EK advertising on radio for pilots!
 

Whatever next. Emirates advertising on both LBC and Capital radio I believe for pilots. Never before have I heard of a company needing to use mainstream media to trawl for
pilots

I think it fair to say the ME airlines are rapidly approaching the 'extremely desperate' stage. It's time for them to start paying Chinese rates and up the T&Cs (considerably) to attract anyone to the sandpit.

That is seriously desperate... only a few years ago they were the airline of choice in the Middle East things have certainly changed, you reap what you sow comes to mind!

That does sound desperate but there is clearly a limit to the number of people prepared to live/work in that part of the world. Could bases in other countries be in the pipeline? That would certainly attract a bigger pool of prospective employees. What next, adverts in the Job Centre?

£300k tax free, commuting contract, 777 command then I'm in.

... or a UK base.

Same money. :E

something approaching £300k would be what it would take for me as well-current package way way short...

Commuting contract is the key a part of the miney

They have cabin crew based in the UK (or they did) so why not pilots?

They have never had cabin crew based in the UK.

They've never had cabin crew based in UK or any other Country apart from Dubai. All crew, pilots and cabin crew, live in UAE.

As for the package, 47,000 Dirhams per month is the starting salary for B777 Captains with required experience. Accommodation allowance is 16k per month if you choose to live out, another 6,000 per month education allowance per child up to maximum of 3. Just under 6,000 per month from The Company as Provident contribution. This is for line pilots, trainers will get more obviously. 70,000 is a conservative monthly ball park, excluding any overtime and education allowance. 840k Dhs per year is equivalent of £180K tax free, or £15,000 per month with current exchange rate (4.7). When relatively senior BA training guys take home around 10-11 after tax, the money is not the issue. A figure of £300k take home in UK is simply dreaming.

The issue at EK is not so much the money, but the work rate with unsustainable rosters, particularly on the B777. A380 F/O's are getting 15-16 days off every month, 95% are layovers. B777 skippers are doing 100 hours many months, 8-9 days off, 10 if you're lucky with a mix of night turns and layovers with some crappy timings. Most layovers are 24 hrs including home base, ironically the most tiring rest period and one 'recommended' in the ops manual to avoid.

People leave and not enough are joining. The package DOES need to be increased, simply to attract new joiners. More join, work becomes less, people stay. Part time may be on the horizon but only if the numbers increase. I can't see commuting contracts but desperate times call for desperate measures so you just never know.

The only thing that remains constant in this place is change!

That's good and well balanced post Harry!

Since BA has once again been dragged into a post about Emirates! Again!�� (I wonder why?)

Attempting to generalise senior BA training captain's take home pay is rather difficult. I know for a fact, some take home very significantly more than £180k. A top scale bog standard line pilot would do that if they lived in a tax free regime. Which more are doing, and the lifestyle allows. (They also spend less time commuting by air, than I do by car!)

They don't have to live in the sandpit either, nor work for middle eastern employers, with all the issues that entails!! Sounds to me like anyone working there for less than £300k is selling themselves short. No wonder people avoid the place like the plague, and people vote with their feet.

But I find Dubai a great place. To visit!

4468, get off your high horse man. Do a few sums on 180k GBP tax free and figure it out. I'm not a trainer, nor do I do a lot of overtime, but Harry's assessment is correct in both financially terms and workload. My salary last year as a mid seniority 777 CPT was in the range of 160 GBP take home after deductions. The money isn't the issue, the workload is, hence the continued exodus.

Agreed, FWIW as a bog standard line cpt with BA on the 777 my gross income last year was around 180k, i.e.similar to yours, and TBH I'm not sure how anyone at BA can avoid deductions/ tax, "commuter" or not...however the workload/rostering isn't anything like as nasty as it sounds at EK.

Guess where I work. It's what it would take for me to move to the sandpit. :E

As is mine.

My question is, why do EK pilots ALWAYS drag BA into threads about EK??? Odd that isn't it?🙄

wiggy

If you don't know of BA pilots who can perfectly legally, earn tax free salary, whilst living in Europe, then you aren't talking to the right people!

If there's an exodus from EK, then I'm very glad I don't have to work there! Whatever the money, it clearly isn't worth it!

Why not turn over a new leaf chaps, and leave BA out of discussions about how crap EK is??

