I think the figure '2' came from a board a month or so ago where 12 applicants were invited to an assessment day, 6 accepted and 2 were taken. This is the exception though, not the rule. I heard on average half or so of the 12 get taken at each assessment day. 200ish applications for turboprop, 100ish meeting the requirements.

The number of Pilots applying each month, who meet the requirements, is less than the number being hired. Thus the pool is being drained faster than it’s being filled, it’s that simple.

As I’ve always said, Air NZ needs to control the flow of Link Pilots to Jet based on a sustainable number, not arbitrary percentages like 70:30 or now 90:10 otherwise history just keep repeating itself. The Links run out of Pilots and we end up with another “Link Ban” until they can recover.

If the Links can only release 50 per year (for example), then release 50 a year. Sometimes that’ll be 100% internal, other times it might be 50/50 but it keeps the wheels turning.

What are these extra 280 pilots going to fly? What's behind such an increase in manpower? It's not like there any extra jets to fly.

And in fact there are now two fewer jets available: https://www.stuff.co.nz/travel/trave...ngers-impacted

Something that I agree with you on is that there shouldn't necessarily hard and fast numbers because reality is far more dynamic.

Eventually we’re supposed to start receiving deliveries of more 787’s to replace the now retired 772’s. I say eventually because between us delaying them and Boeing failing to deliver I’ve mostly tuned out to when they’re actually supposed to show up. We’ve also got another 4 A321 NEO’s on the way from memory… assuming we can find some engines for them.

In anticipation of the eventual seat changes certain Ranks are being over crewed in advance, such as C20 to prepare for the eventual flow into C8. But as always, the choke points further down.

Anyone know if the externals have got a start date or when they’re likely to start? Also curious if the rumours of another interview panel this year is true?

No externals have started.
Recruitment boards are still running but unsure if any are slated for externals at the moment.

There is a looming demand to hire externally, just hasn't happened yet.

the next round of emails have gone out for external psych testing last week

Good to see it’s ongoing. Out of interest how many candidates usually make up a board/assessment?

I’ve also seen the company is looking for a manager to lead the new low (or zero) hours pilot recruitment programme. So it seems they have a solution to the lack of suitable prop applicants. An exciting development for aviation in NZ.

Who says it's for the props?

The author of the memorandum.

For now.

Doesn't help the left seat problem.

Exactly.
Great opportunity for Pilots to get in early, but they’ll be a long time in the RHS and as we’ve already seen, hiring FO’s with 800-1000 hours has already caused bottlenecks for Command upgrades thus preventing existing Captains from being released. This would only exacerbate things.

Let’s not forget, pre COVID JW wanted SO Cadets on slave wages so they could “build experience” before going to T-Prop FO.

The low hour pilot pathway will only ever supplement new hire recruitment, the main stream will always be GA. Probably better to get your C cat and the 500 hour minimum hour requirement to avoid 'graduate pilot pay'. In saying that it probably won't be very hard to recruit a few classes of very bright young wannabe pilots that wanna fly the koru.

Hi All :)
Trust you all are well!
I am a FO on the A330 and A320/1 and would appreciate if someone can shed some light to the following please;

1. Has Air NZ started recruitment/ interview process for Externals on Jet? If not, around when would that be?
2. How could someone prepare for the Air NZ interview?
3. What would be a FO Salary before Tax?
4. What would be a SO salary on the B787 before Tax?
5. How many hours per roster are you all rostered for. Here at base, I do about 80 hr rosters
6. What is the hourly rate paid at Air NZ?

Appreciate this much!
Thank you

The majority of these questions are already answered in this rather short thread, just have a wee scroll up and I’m sure you’ll find what you’re looking for :ok:

​​​

Yes they are interviewing.

1st year FO on 320 is $139500, after 1 years service (if you have an ATPL) it jumps to $156,000. From there it increases by about $5000 per year plus CPI inflation plus 0.8%. Tax free allowances are approx 20/30k pa.

1st year SO $124,400 then $139,000 after a year. Allowances 30/40k pa.

On top of the salary is incentive pay. This is variable between fleets and domiciles. But any hours over 60 per 28 day roster your salary is multiplied up to 100hrs.

At the moment on the 320 its about 15% (approx 70 hrs) times your salary and SO are 25% (approx 80hrs) times your salary. Very rough and variable but just an idea of how much you’ll earn.

They don't have an hourly rate. They have "incentive pay" which pays an additional percentage of your pay depending on how many hours over the min guarantee (59 for A320/1, 60 for the Boeings) you worked. Unfortunately it's a sliding scale that works out to be less per hour than what you were paid for the initial 59/60 hours. So say you are earning $156K flying the A320, your hourly rate would be $203 / hour (156000 / (13*59)) for the first 59 hours you work. Then incentive pay kicks in. Initially it's paid at 1.25% of the 4 weekly salary per hour and the percentage increases the more hours you do, this works out to be $150 / hour from 60 - 75 hours. As soon as you go into incentive pay you are getting paid less per additional hour than your ordinary pay. You only get back to earning the same per additional hour of work when you hit 100 hours and even then it's not quite the same. An A320 pilot flying 100 hours will achieve 167.5% of their base salary, meaning they've been paid $197 / hour for their "overtime", still less than their nominal hourly rate.

There are a lot of good things about the contract, but incentive pay isn't one of them. A needlessly complex system that would be far better by just paying the nominal hourly rate for each overtime hour worked (a whole chapter of the contract could be replaced by one line).

Imagine a labourer being asked to do some overtime for 75% of their normal hourly rate. They'd laugh at whichever clown proposed that, they'd laugh even harder when told it's "incentive".

Thanks alot... appreciate the feedback and info. :)