skiptoit

I was extremely fortunate to be offered both a job with Ryanair and with a turboprop operator towards the end of 2008 just as things really started drying up. As a wannabe who had a grand total of only 207 hours and had gone down a mixed school modular route I was shocked to get either offer as I had expected to need to get an FI rating and do that for a few years. Faced with the choice, I took the turboprop job. I paid a small proportion of my type rating with the rest being funded by the operator. I just couldn't justify taking the risk with Ryanair. Being a contractor they can lay you off at any time. I have a watertight contract with my current carrier, I fly 50-60 hours a month and take home a reasonable, if not particularly spectacular wage, but what really matters to me is that I have stability that I'm not certain I would have had at Ryanair.

I got the turboprop job by networking, I came down to the airlines' base and sat around until I could catch the Chief Pilot for a five minute chat. It worked. They had never advertised the job and it was purely luck that I turned up the day after he had lost on of his other FOs to Jet2.

I do a lot of hand flying, and in my first 100 or so hours I have seen my flying skills rocket. I can't recommend it enough! There are a very limited number of turboprop jobs out there, but you need to get out there and search for them, you can't just send out CV after CV and hope they will come to you.

I now feel that when this downturn does finally come to an end, and that will probably still be a long way off, hopefully I will have about 1,000 hours of turboprop flying and I will be able to move up the ladder onto a regional jet or maybe even something bigger. But for the timebeing I am having the time of my life at a total cost of about £44,000 including all of my initial flight training and my type rating costs. Had I gone to Ryanair this would have been nearer £63,000 with the current £/€ exchange rate.

Reluctant737

Skiptoit,

I work for Ryanair, and I must say my sentiments near enough match what you've written in your post. To tell you the truth, I am SICK of hearing people coming on here, winging they've sent off 100,000 CVs to 10,000 operators around the world, and how there is no hope because they've heard nothing back.

Well done mate - I did a little flying down in Africa very early last year - sometimes 8 hours hands on flying a day certainly does something for the old handling skills! I do wish I'd have been fortunate (expeditious?) enough to have been in a similar position to yourself.

But that's exactly what people need to do. Get off their arse and get down the airfields/airports. Mind you, let's not tell them that - Darwinism was invented for a reason

Ad

p.s. MikeHotel152, airline captains are great to intercept and bother about the current situation in the airline industry, but 80% know jack **** about GA anymore. Not having a go mate, just saying the only people really qualified to make such a sweeping statement are the front liners - FI/CFIs, flying school owners, etc. We may all be involved in aviation, but there are many many sub-categories (more than you may think!), each with their own areas of expertise

skiptoit

Reluctant737, I like your Darwin reference! Let's keep it that way! Those who actually want this badly enough will always work out how to get it no matter how much effort is required and time taken. Congratulations on getting in with Ryanair. I've seen from your other posts that you have been there for about six months now. I'd love to have taken the opportunity but I really couldn't justify the cost. Now I'm in the postion I'm in I quite look forward to working my way up. My ideal job would be something like BA Cityflyer at LCY, so hopefully I can go in that direction. Anyway, congratulations once again and keep fighting the good fight!

interested123

Thanks Horgy,

not as scary as i thought then



just for clarification:

How long do you spend in Stockholm/Amsterdam?
How much does it cost, including accom and women? haha
What is the average take home pay for line training FO and a full FO please?


Thanks

SD.

How long do you spend in Stockholm/Amsterdam? 2 months


How much does it cost, including accom and women? haha Around 32k€ for the type, £1.5k accom, living expenses, food, beer and woman - depends how much you want to consume

What is the average take home pay for line training FO and a full FO please? I would estimate around £2k a month during line training (based on around 80 a month). Once online, anywhere from £1500 to £4000 - depending on what screwing roster you in for.

woofly31

Hi

Which bases are currently used for Line Training. Is it more likely to be Stansted, Liverpool, East Mids and Dublin? How long is it before you get your base preference. Do you get any pay for Stand by duty etc?

nick14

Don't think Brookfield has standby pay, only get paid if you fly.

I think the line training base is wherever they have to need and the line capts, that would be my guess

N

MrHorgy

Nick has it right, no pay on standby (unless you get called obviously) and Line Training could be anywhere. I think I once heard they aim for one LTC per aircraft so you can extrapolate that at your will.

Horgy

interested123

So after type rating you take a Brookfield contract, do Ryanair offer their own contracts? If so, when?

nick14

I think all the newbies are on Brookfield.

As for FR contracts I believe they can come with a command upgrade, otherwise im not sure, maybe if you have spent the 5 years with them and they think you will stick around.

