Staying near to the acton!! Dispatch??
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Staying near to the acton!! Dispatch??
Hey,
Hope this is the right area to pose this particular question!
I'm a low hour guy slogging his guts out to try and get in with the Airlines. I appreciate all the ins and outs, however I'm just qualified and I'm going to give it 3-4 solid months of trying everything I can before I call it a day and go for the FI route, which would be a fantasic experience. After all, I believe this to be the best time of year to get in and that the market is doing better than it has in previous years.
For the interim i'm looking to get a job at one of my local airports. The closer to a/c ops the better! The only job I can really think of that might be suitable would be something like dispatch! (Any other suggestions?)This could be a great way to build contacts as your with people all day and of course the pilots, helping them out with their paper work. I guess an fATPL would actually look good when applying for such roles..
However where are they?? Do dispatchers belong to each individual Airline or the Airport authorities? Where are these jobs typically advertised? I've looked at agency websites, aviation job websites, airport job websites and even scanned the airline websites as I'm looking for flight crew info?!
Where are they hiding
..
Sorry to drone on... Any help would be much appreciated!!
Hope this is the right area to pose this particular question!
I'm a low hour guy slogging his guts out to try and get in with the Airlines. I appreciate all the ins and outs, however I'm just qualified and I'm going to give it 3-4 solid months of trying everything I can before I call it a day and go for the FI route, which would be a fantasic experience. After all, I believe this to be the best time of year to get in and that the market is doing better than it has in previous years.
For the interim i'm looking to get a job at one of my local airports. The closer to a/c ops the better! The only job I can really think of that might be suitable would be something like dispatch! (Any other suggestions?)This could be a great way to build contacts as your with people all day and of course the pilots, helping them out with their paper work. I guess an fATPL would actually look good when applying for such roles..
However where are they?? Do dispatchers belong to each individual Airline or the Airport authorities? Where are these jobs typically advertised? I've looked at agency websites, aviation job websites, airport job websites and even scanned the airline websites as I'm looking for flight crew info?!
Where are they hiding
..Sorry to drone on... Any help would be much appreciated!!
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You may have looked here already, hope it helps anyway.
http://www.aviationjobsearch.com/emp...D=18&IndType=0
http://www.aviationjobsearch.com/emp...D=18&IndType=0
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Check the Flight Ops, Crewing and Dispatch forum.
There is a big difference as to what a dispatcher does.(UK Vs US description)
Usually in UK, they are employed by handling agents such as Servisair, Aviance, SGS etc. Some airlines like BA, Virgin will employ their own.
Good luck..its hard work!!
There is a big difference as to what a dispatcher does.(UK Vs US description)
Usually in UK, they are employed by handling agents such as Servisair, Aviance, SGS etc. Some airlines like BA, Virgin will employ their own.
Good luck..its hard work!!
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Contact the handlers at your local airport. Virtually always vacancies for these kind of jobs due to the low (min wage) pay and the shift patterns required. No reason they wouldn't take you on, especially as you're likely to have a more professional approach to the task than some of the oafs that somehow get employed.
Highly recommend it as an interesting addition to your experience - I personally loved it - and it will be a useful background when it comes to troubleshooting through handling issues which you will inevitably encounter on the line. Some of your future flight deck colleagues have absolutely no appreciation of what goes on outside of the flight deck and it shows.
It also allows you to know when some of the less gifted dispatchers are making a total hash of things and trying to bull**** you about what is going on.
Highly recommend it as an interesting addition to your experience - I personally loved it - and it will be a useful background when it comes to troubleshooting through handling issues which you will inevitably encounter on the line. Some of your future flight deck colleagues have absolutely no appreciation of what goes on outside of the flight deck and it shows.
It also allows you to know when some of the less gifted dispatchers are making a total hash of things and trying to bull**** you about what is going on.
Dancing with the devil, going with the flow... it's all a game to me.
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I'd second what Maude Charlee wrote; also, you will develop useful contacts with some of the airlines you'll end up handling, and that may well make all the difference someday! It's not what you know, but who you know...
All the best
All the best
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My mate spent 4 years in dispatch at EGLL looking to get contacts. Does 4 years alarm you? Eventually he went to ryanair at his own cost so he could have saved 4 years eh? Total waste of time for contact building, so if you do want to get into it, go to a small airport and do it if you can afford the re-location costs.
I've yet to meet a Servisair/Menzies dispatcher at LGW who has a FATPL. I used to be a loader and that is helpful at interview.