Just to stop the "tax free" comments distorting further debate FWIW I live in Europe, do talk to people and I very much doubt any pilot in BA is earning a completely tax free salary ( regardless of where you reside at the UK end you will pay full NI, and HMRC always assess you annually for income tax based on your U.K. Duties ), though some may claim otherwise in the bar or on the jumpseat. That said I agree with:

4468, the reason BA is used is because it is or was considered a benchmark by a lot of senior people here, or it used to be, given the numbers from the uk in various roles employed.
Backhanded as it may seem, I'd view BA being used as an example as a positive, at least we can hang on to that, rather than how wonderful Ansett used to be.
Maybe given time, you won't have to read much more about it on here 4468, the numbers of recruits from more "austere" locations and regulatory environments is definitely on the increase at EK...I even had occasion to remind the TRI on the flight deck that conversing in English rather than his native version meant I could understand what him and my F/O were discussing during our line check.

Thanks MM.

I do get that.
Wow. In that case £300k is sounding about the right figure!

4468

Odd? No, not at all.

I was in no way deriding the salary at BA, far from it. BA is still seen as the benchmark within the UK and an airline that most UK based pilots would aspire to work for. Most, not all. The BA remuneration was provided as a reference for those expecting miracles and to drive home the most important message of this thread that it isn't just the money that attracts people. If an EK new joiner can take home 20-25% more then a fairly senior BA guy, does it not merely highlight what a problem EK is facing. I don't hear BA advertising on the radio, neither do I hear of an exodus of their pilots unlike Emirates.

Curiously, what airlines do your BALPA representatives use as a reference during the yearly pay negotiations, or are they too not allowed to 'drag' other airlines T&C's into a discussion? Not sure why the sensitivity but on a public forum, we're all fair game for comparison!

Harry

I'm rather ashamed to say our BALPA representatives seem to use the exact same comparator airlines as BA management do. So Norwegian, Easy and Ryanair. I never hear BALPA seek to compare our package to legacy carriers in Europe, Middle/Far East, or the US!

Employer and union sing from a single song sheet!

Whilst there may not (yet) be an exodus from BA, far more people are moving elsewhere than I ever remember! The industry, or perhaps more accurately 'working for a living', appears to be in a downwards spiral!

The gap between workers and bosses can rarely have been greater in the modern age?

Perhaps we should console ourselves with the knowledge that we do at least remain as one of a group of more highly paid 'technical' workers? In reality we are just blue collar workers. Although there are white collar expectations of us?

Ref the pilot recruitment shortage, what have EK got against for example, a European aircrew Base? Surely that would attract people who do not want to live in Dubai.
Ok to visit but but not to live IMO!

What a great idea Pete. How should they start it, applicable only for new joiners, and piss the established pilot group off? Or allow those already employed to take a base, and still not attract newbies?

Now I'm getting confused!

From previous posts, I thought the entire attraction of EK was tax free status? (money)

But now you're suggesting there'd be a flood of current EK pilots desperate to pay tax, yet still work for an ME carrier, that doesn't even count bunk time as duty???

If they based themselves in the UK, they'd have to pay UK employer taxes (NI etc) and abide by U.K. employment laws - one of which is 900 flying hours per year. :oh:

... and £300k tax free is roughly equivalent in the UK to about £180k tax paid. Therefore it equates to a "tax free" UK salary versus BA.

In China you can have 180k tax free, and commuting.

It appears that living in a certain European country, while working at BA, means you pay virtually no tax at all. All above board and with full declaration to the tax authorities of both countries. A significant number of people now live there, and easily commute to LHR for flying duties.

There's no point living in a :mad: hole while you're earning the same dosh you could be back in civilised countries.

Be interesting to know which country......but maybe not ...

In any event FWIW you pay Full employees NI at BA, regardless of where you live, and even if you live outside the UK the HMRC will tax you on that proportion of your income earnt in the UK or UK airspace, so you are never going to be fully tax free.

There are some perhaps living in some principalties in Europe who legitimately pay no tax, there are alledgedly some living (perhaps under the radar) in places who have vague tax regimes, that is something that is perhaps easy for the singles to do and those with no kids but once you get family commitments it gets difficult if you are not fully embedded in the local system for healthcare, education, etc etc .

