getaway...

OK, I'm trying really hard to think outside the box, and at this point it seems to me that if you are going to be running a virtual airline then I think that you will find that you are going to need an AOC ..... refer S.15.20 of the CASA AOC Handbook Volume 2 - Flying Operations.

And if that's the case then you need to understand S.28 of the Act, which at this point I'm not so sure that you do. :uhoh:

And that all means that you are going to have a fair bit of working capital right from the outset to get your virtual airline up and running, which presumably you and your mates understand?

Yeah just to kickstart a career. In the meantime, just applying with Centrelink for jobseeker until something comes up. Willing to do anything to be honest! But your right, I don't have to start paying any of it back until I earn over a certain limit. I just didn't know what the expectation of a new pilot is nowadays. Whether you need to do some work experience in a remote area on no income or minimal wage. Hence the question...

Okay... well thanks for that. Will take the average of the opinions and will run with that.

Surely you researched these things before setting out on the career?

Ps, don’t work for free. Even a prostitute gets paid.

When aviation recovers there will be a lot of folks with new license in the queue.

How can you make yourself more attractive.

1. Build hours.. doesnt matter in what, 200hours in a light single will be 200 hours more than a lot of folks. Instructing for free hours may be an option depending on where you are.
2. Take up additional courses.. anything safety related is good, does not have to be aviation but should be recognized by national bodies. OSHA, work related safety, if anything these will help you give good answers in the interview in addition to giving the impression you're not sitting back and doing nothing. These course are usually provided at nominal costs.
3. If you have access to funds, a degree in aviation/aeronautics helps put you ahead of the pack.

I agree with the rest that offering to work for free is not good .. and you will be severely disadvantaged when it comes to the interview as there will likely be rated pilots looking for the same job. Good luck.

Anilv

Flying for free in China?
 

Hi guys so I qualified before lockdown and was wondering if anyone had any information on obtaining any unpaid overseas flying to build up some hours? Obviously right now I'm up to my eyeballs in debt (roughly 130k) I'm also no spring chicken (the hairline recession is beginning to scare away the opposite sex!) Haha so really I want to focus this period on obtaining some flying hours and it seems there's nothing to be found in the UK right now, I'm thinking of overseas opportunities where I could for instance be involved in flying livestock from places like the Far East and India, this would be of course 100% voluntary and unpaid if anyone has any info on whether there's an opportunity here to build hours or even if this is a good idea I'd appreciate it.

Thanks 👍

That isn't my experience. People I knew who either paid for commercial flying or for flew for free raced through the industry pretty quickly and were in QF or Regionals or good paying GA jobs faster than anybody else. It's all well and good to take the moral high ground on this issue, but those who did it in the past seemed to benefit pretty well from it. I have never actually heard of anyone being blackballed but certainly knew of 3 operators who threatened it but noone ever followed through.

The reason for this is that essentially Aviation Recruitment at EVERY level is fundamentally a box ticking exercise. If you don't have the minimum requirements (whatever they are) you will never be able to go anywhere regardless of how many 'hard yards' you've done. The guy with 250 hours ME Command for free is always going to beat the GA hero who has been all around the NT and FNQ but zero twin time no matter what a good bloke he is. That's just how it is unfortunately. I met or worked with at least 5 guys that I can remember in my GA days who had flown alot of twin hours either privately or for free, and everyone bitched about them but they were the guys who got the job because they had the hours in the logbook.

Exactly.

Anyone who works for free is a f***ing scab who deserves to fail

So you think people who do this sort of thing for a living should step aside so you can do it for free?

I have to say getaways posts are so ridiculous they have to be a wind-up, surely.

Unfortunately, Neville nobody is quite correct though. At least in the past (who knows what will happen now).
I know a few pilots whose wealthy parents paid for them to get an endorsement and hours in an “airline” environment, and all of them went on to careers in the majors, while the rest of us scrubbers battled it out in GA.
I remember all those ads in Flying magazine offering x hundred hours in a turboprop for $40k or whatever.

The truth is some people have always been able to buy themselves a job in this industry.
Maybe that will change now?

I doubt it. I still get people sending me resumes offering to work for nothing, or even offering to pay me to take them on; they go straight in the circular filing cabinet

Don’t worry China will not take you on, CAAC stopped issuing CPL’s to foreigners from 2012. You basically have to have an ATPL in order to even step into the Chinese market for foreigners. Especially in these current conditions, the market is already saturated with local airline pilots only flying once or twice a week domestically.

Goodluck looking elsewhere, but I’m pretty sure companies will raise an eyebrow if you are wanting to work for free. You would probably be better off with those pay for rating & hour schemes, which is better than fly for free. Just my pinch of salt.

At what point do you want to stop working for free and actually start earning to pay off that debt?