"Tell us something that no one else has told us today at interview".
"Well Sir, I can load 747's, A340's, 777's............."
Go for the FI route straight away, I was one of those, and still am around the A319. Way better for contacts. My name went to loads of airlines through current and ex captains who hung out at my flying club. On-line, dispatchers are always in the firing line. Not a stigma you want to have.
I've yet to meet a Servisair/Menzies dispatcher at LGW who has a FATPL. I used to be a loader and that is helpful at interview.
"Tell us something that no one else has told us today at interview".
"Well Sir, I can load 747's, A340's, 777's............."
Go for the FI route straight away, I was one of those, and still am around the A319. Way better for contacts. My name went to loads of airlines through current and ex captains who hung out at my flying club. On-line, dispatchers are always in the firing line. Not a stigma you want to have.
Last edited by Craggenmore; 22nd Aug 2007 at 21:28.
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aaaah... Damn..
You shot me down there VFE.. How did I let that one slip through my fingers? On the thread title as well!!
Thanks for the advice peeps.. Keep it coming
You shot me down there VFE.. How did I let that one slip through my fingers? On the thread title as well!!
Thanks for the advice peeps.. Keep it coming
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I'd agree that FI is now probably a better choice if one can finance it after a fATPL. EGLL is probably too big an airport to develop useful contacts - and the airlines flying there will not typically consider frozen ATPL holders.
That said, over the course of 2 years, 4 dispatchers from my office got jobs with 3 airlines handled here; 3 out of 4 on heavy TPs, 1 on heavy jets. None had more than 350 hrs, 3 out of 4 didn't have to pay for a rating (they are bonded though); they (we) got interviews nearly exclusively through "on the job" networking. Being a dispatcher was also a plus at interviews, and now on the line.
That said, over the course of 2 years, 4 dispatchers from my office got jobs with 3 airlines handled here; 3 out of 4 on heavy TPs, 1 on heavy jets. None had more than 350 hrs, 3 out of 4 didn't have to pay for a rating (they are bonded though); they (we) got interviews nearly exclusively through "on the job" networking. Being a dispatcher was also a plus at interviews, and now on the line.
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I was a dispatcher at EGCC for nine months with Servisair, it's hard work and you dont get too much time to chat to flight crew but you can make some contacts.
However I was only a dispatcher for nine months as I was lucky to get a job on the 737 at EGCC with one of the airlines I dispatched, I brought it up in the interview and explained my role and that I thought it would be helpful on the flight deck to know about some of the problems that you can experiance from the other side and that it would help me in the long run to have a greater understand of the entire turn round procedure.
I think it personally helped me, and you can make some good friends and have a good time at work beats being in an office with a pc and phone.
flan
However I was only a dispatcher for nine months as I was lucky to get a job on the 737 at EGCC with one of the airlines I dispatched, I brought it up in the interview and explained my role and that I thought it would be helpful on the flight deck to know about some of the problems that you can experiance from the other side and that it would help me in the long run to have a greater understand of the entire turn round procedure.
I think it personally helped me, and you can make some good friends and have a good time at work beats being in an office with a pc and phone.
flan
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Being a dispatcher was also a plus at interviews, and now on the line.
Wannabe Airways,
Give Servisair (or whatever they are called this month) and Aviance a try at your local airport.
It can be quite difficult to get into Dispatching though as most companies only recruit from with-in or if they do recruit externally they usually only take on people with experience. From what I've seen having and ATPL can be a bonus, but it can also backfire on you getting the job in the first place as the employer will know right away that as soon as an offer of a flying job comes along you will be off.
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Sorry, have to disagree with you there my friend. The Servisair station where I worked (regional airport) has consistently recruited pilots fresh out of training, or guys looking to start. I was one of 3 in a team of maybe 20 when I started with them, and they've had at least another 5 or 6 pass through since I left. It is no handicap at all.
As for whether or not it is looked on unfavourably in your flying career, I would have to say definitely not. It may not necessarily impress, but it certainly won't disadvantage you. All the flying dispatchers I knew are working for a variety of airlines, and we had the massive disadvantage of leaving training in the months following 9/11. Strangely, the last 3 of my course mates to get airline jobs were all FIs. Make of that what you will.
