CTC are never going to invite line pilots to provide the truth.

Its a business, first and foremost; they have no interest in these people, other than their money.

Just watched the latest CTC SCAM video. To all you people out there thinking of signing up to this shower, do some proper research. Go to your local airport and talk to actual cadets!! hell just ask them on this forum!!! You and probably your parents are being taken to the cleaners just so you can sit at the front of a shinny jet and get paid/treated like s**t. :ugh::ugh:

Saw the video.

I know one person that was mid 20's who went through CTC as a cadet, joined the orange airline and was laid off after 6 months. He soon went bankrupt for over 100K to wipe his debts. CTC would not help him as they did not want to affect the relationship with the orange airline.

After some guidance from the older generation of pilots, he later found a job and renewed his type rating via another organisation.

The video mentioned the selection being hard, actually some have get through and still fail / drop out. Its not 100%. I had to work for it via the modular route whilst having a full time job and never did any selection for training. I think that is harder and more dedicated if you want it. Especially when doing those ATPL exams distance learning or an IR lesson after a hard days work when you cannot borrow all that cash.

I have a background of I.T and software. I know of software companies that write selection software and charge per test. e.g Compass or similar. Theirs a industry around selection and the cadet is charged for the selection because the school or an airline has often pay the software company per test for each student. The test results get sent to a central server at the software company and the pass mark or bar can be set to the required value. The results sent back to the software company has all statistical data from the various training or airline organisations around the world.

CTC charge the airline a large sum each month for those cadets and the cadet gets a crap monthly salary. They are also blocking those people who are in turboprop jobs with experience being able to move up to the next level or even those on jets changing operators.

The chief pilot in the video mentioned statistics for pilot recruitment in the future. What he failed to really state was the statistics for those required in Europe, constraints of requiring perhaps a specific license such as FAA instead of EASA to apply for a job or anything regarding other requirements such as being a national of a country, speaking a foreign language etc.

Asia / China will need their pilots trained and this will be where CTC will focus their business on. The BA scheme being talked about, in the small print, the debts still in your name I heard ... not sure if that is 100% but something worth checking.

I would have hoped the banks would have closed in on CTC to make it harder for people to get the money. Especially with the ratio of salary you earn against the debt to pay back when you start. Perhaps then it would create a shortage or stop the further borrowing for a type rating if a airline require it. Oh well :)

You can expect more 6 month appointments followed by the scrap heap in easyJet too. There isn't much expansion next year so not enough space for all these wannabes. I'm surprised nobody has put Trading Standards onto CTC for selling a myth. I wouldn't be surprised if the EJ/CTC relationship becomes tenuous either in the coming months. I hear Balpa have legal plans afoot over flexi-slaves.

It is highly unlikely that an enthusiastic young person, who has dreamed of becoming an airline pilot and who has supportive parents that are wealthy enough to be able to help out financially, is going to be dissuaded by anything that is written on PPRuNe.

However it is clear that all future graduating courses will not only be offered only the eight month training contract (and nothing more) but will be gradually superceded by the MPL cadets from OAT.

Vacancies at easyJet, for the forseeable future, will only arise through attrition. The numbers of new graduates who will reach the dizzy heights of "flexi-crew" will be very few and far between indeed.

As far as I am concerned there's only one CP of OAA MPL cadets and they are starting their TR the following Spring...

I am sure EZY will need more than 12/24 pilots a year, and I am sure many of them will be offered more than the 8 months training contract, as it has happened before (not always, but more often than what many people here).

My understanding is that 2012/13 will be a poor year for recruitment but 2013/14 will be much improved. There are also many unknowns between now and then - expansion plans (if any), attrition, BA recruitment etc. There are currently a number of our Captains working out their notice to go to Virgin Atlantic and Emirates. Whilst these are not enormous numbers, the trickle is there and I would expect that to increase rather than decrease. Underlying all this is a battle over the future of flexicrew which is being fought out behind the scenes between the Union and Management. There are, therefore, many permutations which make recruitment plans difficult, if not impossible, to predict.

Ecam and vik: There are 4 MPL courses

..and 10 joining through an internal sponsorship programme.

For those hoping to do a bit of time as slave-labour at EZY, and then apply to BA are going to be very disappointed. The current annual bid results show that we are seriously over-crewed due to the BMI merger. The Airbus SH fleet is over-crewed, along with a few of the LH fleets. There are a handful of spaces reserved for FPP cadets, but no DEP recruitment on the horizon during 2013.

