ACE crew leasing
 

ACE is the name of a crew leasing company owned by Air Atlanta Icelandic.
Pilots are hired on total $175 per day (nothing else!). The sole purpose of ACE is to dodge Icelandic employment laws and taxes as well as any form of union that these poor souls might want to form. ACE is located (I think) in a desk drawer in Virgin Islands. I heard once of a pissed off Air Atlanta pilot that was there, he wanted to visit ACE headquarters. He went to this address, the one on his small paycheck, and found a tiny sign on a tree in between traffic lanes: "ACE crew leasing" read the sign. He took a photo of this. I think this was then published on the Net.
Does anyone know anything about this?
:mad:
MB

I believe that your facts regarding the taxes and unions are quite accurate, but the location of ACE is certainly in the UK. They may claim to be elsewhere and they may have a dingy little sign up in the middle of nowhere, but I know for a fact that I've stood next to the chest of drawers that is ACE! :yuk:

Direct Personnel offers USD$7500 per 75 block hour
month, overtime is paid at $100 per hour. How much is the Average Basic Salary of a AAI captain contracted by ACE. $175/day, i believe would be less than $7500.

MY mates tell me that Capts with Atlanta get $250 per day they work,but nothing if they are sick or on leave.They are 'contract' pilots..so they can walk away whenever they want,and can be let go whenever Atlanta want.They have no problems taking leave as long as Atlanta are short of crew.If there are too many..it might be a bit silly as there is a chance they can find themselves taking an extended leave until the next Hadj or a new contract turns up.Ground Engineers are also contracted in via ACE.
There are no unions,but individuals down the pub (mainly engineers)do belong to unions to get some protection if things go wrong.No one has ever told the guys that unions are verbotten.The Icelandics have a union with a name no one can spell but is known by the acronym GGG or LLL or something.It is more like a club for Icelandic pilots only and gives them privilages that the rest of the blokes can only dream about.The chaps reckonthat there will never be a union in Atlanta because nearly all the pilots and engineers who end up working for them have been so badly shafted in the past by union failings...Ansett ,Canada3000 etc..Also the blokes down the pub reckon that Atlanta pilots are so tight they would never be prepared to dip in their pockets to support a union!
None of them see a problem with ACE's registered office addresses in the Cook and Virgin Islands as long as the cheque arrives on time.To visit a company's registered offshore address expecting to see an employee is frankly naive.
I'm seeing them all for darts next Tuesday...all I can say is that for a company that gets such a poor press..they can't stop yacking about it...its a bit like Neighbours..you miss an episode or two..but can immediately pick up the story again when you see it next.The bit of excitement at the moment is tax....roll the credits!

abra, you are absolutely right there. It is not a union the Icelandics have, just an exclusive club and it is called FFF...... It was formed by the then CEO of Air Atlanta because he didn´t like the Icelandic Pilot Association, and for the first few years he happened also to be the union leader just to get everyone really cosy and comfortable, also to get the message across not to mess with the company.
In the past few days the Icelandic press has suddenly turned thier attention to union and tax matters concerning Atlanta and ACE. This attention is mainly due to that the Icelandic Pilot Association pointed out the cosy relationship between Atlanta and the icelandic CAA in respect to validating licences to pilots from outside the EEU and turning the blind eye to some ´minor´discrepacies in thier maintainance and crew logs.
As for the tax, Icelandic tax laws require Icelandic client companies to hold back the income tax a fact that only recently became clear due to another unrelated labor dispute in Iceland.

Good analogy. AAI is like a big flying soap opera complete with heros, villains, scandals and cliffhangers. You couldn't make it up!