I agree to a certain extent with the statements about building contacts. London is certainly an exception to the rule, but at regional airports, or even the larger internationals with a high number of regional airlines (MAN, BHX), you have the opportunity to get yourself well known amongst your regular crews. If you get a good name for yourself as a hard working and capable dispatcher, it can definitely work in your favour. It may not help get you that first job, but your crews will remember you and this industry is unbelievably small. You just never know who you'll bump into again. My next move is almost certainly going to be back to the airport where I was a dispatcher, and to our main client. I'm still in contact with many of the crews who happen to be friends now, and I intend to use that to my full advantage when the time comes.
If nothing else, hard graft, crap hours and the minimum wage will ensure you appreciate flying for what it is. I'm constantly disappointed by the greedy whingers who think they've been hard done by in this industry, when we get paid a small fortune for effectively doing very little on a day-to-day basis.
As for whether or not it is looked on unfavourably in your flying career, I would have to say definitely not. It may not necessarily impress, but it certainly won't disadvantage you. All the flying dispatchers I knew are working for a variety of airlines, and we had the massive disadvantage of leaving training in the months following 9/11. Strangely, the last 3 of my course mates to get airline jobs were all FIs. Make of that what you will.
I agree to a certain extent with the statements about building contacts. London is certainly an exception to the rule, but at regional airports, or even the larger internationals with a high number of regional airlines (MAN, BHX), you have the opportunity to get yourself well known amongst your regular crews. If you get a good name for yourself as a hard working and capable dispatcher, it can definitely work in your favour. It may not help get you that first job, but your crews will remember you and this industry is unbelievably small. You just never know who you'll bump into again. My next move is almost certainly going to be back to the airport where I was a dispatcher, and to our main client. I'm still in contact with many of the crews who happen to be friends now, and I intend to use that to my full advantage when the time comes.
If nothing else, hard graft, crap hours and the minimum wage will ensure you appreciate flying for what it is. I'm constantly disappointed by the greedy whingers who think they've been hard done by in this industry, when we get paid a small fortune for effectively doing very little on a day-to-day basis.
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I wouldn't bother, I think it's a prerequisite of working as a dispatcher that you have to be a fat, lazy, pot bellied, tattooed, disinterested, idle Scouse git. I'm sure it's somewhere in the small print on the Servisair website anyway 
Seriously, I guess it wouldn't do any harm, but I sure as sh!t wouldn't delay the FI rating thing for the sake of being a dispatcher ... 50 hours instructing will look better on your CV than 50 years of dispatching that's for sure.
Seriously, I guess it wouldn't do any harm, but I sure as sh!t wouldn't delay the FI rating thing for the sake of being a dispatcher ... 50 hours instructing will look better on your CV than 50 years of dispatching that's for sure.
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MC,
At the last 2 places I've worked (both airlines with their own dispatch depts @ LHR) they would not usually take on f/atpls's purely because they knew they would be off when a flying job came up, and as dispatch jobs in airlines are like rocking horse ****, they wanted people that were going to stick around.
I agree with you though when it comes to the circus in regional airports, some of the 'tards they employ !!!.
At the last 2 places I've worked (both airlines with their own dispatch depts @ LHR) they would not usually take on f/atpls's purely because they knew they would be off when a flying job came up, and as dispatch jobs in airlines are like rocking horse ****, they wanted people that were going to stick around.
I agree with you though when it comes to the circus in regional airports, some of the 'tards they employ !!!.
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I think having an fATPL can work for or against you when applying for ops / dispatch jobs. Some people will be put off hiring you, thinking you'll be off again quite quickly. Others will think its a good thing, because you already know quite a bit about aircraft and flying eg. you'll understand METARs / TAFs. This certainly helps when dealing with Flight Crew.
I've been doing an ops job for a small charter company for 8 months and have been enjoying it. I didn't cover up the fact I had an fATPL in the interview. I simply said that I thought that it would help me with getting to understand the job quickly. I also said that, although I would eventually want to look for a flying job, I thought working in ops for a year or two would help me a lot in understanding the industry.
You will make useful contacts doing ops work or dispatching and some of those may well give you job leads. Plus, its pretty interesting work !
I've been doing an ops job for a small charter company for 8 months and have been enjoying it. I didn't cover up the fact I had an fATPL in the interview. I simply said that I thought that it would help me with getting to understand the job quickly. I also said that, although I would eventually want to look for a flying job, I thought working in ops for a year or two would help me a lot in understanding the industry.
You will make useful contacts doing ops work or dispatching and some of those may well give you job leads. Plus, its pretty interesting work !
