Self Funded Type Ratings

[Poontang Luva]

OSOP,

Not trying to insult you mate. Just seems its very hard for some people to see things from anothers POV, you know, walk in another mans shoe and all. Human nature is to look after ones self, as you are trying to do by attacking SSTR people. Why not embrace them to fight the greater cause? Strength in numbers and all that as they say.

I'm with Balpa and very much involved in trying to get better T&C's where i work. I would support a move to bonding though.

But hey good luck to you, personally i think the way your going about is all wrong as you have no perspective of what its like for the wannabee, I also think you can achieve more by not attacking you collegues and confronting the real problem. Try and look outside the box and get over the 'in my day we didnt pay for TR's' attitude. Adapt to the times. The game has changed, the rules have changed. Form a new plan.

Anyway all the best in your foolhardy adventure (if you continue), i'm sure you'll waste plenty of time and cause much undue stress to yourself.

Over and out!

[On speed on profile]

Pootang Luva,

I'm with Balpa and very much involved in trying to get better T&C's where i work. I would support a move to bonding though.

This is not going to be easy with guys fronting up for SSTR schemes of their own free will. If your company is a SSTR operator then they know full well that when it comes to industrial action, pilots who have sold them selves short already, are likely to do it again in the future and that means you will have trouble.

If you support a move to bonding, then why are you slating this thread. A move to bonding would be the best move by a long shot as it is fair to both sides while still recognising the pilots with experience! Geting rid of SSTR's is the obvious step to allow this to happen. You cant get rid of SSTR's until you start penalising those pilots that wish to purchase them.

That is my point, I want to know how we do that!

THAT IS THE POINT OF A RECRUITMENT BAN!

I also think you can achieve more by not attacking you collegues and confronting the real problem.

I have not attacked anyone in this thread! I have been vocal in other threads but this is a problem that I am very passionate about! If SSTR's arent the real problem then what is? It is not the companies that provide thems fault, they are trying to save money while making money for the shareholders. That is what businesses do! Its the deperate 'out of a jet job' pilots willing to buy them and the FTO's that convince them to get them into that position in the first place who are accountable.

Pootang Luva. From the sounds of it, a recruitment ban on those pilots who buy SSTR's scares you. Why is that? Have you brought a SSTR? You obviously value your BALPA membership so it seems like you have a lot to lose should something like this happen! This shows that this idea has some merit and is quite possibly the reason you are trying to convince me to end my enquiry! Please correct me if I am wrong.

OSOP

[potkettleblack]

So how do you treat those airlines that actively poach pilots who are type rated and trained by another airline? Surely using the arguments given above then the T&C's in the "poaching" airline should be better as they haven't spent the costs of training the said pilots. But it doesn't really work like that does it?

Airline pilots are just a cost same as cabin crew and maintenance and for most airlines are one of the largest figures in the P&L so naturally management will focus on ways of minimising this cost in order to raise profits. Whether this is encouraging SSTR's or taking away pensions, increasing working hours, taking away crew food etc etc.

Unions might help, strikes might help, BALPA membership might help but I wouldn't be putting all of the blame on SSTR's.

[Pizzaro]

Cheque book mightier than the log book. A sad inditement of our industry !!!

[On speed on profile]

Potkettleblack,

If an airline poaches a pilot who is bonded, then the pilot or the poaching airline will foot the bill of the poaching. Either way, neither company loses out. The thing is, the poaching airline will probably be paying the type of T's and C's that are worth being poached for. If people dont jump ship so much, companies have to pay more to retain the staff that they want. A rectruitment ban only affects the pilots directly. It affects the companies indirectly because they start getting the even more desperate pilots (who cant find a job) apply so basically they get the bottom of the barrel! Otherwise they would be employed!

Having said that, you hit the nail on the head with this quote:

Airline pilots are just a cost same as cabin crew and maintenance and for most airlines are one of the largest figures in the P&L

The thing is, you have a choice of being a cheap pilot who is helping the hen and stag parties of the low cost passengers get pissed for cheap in another country or a pilot who is paid what they are worth. Without pilots, an airline cant fly, full stop. C/C and maintenance personal are just as vital so we should be able to influence what happens to our Ts & Cs directly. While there are those amongst us willing to undercut the general pilot body, pilots will NEVER have a leverage over their companies. When pilots start to stand together, the only place managers have to look at cost cutting is themselves!

