PilotLZ

It’s correct what you said, no further paycuts, I don’t know where the rumours come from.

Rumor has it that a zoom meeting has leaked costing some heads/managers so far. Many subjects were discussed during this meeting like a matrix on how to choose who should be let go and based on what reasons, further salary cuts, etc.

The 500 EUR bonus will certainly help employees through Christmas season.

aviationvictim

The majority of redundant captains and FOs are working jobs where they make a quarter of their previous airline pilot salary, operators know that, so why on earth should they offer more money ? As of today and the foreseeable future pilot's bargaining power is close to zero.

History tells us a surplus turns to a desperate shortage very very quickly, and while I fully support pilots accepting big pay cuts, when the boots on the other foot, they MUST MUST MUST either walk away to a competitor, or demand a massive pay deal to prevent them doing so (and compensate for the bad times).

And when that deal is assessed by the pilot, inevitably the behaviour of the airline during the bad times will be remembered, so airlines which think they are saving a bundle by slashing pay, will only lose it later by having to pay more when pilots are rare as rocking horse :mad:. So for example, given an offer from both wizz and easy, I would in future need the wizz package to be about 25% above easy, because I now know that come the bad times, the wizz pay will crumble away in a second.

Improvement in T&Cs is due in two situations - whenever the company needs to attract new employees (by convincing them to quit their jobs in other companies) and whenever retention of the present employees becomes problematic (obviously because there are other, better opportunities out there and people are moving onto them in large numbers).

Which of those is the case now? Neither, unfortunately. Therefore, any improvement is off the cards until numerous other opportunities come up, absorb most of those thousands on the dole or in low-paid non-flying jobs now and provide better alternatives for present employees. As things stand now, those who still have their jobs will be clinging onto them for dear life and those who are out of jobs will sign up for literally everything. Not exactly an environment conductive to pay increase.

I'm not talking about now. I think a pilot crunch could be sooner than you think, maybe two years, plus about 6 to 12 months for that realisation to be reflected in pay. I know first hand that at least a couple of big airlines have kept their pilots on the books, not because they are feeling charitable, but because they can see a crewing shortage looming very soon. I personally think wizz will regret letting their true colours being shown.

The paycuts everyone seem so eager to accept are permanent and you’ll never see pay levels rise again. Especially in a non-unionised Eastern European company. Wizz will come out of this crisis stronger than ever with a workforce cheaper than ever. This of course undermines all airline jobs in Europe as everyone’s scrambling to keep up with the ultra low cost idea. It’s never-ending.

Yes, a pay/demand equilibrium does require that pilots are willing to relocate - if Wizz is the only show in town, and the pilots are a captive market, then can pay whatever they want (to a point where pilots decide no longer to be pilots or relocate). But in places like Luton, there are normally many many options for pilots, and accordingly, the Wizz Luton terms were not that different to easyJet (and wizz had a much more reasonable type rating scheme)

Willingness to relocate (or lack thereof) is what allows Wizz to run their show however they please across the Eastern European bases where they are often the only carrier who has a crew base in the city/country (or one of two or maximum three carriers). Local pilots aren't exactly spoiled for choice if they want to work out of their home city - and many spend a couple of years in different bases, waiting for their turn to be relocated to their home town. If they're happy to accept whatever Wizz have to offer as long as they're at home every night - well, everyone has their priorities.

The more interesting case studies will be the Western European bases. As Sick rightly mentioned, the London area is an example of a place where multiple employment opportunities are available in normal times. That's where things will get interesting whenever the market picks up. Either the conditions in Western Europe will be a long way better than in Eastern Europe - or there will be a prevailing presence of inexperienced guys ready to take everything to get a foot in the door and high staff turnover in Western Europe.

It doesn’t matter how much the conditions change in the future in this company.
They show their real face. At the beginning they will continue having applications but as someone said let’s see in a few months.
everybody has a friend of a friend that knows the history behind the 265 pilots fired in April without reason and without transparency.
Their reputation between the collective of pilots is really bad. And most of Western Europe pilots that were working for other big LCC still working.
I spoke sometimes with other pilots from that companies, non of them has the intention at all to go and fly for Wizzair because all of them has heard about the company and what they did.

Same story with Ryanair. I knew a bunch of people who always claimed they would never work for them. They all work for them as of today.

Pearlharbour

I can confirm this...middle east behavior towards to employees and violating law obligations by not paying severance pay to employees who were redundant in Eastern European countries on local contract. Crew was advised not to sue airline in order to be invited back as soon as situation improves. At the end same crew members were refused few months later with no explanation... You don't judge airlines only by redundancies but also how do they behave after they lay off pilots. There is no obligation to keep someone in the company but to avoid to give them something they should legally get...

