OAL after resignation
 

Not sure if it has been mentioned before but once you resign, whilst still entitled to staff travel, you will need to go to HQ to pay for your EK tickets. This is well known however if you are wondering what happens to OAL bookings here it is.
The payment is taken from your credit card so no need to run to HQ and more importantly if during your last 3 months, you happen to be away on days off, wanting to
come back but with no seats on EK, you can still enjoy a better fare than having to pay in full.

If you use myidtravel to book oal tickets then yep can use credit card to pay. We booked 3hrs before departure, no problems at all. If, however, the airline you wish to use doesn't appear on myidtravel but is on the oal list in trips then there is no option to use credit card. I believe you can still book tickets through trips but it has to be approved by an office minion. Unfortunately there were none in the office over eid when I needed them 😡

Zeds and retiree id cards
 

Been out for some time now and just looked on the staff travel website as a retiree. It's all as advertised, offering EK subload and firm tickets per my entitlements.

Two questions:

-At some stage does that website open up access to Zeds? When? At a certain age?

-At some stage do I get a card identifying me as retired staff? It seems it would be useful with hotels, car rentals, etc.

DtP

Dropp,

Its also been a while since I baled out, but I believe that the the Retired Staff ID card is issued when you hit "Normal Retirement Age", which for those of us who joined many years ago was 60;I seem to recall that it was subsequently changed to 65 at some stage, but I'm open to correction about that.

I don't want to put a dampener on your expectations of hotel discounts, but I've yet to find a hotel or major hotel chain which will give the travel industry discount with a "Retired Staff" ID. I've tried most of the majors - Sheraton, Hilton, Marriott, Intercon etc with no luck. In one case (Hyatt in Melbourne), the reservations agent on the phone gave us the discounted rate, but the Receptionist on check-in called the Duty Manager when she saw "Retired" in big letters on the ID card and he politely refused it - current staff only eligible, which is the usual response. We had to pay the best available public rate. I'd be very interested to hear other retirees experience with this.

Never tried it for car rental. It does work very well in getting sometimes huge discounts for cruises - visit dargal.com or vacationstogo.com , both of which also offer limited hotel discount deals to retired staff, but these tend to be north America resort oriented in my experience - Mexico, Vegas etc

The ZED Fares access kicks in after reaching both normal Retirement Age and the anniversary of date of leaving, if I remember correctly. Its all in the staff Travel Manual somewhere - maybe a buddy still in EK could look it up for you to get chapter and verse.

7B

Does anyone know if when you are filling the " Manage Leaving Process " application, the part requiring to submit a quote for your cargo, requires you to submit the quote from the company you will be using on the day ?

My thinking being that perhaps I will happy with one quote but later on, find a better company to deliver my goods. I am thinking of looking abroad in fact ( with a local partnership ).

Thanks

From what I understand it's not critical to put the company you will eventually use. There are parts of the form that must be filled out before submission, like repatriation date and cargo company, but I spoke to my coordinator and she said those can be amended afterwards.

Cheers.
Coordinator... I am not used to it yet 😀😀😀.

I believe the reason for the spot on the webpage to submit the quote is if you are trying to obtain an advance on the repatriation allowance. Otherwise you can submit the final invoice later - which actually works better since you'll have the final amount not an estimate. As mentioned it doesn't really matter which company it is as long as it is a legitimate invoice and within the allowable limit, which varies depending on where you're repatriating to (the entitlements per region are in the Staff Travel Manual, not the Employee Handbook).

I had the full amount reimbursed on my final pay, no issue.

You can use one of the companies approved by EK and they will pay them directly-even easier.

When you have the final quote you upload it and you get an approval within the same day

JNPS have close look at the exchange and bank transfer rates thru multiple currencies. Your plan looks like at least a 3-4% haircut depending on bank rate. The banks do not give the best rates and never send money from Friday to Sunday as that will cost you an additional 1-2%. They use a lower rate to protect themselves in case of currency drop when they are on the golf course figuring how to steal more money.

The retention money plus outstanding money - that included the 2015-16 profit share was all paid out to me as advertised. They state 10 weeks for the payment and that is exactly what happened in the interest of fairness. I did prompt the recruitment coordinator but they were on the ball and certainly no issue at all.

Thanks for the information Olster.

Am getting close to 8 weeks since I left and still waiting for the retention money plus last 2 months of provident fund contributions.

In fairness they said 8 to 10 weeks and everything else was OK with my exit.

Just short of 10 weeks before I got my retention...

Wow, this thread really shocks me. I recently graduated from university and if someone was to ask me "What would be your dream job?" my answer, without hesitation would be a "Emirates 777 pilot" and I've given the same response for the past decade in my life.

It really shocks me that this thread even exists, I can't seem to understand why so many people would want to leave. Anyone care to explain? :(. Also, how did you go abouts getting into EK in the first place, I've been looking for years but it has always seemed EK require qualified pilots with a lot of real jet flying experience to even be considered (unless you are a UAE national).

Oh for goodness sake, read the rest of the thread pages if you want to know why people are leaving.... It's not rocket science.

Thanks bittersweethart

Has anyone left lately with an outstanding personal loan, and if so did you have to leave your provident fund in the bank. Will be leaving in a couple of months.
Thanks guys

777GE90, they really must close Costa.

Closing Costa would be the final abandon the ship call...

Finally I got my retention money on week number 11 !!!