Mikehotel152

Reluctant737,

No need to shoot the messenger, but no offence taken anyway. I'm far too thick-skinned. I don't agree that an FI Rating is worthless, but simply passed on the advice from a few Captains I know. Interestingly, one of them is a line training Captain at an Airline prominently mentioned on this thread...

What I didn't point out is that my other contacts within the industry include many FOs and FIs and they all reckon an FI rating is valuable. However, from what they've told me, from what my FTO told me, and from what I've read on here, FI jobs are very hard to come by right now.

If you knew me you'd realise that I am in no way like those who send off thousands of CVs willy-nilly and crawl into a hole when they don't receive a response. You may well bump into me hiding in a bush outside your Company's office waiting for the Chief Pilot to pass by...

adwjenk

Ryanair contracts are hit and miss!
Everyone I know in the past year has gone onto a Brookfield contract. You can ask for a Ryanair contract if you wish, it has advantages and disadvantages. All depends what you want, I would give it 6 months after line check before you ask.
Just you will take a pay cut, but on a ryr contract your pay is for you to spend no need to worry about saving for tax etc... You do get paid leave and allowances paid once a year in a lump sum. That's about it really, sure one day they will come back when we end up having to many guys as contractors and few Ryanair pilots, only time will tell.

AceOfHearts

Im sorry go back to square one. Im confused as to what Brookfied and Ryanair contracts are. I will appreciate if someone would kindly explain, what they are right from the very beginning. I know this is a bit of a drag, but I tried to make sense of all the information in the different threads but could not piece together a full picture. This request comes after a lot of consideration and its not a lazy way out of searching for information, honestly.

Thanks in advance to anyone who explains to me what they are (from scratch).

jiffajaffa

Ace Of Hearts

You do not have to worry about a RYR contract because you wont be offered one.

All cadets who join RYR are given the option of "accepting" a BRK 'brookfield' contract

This is how it goes,

You are paid NOTHING until safety pilot released, to be safety pilot released it takes a minimum of 12 sectors this rarely happens it can take anything up to 30/40 sectors depending on your ability, if you do 4 sector days could take 2 weeks or so.

After you are safety pilot released you are paid 40.50 euro per scheduled block hour until you have been line checked (this is the final check before you are released into the line for normal operations and you do not need to fly with a line training captain anymore) this is a minimum of 68 sectors and can take anything up to 100 again depending on your ability,

After you have been line checked you are on 55.50 euro per scheduled block hour until you have 500 hours on type, expect to fly between 40/80 hours per month,

After 500 hours on type your pay will increase to 75.50 euro until 1500 hours on type,

Line training takes approx 3 months from any base in Europe,

it takes approx 6/7 months to accumalate 500 hours on type,

Be prepared for alot of standbys after line training due to a high intake of cadets in the next year,

Be prepared to be given a month off with short notice,

Ive recently enquired about a RYR contract and I was told there are no RYR contracts being offered indefinately,

Also for those of you wondering if you are paid any extras on a Brookfield contract you ARE NOT, you are not paid for standby days unless you are called..


Just a bit of advice for all cadets who have been accepted to the Ryanair cadet program

READ THE CONTRACT BEFORE YOU SIGN IT

JJ

nick14

Jaffa,

Did you recieve your Brookfield contract before you payed for the type rating?

Thanks
Nick

MrHorgy

JiffJaff has the details on the new contract, it works out better now because your getting more cash whilst line training. Only thing I disagree with is safety pilot release - 30/40 sectors, WTF? Remember it means RYR has to pay an experienced FO to sit and babysit(probably on the higher BRK rate). Unless your seat is facing the CB's instead of the big blue picture you'll probably get it in about 16.

Oh, and BRK contract issued AFTER type rating completion I think.

Horgy

nick14

Does that mean we go into the type rating having paid 33k without a written comfirmation that we will get a contract?

Another reason why cadets aren't that cheap, plus the extra expense of the line captain sat next to us.

Nick

MrHorgy

I stand corrected. I've just dug out my old contract I got from Ryanair when I started and it was issued before I started my type rating. This was under the old system of RYR contract for line training then moved to BRK.

I can't comment on the new deal, but the way they are generally worded is along the lines of "subject to your satisfactory performance during training, you can expect to be employed by us" - no us in the Ryanair contract sense, more us as in you fly our planes.

Horgy

jiffajaffa

Horgy,

I know of 2 cadets in my base recently who exceeded 30 sectors without being safety released, it is not uncommon.


As I said it depends on your ability,not everybody has the ability to be released after 12 or 16 sectors..


Nick,

When I line trained I recieved my contract before I started however that was the old Ryanair training contract which has since been removed and now the Brookfield contract has replaced it,

Cadets are offered the contract before the line training begins or after it has started and not before the type rating.

JJ

Massy

..and when we'll get detailed info about TR? Such as detailed cost, duration, payment methods?

Max