I take it from the video the reason why they had the Emirates guy there is to mitigate the concerns of what happens when EZY let their cadets go, but I do believe you need 2,500hrs in a jet. Anyone actually believe that guy looks through CVs, when they have an online application form eh? He must be up for retirement soon.

You really want to spend the next 35 years working in the sandpit?

CTC have completely ruined the career as an airline pilot in the UK. It sounds as though they are out to do the same in other parts of the world.

If you enjoy it out here then yes!....although at my age it won't be anywhere near 35 years.

Eternal golf in the sun, wonderful.

You really want to spend the next 35 years working in the grey drizzle, being stuck on the M25?

I've done both - have you?

Yes, I have worked and lived in the Sandpit, although in a more punitive state than the UAE. It's the people in their big leather chairs with fancy offices which end up driving you insane, as well as the three or four tier social and legal system.

It's only grey and dull up to 6000ft or so. The sun was shining last month too. :ok:

turbine 100 - your description of your mate who was laid off for the winter brought tears to my eyes. Yours is only one very limited perspective however. By going bankrupt when he clearly did not need to do so he has stuffed a whole generation of future pilots by the ultimate application of the, 'Its all about me' principle. Here is a young guy who knowingly takes on a loan for £100k with HSBC or someone, and goes into the airline game knowing all the risks. He then gets a type-rating on the Airbus plus a few hundred hours before being given a few months off. Every other guy in his position worked in the Co-Op, bars, fast food restaurants, Tescos etc and just hung in there. Not your boy. He played the system and got before some numpties at a bankruptcy hearing to convince them he had no money or any likelihood of getting any. Surprise, surprise and a few months later he has his rating renewed, a new job and flying Airbuses again. Great news though - no debt! By doing what he has done he has stuffed countless people from less well off backgrounds who had no rich parents but were desperate to get into aviation. HSBC understandably pulled the plug when they saw what could happen and now only rich kids get into flying. That is truly the ultimate, 'I'm all right Jack' story.

A very naive position I'm afraid.

To repay that level of debt and actually afford to rent a room, keep a car, buy food etc you would need at least a £30k - £35k job. Very very difficult if it's clear on your CV that you would be out the door at the first sniff of a flying job. Have you seen the state of the economy these days? It's actually difficult to get a job *anywhere*:

Graduate salaries down on previous year

None of these guys were particularly excited about going bankrupt - you can pay as much as you like per month into the HSBC unsecured loan but at 6 months arrears (so about £6,000) they sold your debt to a collection agency. This would eventually lead to bankruptcy.

Note that easyJet choosing to stop their traditional route (6 months on £1,000pm and then onto a cadet scale but then £1,000pm tax free) was the death of the unsecured loan - and of any decent route into easyJet.

If anybody asked me how to become an airline pilot these days I would say either:

1) Do the BA FPP scheme and go to Jerez because it's significantly sunnier than The Tron!

2) Don't do it. It's a futile exercise pandering to a company's whim with no respect whatsoever in the opposite direction. You're plain and simply an unfortunate cost to be managed.

I do hope all you hopefuls/dreamers are paying attention to the recent Balpa video message!!

Balpa Video Message
 

Indeed, it is a very interesting watch for prospective pilots, current pilots and the general public.

easyJet recruitment 2013
 

What's the outlook like for the coming year then? I see both PARC and CTC are still advertising quite keenly.

Grim unless you want to be a contractor for several years. Avoid.
Crew are great but Management are Ryanair.. Only worse. They want to beat Ryanair at their own game and will stop at nothing to drag ezy into that gutter.
Avoid.

OK, that's granted but would you say there is a genuine man-power issue regardless of the fact that the powers that be are trying their best to increase the Contractor vs Perm employee ratio? Would appreciate an honest answer to that. Thanks

They have **** Portuguese contracts in both seats a la Ryanair. They use Parc in the same manner as Ryanair use Brookfield. They will impose new entrant contracts that look nothing like those currently in existence. Their management aspire to Ryanair. They will ring fence existing expensive crews and have them marginalised within a few years. It looks feels and carries the unsavoury smell of Ryanair to me. Wake up- it's happening under your nose.