JOC Advice Request

[magicmick]

As many operators are now insisting that applicants have completed a JOC, I have decided to take the plunge and commit to completing a JOC and have distilled my choices down to a couple:

CRM Aviation - 1 day course, only 4 hrs sim time, 'only' £785 cost, commutable from my home (just) and plenty of positive feedback and recommendations on PPRuNe.

Stapleford Flight Centre - 2 day course, 9 or 10 hrs sim time, £995 cost, not commutable from my home.

My chief concern with CRM Europe is that there is only 4 hrs sim time versus double that time for £200 more at SFC and I am concerned that the employers who insist on candidates having a JOC would look down their noses at such a low number of sim hours.

Therefore I would be extremely grateful to hear your thoughts on these courses and my concern over the CRM JOC lack of hours.

Especially interested to hear from ladies and gents who have completed stand alone JOCs with either of these FTOs and have gone on to land that elusive first job.

Happy to receive replies on open forum or PM

[Alex Whittingham]

My views and others on this thread (http://www.pprune.org/professional-pilot-training-includes-ground-studies/578128-has-anyone-done-wings-alliance-airline-ready-course.html) which starts out about the Wings Alliance course in particular and then drifts off to MCC/JOC generally with a comparison table of costs/course durations etc. In short "you pays your money, you takes your choice..."

[Rob Howarth]

magicmick,pends an interesting question.

However,the statement 'you pays your money, you takes your choice' made by Alex, is a direct insinuation that a good value for money JOC, is somehow not 'up to scratch'! Interesting.

The JOC at CRM Aviation is £749, and is priced like this for a very good reason. The course totals 8 hours, 4 ground school and 4 in the sim. The JOC is just that - a jet orientation course - not a type familiarisation course, or a duplicate of CRM/MCC instruction. Purely an ‘orientation’ course highlighting the differences between multi engine piston and multi engine turbofan operations. A JOC is a non EASA approved course - there is no such thing as an EASA approvedJOC - yet! The JOC also offers no credit towards a type rating either.

Many of the current recruiting airlines like Wizz, Jet2 and Flybe request a JOC as well as an MCC prior to application. This request, at times, has been for 16 hours ofthe JOC element (mixture of ground school and sim time).

Some of you will know, although I personally keep away from utilisation of social media and forms to promote CRM Aviation, that I own and operate CRM Aviation. So, the question of why is our JOC, against possibly other offerings, better value for money - simple - the business outright owns all of it's assets. Everything is run in-house, not subbed out to partners, and the business philosophy is to offer professional quality training for good value - it's expensive enough for people wishing to enter this industry. Our JOC is also an extremely intense course designed to maximise individuals potential through positive training, yet retain the training within one day to keep the course fees realistic. We do not advertise and solely rely on offering excellent training and levels of service to ensure our business is recommended by all of those that train with us. That's circa 120 MCC students each year and circa 110 JOC students. All of CRM's instructors are extremely high calibre individuals that have all held extensive training and command experience within the airline industry.

I personally have discussed our JOC elements with the carriers mentioned above and although there were questions raised by them in the past about the hours in our JOC, we continue to see our customers placed within these carriers on a regular basis. Recently we have seen a huge upsurge in our customers securing jobs. Maybe why we’re fully booked until the end of March(4 courses inadvance)?

I do hope that this message clears up any misconception, or ambiguity out there with regards to the JOC, and I wish all of you that are currently training to join the commercial aviation industry the very best for your new careers.

[jamesgrainge]

From a purely common sense perspective. Where else can you get another 4 hours of valuable SIM time for £200?

[magicmick]

Good Morning

Thank-you so much for the replies, Rob I agree that the JOC should be an orientation course and not anything deeper but because EASA/ CAA have not got a grip on it then FTOs can create any syllabus that they like with as many sim hrs as they like and charge accordingly.

I recently spoke with a pilot recruitment officer for one of the airlines mentioned above that used to insist on a JOC with a minimum of 16hrs sim time and they said that there is only a requirement to complete a JOC and there are no minimum time requirements. They did however say that if they had to choose between two candidates for one place on an assessment day they might look at JOC sim hrs to differentiate between them.

The Kura, CTC and WA offerings are not JOCs, they are combined MCC/ JOCs plus some more stuff on top and cost upwards of £7500 plus selection course charges with no guarantee of recommendation to an airline, as always past performance is no guarantee of future success, all the risk is squarely on the candidate. In an ideal world I suppose the selection phase would be free of charge and there would be a deferred payment of the large course fee where the candidate would complete the course and the fee would not be payable until the candidate had found a flying job. That way the training organisation would be further motivated to assist the individual and stay in close touch with them.

Sadly we do not live in an ideal world. I have just seen that Kylie Minogue is single again, perhaps things are looking up after all.