Ryanair did undergo a massive change/shift in their attitude towards pilots. It wasn't always a one way street with pilots bending over. Lifestyle is sometimes worth it's measure in gold, salary figures become not so important. That's what Ryanair gave people in the end. Wizzair will need to do the same especially in Britain, and especially post-Brexit. They can't ignore union recognition in all countries and they wont be the only carrier hiring 2022 and beyond.

But at what cost did the change of attitude come to Ryanair? At the cost of many, many resignations and a massive staff turnover rate. Ryanair only became an appealing career-type airline some 5-6 years ago or thereabout. Not because they were feeling charitable, but because, after some point, growth and development become impossible without having a critical mass of loyal employees who have been trained in-house, have company-relevant experience and pursue long-term growth within the company. The price to pay for that? Surprise, surprise - not treating people in such a way that they become desperate to jump ships the very moment they have a chance to!

It’s actually come to the point where people talk about Ryanair as a career style airline who treat their employees well ?!.😆 We’re all doomed.🙄

PilotLZ

Exactly. I think it was summer 2017 when they did a big disaster and O’Leary said we had a confusion with the holidays of our pilots. They canceled thousands and thousands of flights and the stocks of the company drop A LOT!.

O’leary learned that lesson and as a result they changed. Varadi never had similar situation in the company, that is why his behavior is different.

Post covid people will accept ANYTHING to go back to a flightdeck unless in the mean time they find a job that pays more money and offers a better lifestyle = unlikely for 90% of us.

Yes, but that likely won't last forever. And here lies the big difference between the old and the current Ryanair approaches towards staff: thinking about the day after today and the day after tomorrow. With vaccines at the doorstep, the market will no longer be in dire straits in another 2-3 years. With the amount of flying normally done with a LCC, today's cadet will be a Captain in 4-5 years, an instructor in 7-8 years, an examiner in 10 years or so. Throughout this development cycle, aviation will usually go through some sort of major crisis and a couple of recovery years after it. How do you ensure that, when things pick up, your company will still be those people's primary choice and desired field of further professional development? Consistently providing decent treatment instead of acting solely as an hour-building facility for better places was the solution which Ryanair adopted. And it certainly did work.

Cardiff Base
 

https://www.travelweekly.co.uk/artic...ntingency-plan

whatever you may think of the company, this is good news for Cardiff and the customers in Wales and the south west

Funny how this board is full of low count posters telling us that we must accept ANYTHING! I wonder who is behind all that hype?

Young/low hour pilots starting their career who really must accept ANYTHING in order to get a job?

If in doubt, just follow the money. Who stands to benefit from creating such expectations?

https://norwaytoday-info.cdn.ampproj...-bullying/amp/

I think the obvious violation of employee's rights are PREVENTING them to organize, Mr. Rado.

Elephant and Castle

I’m not saying pilots should accept anything, I’m saying that pilots WILL accept anything to go back flying because :

A) it’s still more money than what 90% of pilots with no previous careers can make (forget the BS of transferable skills).

B) After to much time away from the flight deck your net worth as a pilot falls dramatically, as not even the crappiest loco operator in some forgotten counties will hire you.

All the rest is a good blabla.

booze

“The attempt to use boycott and bullying tactics to force employees to organize is an obvious violation of their rights,” Wizz Air’s communications manager Andras Rado wrote in an email

Oh, so NOW they care about employees’ rights? :rolleyes: They wouldn’t know double standards if you wrapped them around a brick and whacked them in the head with it.

The other day O’Leary said in a interview to Eurocontrol that Varadi labor policy in Western Europe will not work. Also said that they are expanding to Siberia, Dubai or China because they are afraid of Ryanair.

Some colleagues inside Ryan training department told me that is expected very soon a massive Recruitment from Ryanair in Europe. And they will take Captain with or without Type Rating on 73.

also Volotea seems to be that is preparing something, most probably for January

Easyjet opening summer bases in Malaga and Faro...

I think everybody is preparing for the big wave, but seems to be that regarding manpower Ryanair did better their homeworks and are better prepare for their imminent expansion.

This company is an abomination. I’m sure the Norwegian people would find it reasonable to feel pity for the poor Wizz air personal that will be forced to organise themselves for better terms and conditions. The humanity!
Face it the Norwegian have no interest in supporting an Eastern European company run by gangsters to save a few kroner. It just doesn’t work that way in Norway and they’ll leave soon enough.