While people here are generally fairly negative about BALPAs response to articles like this, they are in the most part it seems, in favour of a move back to bonding. We can get BALPA to take notice if we all get together, they are there after all to look after the best interests of all their members. Even if some of you think they only serve the likes of BA, it is still of interest to them and you because Jo Bloggs with a brand new SSTR is going to jump ship early from his first company if BA offer him a slot. BA will be able to offer him lower Ts & Cs accordingly as he is cheaper than the other pilot they were looking at and that will eventually slowly but surely do to BA and others, what it is doing to the Lo-Co market. It is not restricted to the entry level airlines!

I think people miss what I am saying when I say we need a recruitment ban with regards to SSTR's. This would only affect the pilots who take them. A recruitment ban doesnt stop airlines from recruiting pilots. All it does is deny pilots who join the company concerned the ability to have (any) Airline Pilot Association membership and the benefits that those priveleges bring. It is not hard to implement but it makes those thinking of doing a SSTR think twice as they will never be able to have the benefits afforded to them as an Airline pilot ever in their careers. Not a nice prospect if they have a prang or are left out on a limb by an airline with no morals. Not that there are many of those now are there!

People, this is an industry wide problem that we all face together. Some of you are willing to under cut others to get up the ladder quicker. Some are not. For that reason, the pilot body will never be able to stick together solidly for one reason. The thing is, if we can get a ban put on those new pilots who chose to Buy an SSTR, we will at least be taking the first step to addressing the balance of power.

I am trying to work out a way of collecting those of us together that might be able to make a difference because that is the biggest hurdle. If I can get something to work, please stand up and be counted when you get the chance! The longer it takes, the harder we will have to fight!

[Ajax]

Mate you must be crazy if you seriously think a union ban would even be contemplated by the unions themselves, and even if such a thing was in place do you think it would be taken remotely seriously by the wannabe fraternity?

In fact the only time a union recruitment ban has been seriously tried in recent years was with Cathay and HKALPA, one of the most unionized airlines in the world, and the net result of the ban was it achieved nothing, hordes of people kept on queueing up to join their airline under the ban, the union recognized it wasn't achieving anything, the ban fizzled out, and the power of the union in that airline was all but broken as a consequence, certainly membership numbers are much lower now than they were beforehand.

An industry wide ban across an entire country / continent is just a daydream, especially at a time like this when union power is pretty much at an all time low, half the airlines in the world now don't even have union recognition, in fact such a move would only be playing straight into the hands of people like O'leary in my opinion.

Nope the only thing that will stop the rot, is when the inevitable happens, some captain becomes incapacitated and some bloke who's paying to sit in the RHS spuds a plane into the ground. Then we'll see the end of pay-for-training in a right old hurry I would imagine. The regulatory authorities don't really care about pilots crying over their eroding T&C's, but they'll move pretty damn quickly when there is a post-fatal-accident media circus.

In fact if BALPA ever do decide to take this issue seriously, and if I was the person in charge of determining the strategy, rather than attacking my own power base of future members, I'd far rather start a targeted campaign towards a few chosen influential media bodies, highlighting the safety shortcomings of the current system, where those with the money get chosen over those who are most experienced and suitable for the job. There are plenty of newspapers who love to run a good aviation scare story, turn them loose on it, release a list of airlines that operate pay-for-training schemes and those that don't, and let the public decide.

[On speed on profile]

Ajax,

the only thing that will stop the rot, is when the inevitable happens, some captain becomes incapacitated and some bloke who's paying to sit in the RHS spuds a plane into the ground.

Sadly for the industry and for the poor punters that are on the receiving end, this is the truest thing I have heard in ages and I have to admit, was something I was starting to wonder myself.

You have some other very interesting points.

Thanks.

OSOP

[potkettleblack]

If you really want to ensure that pilots T&C's are what they were in the "glory days" then there is only one real solution that I can think of - an MBO (management buy out). This would require the majority of the pilots in an airline to front up with however much it costs (min of six figures for a start I would have thought). You would then form a new holding company, write articles of association that state in minute detail how the company will be run and what percentage of profits goes to the pilots/pensions/reinvestment in capital etc. There would invariably be some cost savings due to wiping out the dividends paid to institutional investors and there would no longer be the need to make double digit growth or whatever else the city analysts put the board under pressure to achieve in the past. To swing this though would be a massive undertaking to say the least. Not least seeing just how many (or few) of your fellow pilots shared your same aspirations.