At what point do the companies then start paying for their pilots when there is a steady stream of desperate people willing to fly their aircraft for free?

Companies are run by accountants these days, give them a 'free' revenue reduction and they will bite your hand off and not change. The only one who loses is you and anyone else coming after you. Mind you you can always come on here lamenting on how those that have gone before have failed to protect the industries T's & C's whilst you work for less than peanuts!

All IMHO of course.

I have 15000 hours you can have. I presently have a sale 2 hours for the price of one! So 1500 hrs cost about $300k. For only $1.5m you can have my un-needed hours, it’s a win win👌

Flying "for free" does not make one a "scab".
it's not the way to go, but who among us hasn't ferried an airplane or 2 for a few beers after?
Lighten up to the newbies.

*Ring Ring*
"Hi there - Cessna 206 airways."
"Hello - I am a pilot and want to work for you."
"Great what will you bring to the company?"
"I'll work for free!"
"So - you'll bring nothing to the company?"
"No - I'll fly the aeroplanes."
"Yes, but you yourself value that at nothing. We have a significant economic exposure to bad flying - we have a serious, legal, responsibility to our passengers - and you value your flying contribution at "zero"??? .... thank you but you are obviously such a bad pilot risk that we don't want to be associated with you."

The sanctimonious hypocrisy of the profession makes me shake my head in dismay. Look at what’s happening in Hong Kong, all those A scalers on very lucrative contracts who derided the ones who joined on lesser contracts, all of them now rushing to sign contracts which when compared to their previous salary is like flying for free. Hubris has a way of biting you in the rear end.

That high moral ground is a slippery slope, beware when preaching from it.

Do I think flying for free is a good thing? Of course not. But I’d never belittle someone else’s desperation to pursue their dream.

Not sure why offering to fly for free is a bad thing! It's not that I intend to do it forever. I am just trying to get some initial hours to at least have a chance at a paid job. It has nothing to do with de-valuing what I can offer. I'm not a "bad pilot" or "unsafe." I have some friends that work as successful freelance graphic designers that told me they had to offer their services for free to get some initial reviews (then started charging thereafter). I know a personal trainer that worked with a few clients (for free) to get a few testimonies to start charging for his services. Working for free (initially) is very common in other industries so I think it is bizarre that it is frowned upon in this industry.

To take on so much debt should already demonstrate some kind of commitment to the game. Being in debt with no job does not feel good at all, with someone in our group falling into a mild depression/regret for having chosen this career path.

So thanks for the harsh replies.

Well lets hope you get a job in GA and spend the rest of your working life trying to scratch a living from it, you deserve it. Arsewipes have been flying for free, overweight, and unserviceable aircraft for 55 years that I know of and are responsible for the industry being the complete shambles it is. Did it ever occur to you to get a job first, earn some money and pay for your flying as you go, nah too hard right.? I think I would be depressed too if I was a member of your group.

The reason it is frowned upon is that once in the industry it is a constant battle to even just maintain existing conditions. Those of us who lived that fight for years dont appreciate the already small industry being flooded with attitudes of 'so what I'll just do it to get started'.

The problem is that next you go and fly for free to get that twin gig, next you pay for some turbo prop time, after that why not got and buy a jet job? By the time you and everyone else has done that the otherwise genuine operators rightly ask why should they pay at all.

You are better off putting your efforts into developing another skill set as you will probably need to draw on it at somepoint in your career anyway.

Sorry but no. This person wants to displace another newbie getting an opportunity to gain some experience and being properly rewarded for it, as humble as that reward maybe. He is not talking about a one of ferry.

You're welcome.

It was your choice to take on the debt, a huge investment in a volatile industry that presumably you did due dilligence on and understood the considerable risk, so why should others like myself who made the commitment by working four jobs simultaneously to pay for it as they went along be expected to give up their career for someone who chose to put themselves in that situation?

Your debt is your choice. If it is a VET debt than we flying taxpayers are already subsidising you. By deliberately setting yourself up to be under the threshold you are already getting a free ride apart from the indexation, isn't that enough? It's not like the bank is going to come along and take your house. My advice, get a trade and start contributing.

The other professions you mentioned are independent contractors. In aviation, it’s the nature of the business that you are always an employee. Totally different situations.

Which then leads back to the original problem of how do you get experience if all the 'professional' operators say you are to inexperienced? To be quite honest it's not even zero time pilots who work for free. Guys with 1000 hours fly for free just to get twin time. So if you take the moral high ground how do you get experience?

Get an FIC rating and start from the bottom. Don't work for free. A prostitute wouldn't work for free, you have a professional qualification.

You get the experience through persistence and networking, NOT by undermining your colleagues as you contribute to a race for the bottom.

The same skills that are required in any career.

Someone who will be ostracised by the staff is NOT going to be a valuable team member. The idea that they are being supported by a rich family doesn't really go down well, nor does the fact that there is a white ant in their midst.