Well noted, nickler. In fact, currency and recency are becoming even more of a concern short-term than earning potential. At this point, there are already quite a few A320 drivers out there who haven't been in a flight deck for over a year now. Think the charter lot who finished off the summer season in the autumn of 2019 but had no job to come back to in the summer of 2020. Also, plenty of TCX crew never found another job after September 2019.

With this in mind, Wizz air explicitly say that their normal hiring minima of X hours within the last Y months and last commercial flight within the last Z months no longer apply as a hard requirement. However, it's also sort of obvious that, if you have recent experience, you'll likely be looked upon more favorably than someone with a gap of over a year.

Does this put extra pressure on many unfortunate guys and girls? Absolutely. At that point, their game is about getting into flying at all costs for the sake of logging some recent hours. No improvement in conditions can be expected for as long as there's a choice between recent and not-so-recent candidates. After that gap in recency reduces, it will be the good old supply VS demand game.

Although agree with most of this analysis there’s the issue of supply vs demand coming back and somehow levelling things out again. Sure they’ll need pilots again but the cuts the boys and girls have accepted to get their recency are permanent. Pay and conditions never went up with the laws of supply and demand. During the best times with strong unions we’ve managed to get an inflation adjustment plus half a percent. Taking a 20 percent cut is something you will never ever get back.
I have very little sympathy for people believing it is okay to work for free just to be in the game. It undermines the whole industry and every other pilot who stood up for themselves over the last years.

People who left the company this year: Head of Maintenance, Head of Ground Operations, Head of Operation Control Center, Head of Organization Development, Head of Internal Audit, Head of Financial Planning & Controlling, Chief Investment Officer, EVP/Group Chief Operating Officer, EVP/Deputy Chief Executive Officer. Things might not all be well then?

They are experts for good PR and media advertising... They entered domestic market in Norway and Italy with hope for good load factors however LF are really weak (20-30pax). Without government support I am not sure for how long can they last with current cash burn... And Varadi started secondary business recently... I hope they will survive this winter until demand starts picking up again. Maybe this is the point where Wizz Air will finally become socially responsible towards their employees and change their attitude towards the stakeholders and stop focusing on shareholders only.

Captain Salary at Wizz flying 3 days in November (10 days mandatory unpaid leave) = 2200 Euros.

I cannot imagine how much are making FO.

plus, bases in Eastern Europe than a Western Europe Pilot is hard to accept.

good luck Varadi and his team. Next months they are going to face what they created during pandemic.

TBSC

you forgot Pilot Recruitment Manager 🧐

jadrolinija

After two verdicts against Wizz Air by the Supreme Court in Romania, the airline is facing a further judicial blow. The Court is asking Wizz Air to admit defeat & publish the summary of those decisions in the national press & Wizz Air on-board magazine. The verdicts say Wizz discriminated against workers who tried to form a trade union and unfairly dismissed union representatives

Pearlharbour

I couldn't even count managers only Heads and above.
29 office positions are listed as vacant on their website at this moment, most of those for 3-4-5 months already. They can't find people even during these times for the pathetic compensation and conditions. El jefe told the press repeatedly that it's no problem if the office is understaffed because then the people need to prioritize their tasks to perform the most important 80%, the remaining 20% is unnecessary anyway. That's aviation for you. I'd say you better go for 100% when filing flight plans, arranging HOTAC, recording MELs, notifying crew members (just like disarming doors and performing stabilized approaches etc) but then again I must be too old to comprehend modern management practices.

Does anyone have some info on how they will handle the contracts for the Sankt Petersburg base? I doubt they will have the same system as in the EU or in Ukraine...

PilotLZ

Wizz is not looking for current hrs or flight in last 12 months. All they want is your current Airbus Rating with Hrs on Type, they invite random for assessments each week. But despite of it, they are only looking for holding pool. Usually they invite 8 experineced pilots. First day, they are going to do test, group exercise and interview. Usually this day 6 pilots will not pass. Next day is SIM check and psychometric test. Due to no demand at all, the pass rate is very low. In my opinion it would be better to do a skype interview like in the past and invite the candidates for sim afterwards. Otherwise its just waste of money and time to go there during the pandemic. (own experience)

Dont waste your money buying some prep. service online, all you need to know is ATPL by heart

Neufunk

That is going to be a tough nut to crack as i doubt they can pull the same stunt as in Norway with Polish crew flying out of their respective bases. No wonder the project has been postponed indefinitely.