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Im my opinion, being a flight dispatcher is very good thing if you work in small company, : charter, corporate, anyway just for jet, beech etc... you'll make friends, etc and of course a small company don't make interview like a big one. it is too expensive. So one day if they need a co-pilot they will know where asking!
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Well I did some dispatch and I must say it definitely opened up avenues. Its all what you make of it. Dispatchers vary and as has been said earlier, if you work on a smaller base, you get known for the reliability of your work. You can't help how crap the company is, but the crews are aware of that...what you can do is build up trust in your own personal approach to the job. This means you may well find some Captain's giving you useful bits of information - contacts, numbers, gen, or even taking your cv and putting it on the inside track. A lot of it I suppose depends on personality. Once you get up and running and capable of a decent dispatch, you'll find the key points. I even used to stroll over to crew doing walkarounds beside 'my' aircraft and quiz the crewmember....it all helps, and if there is one great thing about this industry, its that so many of them know from experience what you are going through and trying to achieve, and the general drive is to 'help out'.
I'm not denigrating the FI route at all; I think that can also be a very useful source of contacts as well as being helpful in a general sense. However, anything you do that is involved with commercial aviation has to show commitment - so I would say, yes, get in there, gain some experience at it, but be aware of the limitations. Your working life will turn to ****, it truly is one of the worst jobs I have ever experienced, but there is good cameraderie - you learn about the whole operation, and as someone else has said - you can forever more look at things with an informed perspective.
If you are resourceful you will quickly get an 'in' with dispatch....the companies can't find quality candidates for the **** pay and conditions. Sing out the answers they wan't. You'll probably find like myself that those interviewing you will be your workmates telling you ****e the company is, and that in itself is a learning point for you!
I fly now, but always remember when talking with dispatchers how it was when I was there. With your first job,the previous experience will definitely help with situational awareness.
Good luck with it. If you do want to proceed with it, forget arsing about on PPRUNE and call someone you know who's done it, ask around at clubs for someone who knows someone who works at Aviance, Servisair etc...get on the phone. If you do that, you'll have an interview within days.
Also, if you do go for FI rating, why not marry up the two - makes you look a bit more hardworking come interview time, and two distinct commercial related exposure-type experiences to talk about.
Good luck.
FP
I'm not denigrating the FI route at all; I think that can also be a very useful source of contacts as well as being helpful in a general sense. However, anything you do that is involved with commercial aviation has to show commitment - so I would say, yes, get in there, gain some experience at it, but be aware of the limitations. Your working life will turn to ****, it truly is one of the worst jobs I have ever experienced, but there is good cameraderie - you learn about the whole operation, and as someone else has said - you can forever more look at things with an informed perspective.
If you are resourceful you will quickly get an 'in' with dispatch....the companies can't find quality candidates for the **** pay and conditions. Sing out the answers they wan't. You'll probably find like myself that those interviewing you will be your workmates telling you ****e the company is, and that in itself is a learning point for you!
I fly now, but always remember when talking with dispatchers how it was when I was there. With your first job,the previous experience will definitely help with situational awareness.
Good luck with it. If you do want to proceed with it, forget arsing about on PPRUNE and call someone you know who's done it, ask around at clubs for someone who knows someone who works at Aviance, Servisair etc...get on the phone. If you do that, you'll have an interview within days.
Also, if you do go for FI rating, why not marry up the two - makes you look a bit more hardworking come interview time, and two distinct commercial related exposure-type experiences to talk about.
Good luck.
FP
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I was a dispatcher while at school and again after flight school. I gave every Capt my CV and after 3 months hit on the Chief Pilot of Brymon who gave me an interview and job on the Embraer 145 two days later. Go for it, I can't see a better way of getting that first job!
Another effective method I used was to turn up at the airline's HQ suited and booted just before lunchtime with CV and ask if I could have a chat with anyone. They didn't let me past the reception but did take my CV and assure me it would be put on the relevant desk. The next day I was called for an interview that afternoon and started the next day!
I'll hopefully not require the CV anymore having finally settled! Best of luck to you all, you will get that job.
Chug
Another effective method I used was to turn up at the airline's HQ suited and booted just before lunchtime with CV and ask if I could have a chat with anyone. They didn't let me past the reception but did take my CV and assure me it would be put on the relevant desk. The next day I was called for an interview that afternoon and started the next day!
I'll hopefully not require the CV anymore having finally settled! Best of luck to you all, you will get that job.
Chug
