR considered Pay-to-fly?

[Googlebug]

It is when the TR costs 2 to 3 times the market rate.
You essentially end up paying for some of your zero flight time.

[wassupman]

ok, still paying i suppose but whom am i to judge...

[schweizer2]

Any payment after becoming qualified to work (ie CPL MEIR) should be considered as pay to fly.

You have done your part in getting qualified, just like a law student, a medical student or an engineering student. Though your bills were most likely much higher :}

[RAT 5]

What happens with PSV & HGV non-rated cadets? They have a 'driving licence' but not the type. How's it for them? I'm not advocating paying up front; bonding, with full salary, seems reasonable. It's not easy to compare with other industries, e.g. train drivers, ships' captains etc. I suspect not many of us have knowledge of those industries.

[wassupman]

Still a lot of airlines, i.e. the flag carriers do pay for everything but the airline industry has changed so much since those days for e.g. it has become a lot affordable to travel, increase in airline numbers esp. lo-co, pilots, traffic, so on and so forth.

Perhaps, that has enabled the airlines to 'do whatever they like' i.e. charging for TR, line-training taking advantage of the number of unemployed low-houred pilots out there. They (airlines) have a greater bargaining power. #porters-5-forces

Sadly, this has become a norm and in my humble opinion is considered a shadow industry where revenue is generated through an exploitation. (Hope this doesn't sound very harsh).

Fair or not fair in comparing other industries isn't really relevant here because wether paying for TR or interview assessment is considered paying...? I.e. Does a HR personnel have to pay to get an interview at an airline?
:confused:

[RAT 5]

Does a HR personnel have to pay to get an interview at an airline?

Very good point. Who else other than pilots have to pay to apply for a job? You pay and still might not be interviewed. How is it with cabin crew & engineers? What about ground/office staff, even managers?

[flash8]

This has been going on for years.. recall a L-410 FO position at MAN(?) (on a 'N' reg) in the early to mid 90's you pay you fly.... this was the beginning....

EagleJet have been offering the 737 since the late 90's... and recently offered wide-body Captain positions for 50K+

It's one thing RHS P2F bad as it is.... but Widebody Captain? wtf.

Edit.
How is it with cabin crew & engineers?

Cabin crew scams are ten a penny as well. Engineers... no... too much of a shortage (and not as glamorous).