And yet, as quoted by several posters above, they appear to be the ones that have surged ahead and got into the majors ahead of everyone else...

They are probably the first to bitch and moan about everything when they do get to the majors too.

That is true although I did check with Fair Work and if it's "vocational" then it's legal to work for free, whether you are an employee or a contractor.

Harsh! Taxpayers didn't subsidise my student loan debt in the long term. It's a debt I owe to the government indexed annually. It's not a donation from taxpayers. The whole point of taking on VET debt is to work in the aviation industry, earn above the threshold, and become an ordinary contributing taxpayer (which also slowly chips away at paying off the VET debt through my aviation career).

I don’t know much about VET, but you’re telling me that you pay the same interest rate that a bank would charge? If not, then yes, we are subsidising you.

I and many others worked our arses off to get our qualifications, and you just want to come in an undercut us all by “working for free, but only at the start”. How long does “the start” go for?

You're degrading your future profession, you’re preventing someone from earning a living and you have a lot to learn about professional integrity.

What about the legalities of insurance etc. when you prang an aeroplane and injure your passengers? You’re not a paid employee, so you most likely aren’t covered by any form of indemnity or hull loss insurance. I bet you’d argue that you are an employee, but watch a lawyer tear that apart in court and then sue you for millions.

Regarding your claim about friends who work in graphic design or whatever needing testimonials etc. Do you think you need that sort of crap to work as a professional pilot? Did you do any sort of research about your intended career path as a pilot? Do you understand your VET loan requirements and the fact that you don’t pay anything until you reach a certain threshold of income? Don’t cry to us that you’re “lumped with debt”. You’ve got a loan that doesn’t require repayments until you earn a certain amount.

What about those of us who have genuine debts like housing loans, and the cost of keeping a family going. You might be a long way down the chain from some of us, but if we get enough of you scabs volunteering to fly for free, it goes up the chain and then next thing you’re affecting my income.

It’s a very small industry buddy, and if people find out your name, then it’ll spread like a weed and your name will be dirt. You might work your way up through the industry no problem because of it, but it won’t be an enjoyable path because of the hatred people will have for you.

Yes, sounds harsh doesn’t it, but if you degrade my profession, then you deserve every criticism you get.

I sense your overreaction and paranoia that by offering to work for free (remember, initially!), that I am somehow effecting how much you are getting paid, "degrading" the profession, etc. I'm blown away by how wildly insecure some of the pilots are here about a few of us in my group that are looking at offering to fly for free when in other industries, it's normal. In other industries, working for free on a probationary period demonstrates dedication.

Please understand that none of us want to work for free. Some of us will be eating into our savings while we fly for free. We just feel we have no other choice to get a break in the industry, so we are going ahead with it.

Yes I did my research before getting into this industry but no amount of research prepared for the current pandemic. Flying for free probably wouldn't have been an option pre-pandemic but the economics have changed so we'll do a resume drop and see what happens.

Nigel's a scab. So is anyone else trying to rationalize working for free.

You're lazy and looking for a way to justify taking shortcuts the rest of us didn't. Like mentioned previously - your name will be made mud if you ever actually make it into a paid position.

However in reality that doesn't happen. You rock up at the twin operator with your 100+ hours of free/paid twin time and the twin operators says, "oh great someone who meets my minimum experience levels" You're hired. After a year there you have a job in a regional or doing mining charter in a twin turboprop. Next thing you know you're flying a jet. Meanwhile all your mates are still fighting over who does a ferry in the Baron to get some twin time.

End of the day noone cares how you got your experience as long as it isn't fake whether you got paid or not is irrelevant. That's just the reality of the situation. Aviation isn't a "good bloke" competition or who took the moral high ground it's all about who has the experience.

Further to all this would you blacklist AMES/LAMES/IT Professionals/Accountants/Lawyers/Plumbers/Carpenters who have offered their services for free just to get flying jobs? Are they scabs as well? How would the local accountant feel that he lost a client because some pilot/accountant did the accounts for free so that he can fly?

Hard to imagine anyone being so unaware! Aviation has always had more than its share of oxygen thieves, so why is this a surprise?

Its also hard to believe that there are the occasional posters here attempting to justify it too. Presumably some sort of scab themselves whose daddy pays for everything, or more likley a shonky operator that exploits newbies to undercut competitors in the first place.

Agreed. Go on Neville, tell us where you got your free hours. Scab

Neville @ post #20

No, that's your take on it to justify your scab behavior. You don't like being told your choices to undermine and shortcut in the industry means you are a scab in the eyes of your peers. That's the reality of the situation.
Clearly the amount of industry people posting here that you are trying to argue against should have given you a clue otherwise.

I have no idea what point you're trying to make here.