Charter companies are mostly crooks anyway so of course their business model is robb
 

"Charter companies are mostly crooks anyway so of course their business model is robbing aircraft owners"

Slight exaggeration and sweeping generalization

It depends on how you define crooks. I've seen downright criminal behavior to just simple exaggerated marketing tactics.

I did use the word "mostly" in there so it's not a sweeping generalization. In such a tight margin business with so much competition it seems those who attempt to do things honestly end up degenerating into crooks or go out of business. Also why savvy aircraft owners often start their own management business or buy a certificate.

Hey man, don't hate the player, hate the game :cool: :E :ok:

Which pilots seem much more willing to acknowledge when they don't feel as though they're getting their "fair share" of the cut!

Yes it's a competitive and often cutthroat business. Name one that isn't! Some individuals are more willing than others to trade their honor for money. what else is new?

Jet owners tend to run the gamut in this way as well. But for every bottom feeding scumbag operator, there's a higher quality operation doing business in a more ethical manner. I've worked for the bottom feeders when I had to and the better operators when I could. Never found that "perfect" situation so far though.

Hope springs eternal...

westhawk

I wasn't really talking about how they treat their pilots. It's more of a commentary on the whole business model. I didn't mean for it to be taken so seriously and become such a topic of interest in this thread.

I hated being asked to lie outright to customers. I think as pilots we are in one of the few professions that allows us to maintain a high level of integrity (if we so choose) so when an operator asked us to lie to a customer I found it uncomfortable. I especially hated it when sales people would throw the crew under the bus to hide the lies they told to sell a trip...."sure we can make it non stop."

Aircraft owners would corner the pilots and try to dig for information so you never really knew what to say. You just had to play dumb all the time.

But these were small annoyances. The margins were so tight and the competition so high sometimes they just had no choice I suppose. Flying charter was usually the most fun I ever had as a pilot. Even corporate jobs can get boring flying the same people to the same locations and staying in the same hotels but charters always allowed you to mix it up a bit. I also never really had problems with pay...some people did though as it was never the same from pilot to pilot.

Agreed..

Charter gets a bad wrap and deservedly so in many cases but I had a good 13 year run with mid-size jet charter, loved the variety of flying and the challenges along the way. Maybe I got lucky.

As far as lying to passengers I was never asked to outright lie but I did run into the occasional problem when running a brokered trip and promises were made without asking the operator, me, if it was even possible. Sure we can get you into that VFR strip in the rockies...make it to Hawaii in February...Fly TEB-SJC non-stop "guaranteed".

Yes, it did happen and from my recollection I had most trouble with the VNY/BUR based companies brokering out the trips. I got the impression they would tell the client anything to sell the trip...and they did.

Still, it was fun. Now a bit older and settled into a solid corporate gig. Not as exciting constantly going to TEB/BNA/MDW/SJC but it serves me well at this point in my career....flying the GLEX pays much better too.

Heh heh heh... Ain't that the truth SJC. (I worked out of BUR and VNY) But that big broker from Boston that wanted you to pretend you worked for them (down to the napkins with their company logo!) was even more so. But they sold some good trips. Same with the big fractional from Columbus when we'd provide holiday supplemental lift for them. Good times from before the great recession...

westhawk