[20driver]

Spinning one in will certainly scare the public. I wouldn't hold my breath on the regulators blaming it in on some SSTR pilot though. Don't forget the regulators approved that pilot's license. I have thought for a long time that an effective PR campaign to let the public know that the right pilot contract can protect them might work. As far as the public is concerned all pilots are equal and flying any airline is 100% safe or the government wouldn’t allow it. (Actually not too far off the reality. Flying is safer and cheaper than it ever has being.)
Truth is if pilots, and other skilled labor groups want to get more $$$ they need to change the way the do business. Pilots do not have the chock hold they may have once had because the industry has moved away from being a regulated cost plus utility. Pilot training is also much more available than in the past. 30 years ago the only way to get it was through the military or an airline. No longer the case and that genie is not going back into the bottle.
Company bargaining is dying because managers can play one pilot workforce against another. The senority structure of airlines works against labor mobility and managers know this.
BALPA or ILPA could get some real leverage if they developed an available pool of trained pilots ready to go to work tomorrow for whomever meets their terms. The pilot union with leverage needs to get into the business of training and bonding pilots to be made available to contracted airlines. Don't sign our deal you don't get our pilots. A return to the old guilds system if you will.
Properly done, with realistic expectations and not the we will choke the chicken till we get the last egg attitude of the past such a plan could work. It would mean senior pilots giving something up, basically seniority, and helping fund this scheme. Certainly has a better chance than trying to tell the newbies at the bottom, go starve for an indefinite number of years to protect our T&C and maybe someday we’ll let you in.

Sorry, got to go, pigs are flying.

[arewenearlythereyet?]

I'd hate to think how long an airline would last if some of the posters on here were ever to run them. The naivety of some on this thread is bewildering, considering that some of you are actual airline pilots and hence, by definition, are of at least middle management rank in your companies.

Comments as petty and stupid as "the only thing that will stop the rot, is when the inevitable happens, some captain becomes incapacitated and some bloke who's paying to sit in the RHS spuds a plane into the ground." only serve to show how ill thought out and innocent in the ways of the world some of you are. At least those of us with a modicum of experience, both airline and of the world, know that there is never one single cause of an airliner crash. If an F/O, SSTR or otherwise, "spuds" one into the ground, with casualties or not, it will ultimately be the captain who shoulders the ultimate responsibility for letting the situation get so out of control in the first place. Of course, the angry brigade will probably claim that the captain was SSTR'd also!

All this talk of recruitment bans and "penalising" those wannabes who have SSTR'd is a total waste of time and energy. You should be canvassing the CAA and the regulatory bodies, not your fellow pilots. You should be ashamed for trying to stir up resentment just because you feel that way. Get your priorities right and get the regulations changed rather than pick on your fellow pilots just because they did what they could to get on that rung of the ladder below you.

[Clandestino]

Don't know about UK but in my bananaland it is illegal to pay for your trainning to company that employs you and only TRTOs around are airlines themselves. Despite it, SSTRs were introduced couple of years ago to everyone's delight. It's actually the same situation as with prostitution and heroin dealing - as long as there are demand and supply, no law will stop it.

[On speed on profile]

arewenearlythereyet?,

When a SSTR pilot, with minimal experience and who may or may not be paying for his/her line training is faced with an incapacitated captain, lets hope the inevitable doesnt happen! If it does happen, and it means that the regulatory bodies have a rethink of their policies, well then maybe it was a price that shouldnt have been paid in the first place.

The point of this thread was not to 'stir up resentment' for SSTR pilots. It was to debate the avenues open to all pilots to help level the playing field when it comes to getting better Ts and Cs. While the SSTR is a major cause of lower Ts and Cs, it seems an obvious thing to get rid of if we are to see the balance return.

If you have any ideas, we are all waiting to hear them as some of us here are trying to address the imbalance and get the regulations changed with regards to SSTR's. This thread wasnt designed to debate the pros and cons of the SSTR or anyones personal opinion of the pilots that buy them!!

How do you suppose we canvass the CAA if we cant get everyone together or at least find out who will support the cause?

[Toadie]

