Those considering Emirates

[theidler]

1/ US airline in bad shape.

2/ 11 year Captain hears about airlines in the Middle East where he can hold onto his command.

3/ Looks on PPRuNe to find out more.

4/ Sees posts about declining conditions at these airlines.

5/ Thinks pilots whinge and whine everywhere so it can't be true.

6/ And anyway he's joining on Captains terms so he's ahead of the game.

7/ Signs up to PPRuNe and writes belittling post about his future colleagues.


And if he's getting 55% on his investments wtf is he still doing in this dying industry anyway.

[mensaboy]

''I have been flying twenty years...
Airline flying 13 of them...
Captain almost 11 of them...
All in the US...''

I think the beginning of your post adequately explains why you have this point of view.
11 years as Captain at airline, out of 13. How fortunate for you, congratulations. Your nice little sheltered career in the US is going to look awfully good to you after your arrival here. ''Roger that, undershtand cleared down 24 OH !''

''The guys and girls that are happy are never on the posts...
It is always the naggers... good googly moogly...''

I am happy and I post here, therefore I singlehandedly prove you wrong.

''Someone is always pissed and spends more time complaining than fixing the problem...''
There is no avenue to fix any problem one might have at EK. You will learn that fast enough after your impending arrival. Will you be running for the head of our Union?


''If inflation is bad... (1) every pay cheque move your money to a hard currency and stop it from devalueing... (2) If the retirement funds are so conservative and earning slow rates contribute less... see point (1) and invest privately in foriegn markets earning 55% plus.''

You are not a logical thinker. 1-How does moving cash to a hard currency decrease the affects of inflation? 2- there is a bottom line contribution so that advice is irrelevant 3- can you give me a list of those 55% plus markets???

''But I swear... all you complainers went to the same flight school because you are all on every airlines bulletin boards.''
What exactly does that mean? So every poster on every board for every airline, went to the same flight school?


''You rot your own mind with the sh*t you fertilize it.''
Must be a pleasure spending a red-eye next to you.

So to sum up. You are a brilliant investor, a pilot who has spent a whopping 2 years in the right seat at an airline, with an apparently 'blessed' career path, who feels it necessary to criticize and belittle anyone who posts a complaint on an airline forum................. YET YOU ARE LEAVING YOUR STORIED CAREER BEHIND to join as a DEC........ and at an airline that should never have started a DEC policy!

On behalf of the rest of us whingers and complainers, I would like to welcome to EK the next Captain America!

Guys like you really do make me feel smart. Thanks for your intelligent and well thought-
out post, haha.

ps. Good post rj274

[SOPS]

"All of them in the US".....here comes another one!!

[GoreTex]

rj, remove your post, you give americans a bad name, now poeple think all americans are stupid which is not true.

[mensaboy]

I think you got that wrong Goretex. rj's post was excellent. The post from spidermoth is the amusing one.

[Trader]

Heard from recruitment guy that DEC are done for now - no more hiring of DEC's in for the next while anyway!

[gl69]

DECs

Do you really believe what the company tells you? When was the last time they told the truth? How many times have they told us no more DECs? As sure as the sun will come up in the east tomorrow Emirates will hire DECs just to further lower morale.

[Wiley]

SpiderMouth.. sorry, Moth, I had a friend who spent three years as a military recruiter. He said 99% of potential recruits had one thing in common - they heard only what they wanted to hear, and simply blanked out or ignored anything he told them that didn't fit into the mindset they had when they walked in the door, hell bent on putting on a uniform.

Six months down the track, a large proportion of them were bitching that things weren't as rosy as promised - despite the fact that he had clearly spelled out all the pitfalls and shortcomings of the system they would without doubt experience.

I had a similar experience in my time in the military when I found myself in a position of interviewing and selecting enlisted men for airmen aircrew positions. (Most applicants had spent three or four years in the Service in non flying jobs.) My speech to successful candidates went along the lines of: "If you have a really important family occasion, an anniversary, a child's school prize giving, a wife's birthday, I can almost guarantee you that you'll be away on detachment at the time or sent way on a trip the day before the big event. Have a talk with your wife (if there was one) and make sure she understands this, and if either of you can't handle that, this job isn't for you.."

To a man, the applicants would nod sagely and assure me they understood and were willing to accept that. ...and six or 12 months down the line... you guessed it. "We didn't know... Why weren't we told... I wasn't expecting it to be like this..."



Of course, with your (excuse me as I pause here to gasp in admiration) 13 years airline experience, 11 of those years as a captain, none of the above will apply to you. Welcome to the Sandpit. The lads in head office are gonna love you. But you'll really need to be creative to have them love you more than they already love your countryman Brian. (A perhaps cryptic comment you'll all too quickly come to understand after you get here to take up the DEC position [at least you consider] you so richly deserve.)

[7x7]

I have been flying twenty years...
Airline flying 13 of them...
Captain almost 11 of them...
All in the US...

I am applying to Emirates...

We're saved!!!

Bloody septics. Their main problem? They don't know that they don't know.

[silverhawk]

Gillegan

Re-sizing the photo did work, thanks very much.

At last the application is finally submitted.

[Londonlads]

"Crew scheduling remembers everyething and writes it all down on your personal page."

Scarey! Scarey stuff! I would have thought that was the case with most airlines as it's probably very difficult to remember each and every employee! It even happens at BA! Yes! Believe it or not!

[RFusmoke]

Spidermoth

great post...I can almost hear your southern droll whe I read ittttt!!!

now what eye wan d to no is what are you wastin your time answerin all thes dere criters on PPRUNE when you could bee hedgin all that dere mone of yours on oil or some thin ???