Many of the former tax "havens" have tightened up in the search for tax revenue, for example France started taxing foreign based aircrew a few years back, and certainly in many European countries you will be liable to their income tax as well as the UK's in some shape or form. Ultimately if anybody here is seriously thinking of joining BA + living in mainland Europe for tax purposes they need to take professional advice, not just the advice from someone who has heard a story from a guy that lives in XXX........and of course just to add to the mix there's the complication of Brexit, residence or not on mainland Europe for Brits and perhaps even complications on cross border working coming up.....

On another subject have to agree with 4468 that :

" BALPA representatives seem to use the exact same comparator airlines as BA management do. So Norwegian, Easy and Ryanair. I never hear BALPA seek to compare our package to legacy carriers in Europe, Middle/Far East, or the US!"

Go on, give us a clue, cos it sure as :mad: ain't the one I live in.

Only second hand (I don't live there) but I believe it's a place which prevents Spain from getting Atlantic weather. ;)

If it works, why not...

I hope people from HMRC are following this thread! To avoid paying tax by legal or illegal means implies you are a leach on society. Naturally I'm sure the people that do it will be falling over themselves to justify it that somehow it's different for them...

^what utter tripe. I suggest you research the country in question and the 10 year NHTR scheme before spouting such nonsense.

Suggest we get back to the thread instead of getting sidetracked into the legitimate business of individuals who reside somewhere else and declare their tax there-wherever and whatever that jurisdiction is,jersey,iom,Guernsey,Switzerland,etc etc etc.the point is emirates aren't paying enough to attract what they need.

Boeing 7E7

Do try restricting your comments to subjects with which you have knowledge. That way you don't have to come across as a total idiot!

Commuting contracts and UK resident means you can wipe 40% in tax off the package making it completely pointless being there unless they up the money an extra 40% to make it worth while.

Except when the place you work does tax your salary legally, does provide sound papers on that, and has a treaty on double taxation with your place.

Which is the normal way of doing things, UK or not.

Just to throw an observation point in regarding why BA comes up in threads about EK.
It's clear that most people in this thread are British, so BA is the most comparable operator.
Not to sure you can liken easyjet or Jet2, as their extensive long haul operations and fleets of A380 and B777 far exceed EK's!😜

So from a bystander point of view, BA is the only UK operation that can be compared for UK pilots. (Maybe Virgin if you squint your eyes a little)

Commuting to/from the UK doesn't necessarily mean you will pay U.K. Tax.

As far as I understand it you can spend up to 90 days (or 120 days if you've not been UK resident for last 3yrs) if you have 2 ties (e.g. Family in UK and UK home). So 'IF' they were to offer a contract of 10 days off per month (for example), you won't obviously reach the 90 day limit until approx 9 months. After that I imagine holidays in somewhere other than the UK are a good idea!

I think you would also have to monitor your UK layover trips as there is a tie associated with that also.

Jinkster

There are quite a few pilots here in EK that either have sufficient finances not to care or, don't care about their finances. The point being that I know personally of at least 5 individuals who have children in the UK and are finding it very difficult to see them. It may be because of divorce or simply that the wife hasn't settled or they prefer the education in the UK. Either way, this puts massive pressure on them and may be the catalyst for seeking alternative employment.

Despite the tax, the package would still be good compared to most UK operators, including BA, but money would not be their overriding priority. Emirates must grasp the fact that the dynamics of it's pilot workforce has changed over the years, as has the raison d'être for many wanting to leave. It prides itself on expensive and fancy PR advertising, promoting innovation and technology, yet fails to apply those same core values to it's very own staff. If it is genuine about acknowledging value in its staff, it's doing a poor job in showing it. These issues have not been building surreptitiously amongst the pilot force but have been evident for quite a few years. A strong and effective management team would have recognised this and acted accordingly. The Company, for one reason or another, choose to turn a blind eye. It's now reaping what it ignored. Highly experienced pilots from both seats are leaving unnecessarily and being replaced by good but inexperienced pilots. Pilots who will not cut their teeth on 4 short haul sectors a day with experienced Captains, but will face an extensive Worldwide network into some for the most challenging and busy environments ever. They will fly with some demotivated and less experienced Captains who may have spent 25% of their 5 years in EK sleeping in a bunk. Whilst the dilution of experience has undetermined consequences, the outlook is not positive.

The problem we face is that while current management and their policies will probably be gone in five years from now, the impact of those short term policies will remain. As pilots, we'll have to manage that.

And it's that, that scares me.