I thought I would post my experiences of SSTR's. I appreciate that I made a silly move - please appreciate that I am posting this to give a first hand account of the potential problems. It is embarrassing to admit to be so foolish, but in doing so hopefully I can prevent others making the same mistake.
Having considered a SSTR I decided I would not proceed unless some work was attached to it. I understand the arguements of queue jumping and buying a job - but from my own earned income I had the choice to pay for a rating. No rich parents, just my own sweat and effort.
I was assessed for a position with an expanding low fares airline and offered a job flying a nice shiny jet, subject to funding and passing my self funded type rating. To rub salt in the wound they then also bond you for two years on a non-decreasing basis to cover your additional 'training costs'.
I had some reservations about the lack of paperwork, but was told by the course provider that this was normal for this airline, but they had always delivered and to trust them. The provider was not linked to the airline.
I parted with my money and joined the course, only to be told on joining that the start date had been slightly delayed. During the course no further paperwork was provided -except an email confirming we would be offered jobs upon completion of the course.
After passing the LST we notified the employer and rolled straight into the base training. License issue was done immediately.
Then silience from the employer. The key guy was not available, no comments or commitments could be made.
To cut a long story short after chasing we received an offer two whole months after completing the course, and the start date was set for a month after that. To top it all off, for the 'further training' such as wet drills CRM etc we have to pay our own transport and hotel. The terms of the initial offer were also slightly amended.
Some may say that as we elected to 'prostitute' ourselves by spending the money, we got what we deserved. However I feel that this is slowly the direction that SSTR's are going to go. The job market for pilots is picking up, and it makes good commercial sense for airlines to not pay for training. With people thinking they will wait to see if they can get a 'proper' job the training providers/airlines have to be slightly more creative in how they pull the punters in. Offering a job and using that to get people committed is one approach they can use.
The same airline a couple of weeks ago got a friend in for interview. The Head Office was some distance away and he required travel, hotel etc for the interview. He passed the interview and was told they wereinterested in him, but not til next year as they were fully crewed. The question is why waste people time and money? My experience of them is that they hold no value for their employers, and the respect and feeling of belonging that should go with the job is lost - this devalues the opportunity to the point where I wish I had not bothered, and do not want anything to do with them as an employee.
I think the moral is buyer beware, and that any company asking you to part with money to join them is going to treat you badly. By offering and actually paying you devalue yourself in their eyes, and give them the opportunity to hold you to ransom, mess you around and give you no respect.
The market is changing, and other opportunities came my way through the period of training and afterwards. From speaking to friends who have gone along the normal route (airline paid for rating with bond), their experience has been much better. They feel more involved in the company, more in the structure and better cared for. After spending so much training, it is a shame to go to your first job resenting your employer, it taks the edge and excitement of what should be such a fine point in yor career.
Any ramble over!
Toadie

[IDENTING]

“When a SSTR pilot, with minimal experience and who may or may not be paying for his/her line training is faced with an incapacitated captain, lets hope the inevitable doesn’t happen” I’m afraid this might be one of the most stupid points I have ever seen made.
Why on EARTH would someone who’s self-funded a TR be any less able to cope under the pressures of an incapacitated captain than someone who’s been given/ bonded a TR? Does the fact that someone who is willing to SSTR somehow make them severely dyslexic? The amount of effort, dedication and determination required to SS a TR is exactly what makes up the kind of person I want sitting at the front 100 tons of metal. A decrepit old captain about to suffer incapacitation isn’t. Just to get on an SSTR you have to go thru the same selection as you would with most airlines, even harder if you go thru the likes of CTC etc. I know loads of pilots who got in with airlines that paid/bonded their TRs because of who they knew, the only selection being an interview. I also know of loads of pilots who got on SSTRs but first had to do rigorous aptitude tests, math tests, aircraft tech tests, group exercises and then finally a sim check before starting the rating and handing over £24k.
If anyone could simply “buy” a TR then I could see your point.

[Clandestino]

Originally Posted by IDENTING

The amount of effort, dedication and determination required to SS a TR is exactly what makes up the kind of person I want sitting at the front 100 tons of metal

And money, you've forgotten the money

[African Drunk]

I was an IR instructor at a large uk school and argued for years against buying SSTR. When however the pilots who listen to you watch other far less suitable students get jobs, because oftheir cheque books, you realise it is unfair to make them take a stand. You have to use the senior pilots to fight against this if the TRE's at a company refused to train SSTR pilots the companies would take notice, it worked in the US.

[jayteeto]

Are you boys and girls prepared to pay my 130 grand mortgage while I hold out my principles and dont get a job??
Get real, you do what you have to...........

[Clandestino]

...and that can be read as: "I'll do anything that's required to get and keep my job, even if it involves copious quantities of KY gel"

[haughtney1]

Or onthemove picture this.......bide your time, continue to build your experience..build a base that is as marketable to just about any reputable airline on the planet, and hey presto get offered a job without laying out a penny...500hrs go by in 7 or 8 months..then your free of everything, and just as marketable
But then you numpteys that have been sold the "zero to hero dream" would never stand for that would you?..it involves something called hard work

[haughtney1]

How should one continue to bide ones time building experience when you cant get a job in any commercial aircraft in the first place - in the mantime trying to keep the hand in flying or going back in the sim each month to try and remain semi current (also costing money). ?? (Genuine question)

Instruct perhaps?...(desperate shortage at the moment) get off ones arse..(and off PPrune) get out there, make yourself known..and hunt down that job (you would be amazed at the number of people get their first big break that way) by putting yourself in the right place at the right time. Again you would be amazed how successful this can be..if your prepared to put the effort in