[vlatkomk]

Hello! I've been reading positive and negative opinions here for only a few days so please don't attack or be presumptuous about how much I know or don't know or how smart or stupid I am.
I would like to express my view on how I see this situation and I need your input, as objective as possible, on where you think I am right or wrong.

The way this job (F.O) is described on EK's website, it seems ideal to me - the "2 month regional pilot" with a min $720 paycheck every two weeks. I think it would help, when you express your opinions, to explain the background you come from and compare and contrast what is so great/awful at EK compared to your past work experiences.

Being from a not so smoothly functioning country in Southeastern Europe (Macedonia) I know that I would be used to the lack of liberty of impact on company policies/decisions/actions/justice/fairness so that is one thing won't bother me working for EK. The US is not much better. I work for one of the top 3 regionals in the US and in the 2 months of being there I have already seen the company override the contract in several occasions such as displacing pilots out of seniority after a base closed and so forth. So as far as EK's integrity goes, or any other's, you will be stepped on no matter where you go. I've accepted this, check in the box.

As far as living in Dubai goes, I have already made a huge cultural leap when I moved to the US as an exchange student at 16 (now 25). So I have already dealt with what most people refer as a "cultural shock" (which I never experienced) so It wouldn't be as hard to do it again. Drivers where I come from don't really comprehend the term defensive driving as it is anyway so little details such as that wouldn't really bother me as much. Males staring down other females (or even other males) as if it was mating season is another phenomenon I am very much accustomed to.

As far as money goes, I think that a starting salary of approx. $75,000 tax-free with majority of expenses paid is a very genenerous salary. For the skeptics that may claim it gets taxed when you bring it back in the US, it doesn't - as long as you spend 330 days out of the 12 months of the year you are exempt. So if you spend 5 years in Dubai stashing most of this money away, not to mention your vesting fund, which if honored at 12% contribution should bring you a nice chunk of savings.

43 days off a year? Who can beat that? (other than cathay) I think it's not bad if you can't take more then 3 weeks consecutively off. Would you be able to do that anywhere else? A handful of places.

I'm gonna stop listing EK benefits as I'm sure most of you are much more familiar with them then me. My attempt here was to present my view, and my view only. I don't think I am right or wrong neither do I think that anybody else is right or wrong. My point here was to show that a negative thing for you may not be such a bad thing in my opinion. I understand if you think that's stupid just because It doesn't agree with your view. But RJ made a good point when he said this is everybody's perception of things and a collection of views. So I invite you to give me yours. And more importantly I would like you to elaborate more and possibly document some of your points, such as company provided housing with maybe some pictures of the areas where you live, the interior, exterior, surrounding area etc. or just pictures from everyday life. What are some ranges of rental fees for, apartments, condos, houses, villas or any type of common housing that is in the Dubai area, in particular, areas popular for westerners or EK pilots.
What does DHS 10,565 in housing allowance a month get you? Do you only get this for a year? Are you on your own afterwards? Is health coverage free? Sounds like a good deal. What is flying pay? Is this additional to your monthly salary of Dhs 22,720 a month or is it calculated in it? What about productivity pay?
The website gives very poor description of some of the benefits and I don't see any posts that discuss these things at length. All I see is you guys bickering over who's sees what

Please, do not criticize my post, as it is a waste of all of ours' time. I would love to read what you have to add as long as it is informative, not just your general opinion. Opinions are good as long as they are objective, which we as humans are rarely capable of producing

[Saltaire]

Your situtation is not unlike the hundreds and more every month it seems, looking seriously at EK. From your point of view being very young at 25, and flying a small regional jet making just enough to party on the weekends, it seems like a very good deal. And much of it is....however, it is perspective and most of the new hires are older with families in tow with perhaps with more to consider. EK still has a minimum requirement and with more and more from the US applying I would guess recruitment will become more competitive. As it should, some of the new recruits are fairly inexperienced... having said that, "what the heck", if EK gives you the opportunity, who could fault you at 25 coming from a US feeder.

[White Knight]

Fatbus - summer leave has NEVER BEEN A GIVEN....... Did you take it as such?

[GMDS]

vlatkomk

We can all see where you're coming from and fully understand that the EK conditions must look like a bargain to you. Let's not forget however that earlier EK wanted to attract experienced pilots, LHS or RHS, mainly WB experience in their CV. With a few exeptions only bigger carriers provided such experience, so in order to reach these guys they had to set up similar T&Cs. With the need for more pilots and not enough trickling in, they lowered the requirements to get the numbers, therefore tapping into a pool who was not used to decent salaries. These might tend to regard the complaining EK pilots as whingers, but consider the above and you will see that the starting point is very different.

Just seize this opportunity right now, because i think with the downturn in global commercial aviation, there will again be a lot of more experiened pilots available! I believe EK will go for them, mainly because the higher training and failure rates the less experienced actually demonstrate mean higher cost.

Best luck

[Itswindyout]

Just do it

Cut to the bottom line, it is great fun here. Life is good, OK, some problems, but who gives a flying F.

I am not with EK, but spend a lot of time inside their brain.

glf

[mensaboy]

Vlatkomk,

If I were you, I would be here in a heartbeat if given the opportunity.
Best of luck!

[Fart Master]

Gee, thanks, that really helps.

You spend a lot of time inside our brains..........huh!!

[MrMachfivepointfive]

???????????????? Haven't started yet? Spent there about 20% of my life and am about Jeremy Clarkson's age.