Thanks for that. Last one from me, PPJN states that year 1 FO base salary is £55k 😬. What is realistic net monthly take home pay for SH/LH....presuming LH get more in the way of allowances?

Cheers

Yes it’s been going on but not in the numbers we’re seeing right now. In a year where there are potentially 350 recruits less than 100 airbus FO’s have valid moves elsewhere (at last count) suggesting that the majority of this year’s recruits will be going to the long haul fleets. That’s wrong and it’s in complete contrast to the recruitment team’s assertion that the A320 is the primary recruitment fleet. I’m not even moaning necessarily about a longer wait for long haul, it’s stopping the junior guys in the Airbus RHS from moving up their respective list and getting better bidding power. It shafts every airbus FO in its own little way in complete isolation, but of course the company couldn’t give a sh1t about Short Haul and even less about SH FO’s so it doesn’t matter.

I genuinely don’t aim this at and bear no ill will towards people who take a DEP position on the Long Haul fleets, I’d do exactly the same in their position and would have done had it been offered. What I didn’t count on in accepting a SH offer was the majority of recruitment after me being on the long haul fleets and not only slowing down the move to Long Haul but not even seeing the benefit of better rosters in the meantime in a time of mass recruitment. Buyers remorse.

Rex, I’ve just had a quick look through the PRIAM results. It’s not the easiest document to just skim through and decode, but are you arguing that BA should be releasing people from equipment freezes before allowing recruitment onto fleets that those frozen pilots have bid for? I cannot immediately see any short haul pilot who is unfrozen and has the seniority for their requested move, who does not have a valid bid. BA have a requirement for pilots in various locations and they obviously want to do that as cheaply as possible. That’s the whole point of the equipment freeze period.

If you are talking about pilots who have served their time and are unfrozen, then I absolutely agree with you 100%, but I cannot quickly find any such cases.

I don’t understand where numbers of people being recruited onto other fleets makes a difference to the pain of an equipment freeze. Everyone has the same freeze when they first join. A few lucky people do get released before the end of their freeze period, and always have done if it suits the company, but it’s fairly rare. When you’ve served your 5 years, you jump to your next fleet of choice ahead of everyone that joined since you. If a large number of people have been recruited onto your new fleet since you joined, it is actually much better for you because you’ll join the new fleet on an even higher relative seniority. If no one had been recruited since you, you’d end up bottom of the status list on that new fleet. It has nothing to do with whether BA cares about short haul pilots. People recruited to long haul who want to get to short haul have just the same freeze. If there was no recruitment going on, you would still have your 5 year freeze just as you would if there was double the current recruitment going on.

Let me illustrate exactly how. If everybody who had joined BA after me had joined on the Airbus, I’d be sitting comfortably in the top 10% of the status list right now. In fact that’d be the same even if 50% of new joiners had joined on the bus. How is it impossible to see how much of a difference that makes to the pain of an equipment freeze? I’d say it’s pretty easy, much better rosters. Especially being top 10% under JSS. As far as a Long Haul pilot wanting to get to Short Haul but being subjected to the same freeze goes, are you having a laugh? (If I was of a certain mind, I’d say you were almost trying to deliberately wind me up with that one ;-) )

I appreciate that I’ll slot in ahead of the more junior guys when I (eventually) get to move but as a commuter even the worst JSS lines (except maybe the jumbo, but I’m not touching that with a barge pole now) are far more straightforward for commuting so I’d take them tomorrow.

Yes equipment freeze waivers are rare, I appreciate that, but after a couple of horrendous summers now it might have been nice to say to some people in the final year of their freeze that they had been waivered to go to the A350, especially as you could do it as a short CCQ in no time. But no, more Long Haul DEP onto the shiniest newest jet in the fleet. I’m not the only one bothered by this. Not by a long shot.

Don’t you think it sounds like you want the rules to be different so you can have it your way? It used to be about 10 years to get in the top 10% of the short haul status list if that helps so you’re already doing far better than hundreds of pilots that joined before you. If only they’d had scale of movement that we’re seeing now.

It’s the same for everyone. I doubt you were bullied in to accepting short haul and commuting when you did and nothing has changed since you joined so you knew the score? You probably took shorthaul because seniority is everything? Well that’s still the case.

I’m a little baffled by your sense of entitlement mind. You’ll have a much happier existence if you just accept that your time will come when it’s your turn. Patience is all.

Does anyone have a sim ride coming up in the next few days?

Without wishing to pile on further controversy I’d commend OBK’s comment “to the house” and given there are some optimistic estimates being handed out to prospective joiners feel I need to add the health warning that:

“past performance is not an indicator of future outcomes “

...well certainly the past performance measured over the last 4-5 years..

We’ve had an unusually high rate of recruitment (which hands up, I didn’t predict) at BA over the past few years. That has propelled some up the short haul “fleet seniority” scale at a dizzying rate. That is not the historical norm (OBK’s 10 years to get 10% from the top of a shorthaul P2 list sounds more normal) and TBH looking at future rates of retirements from BA and forthcoming events that might effect the U.K. and other economies I’m not sure I would be making plans based on an extrapolation of current progression rates up the senority scales and bouncing across to LH PDQ...(that’s me, all optimistic as usual).

As for the controversial issue of engagement freezes, they are what they are, always have been.

Over the years there has frequently been sizeable DEP recruitment onto LH fleets...what has perhaps made things more irritating for some nowadays is that decades back the Back Every Afternoon ;) cohort were generally very happy with their day trips, Berlin postings and shuttle back up credit and they wouldn’t touch LH with a barge pole.....now with EASA FTLs and the hit of JSS SH has perhaps become a much less comfortable place to be.

Take the seniority as soon as you can, the difference of weeks in join date could mean years of your career being behind.

with the retirement plot with those that decided to extend from 55, it’s not stopping any time soon. Maybe a pause with brexit if the industry takes a demand hit but even so, retirees need replacing.

Id be surprised to see it stop for the next 3 years tbh.

..Short answer = what Ollie said.

Long answer= ....and if BA aren’t recruiting in a year?.

Look I know I’m in danger of starting to sound like a stuck record but on the basis of having been at BA during a couple of downturns including the fallout from 9/11 I can promise you if something comes along out of left field that adversely effects the business BA can and will slam the doors shut overnight (post 9/11 the 747 Classic Fleet was binned so fast if you blinked you missed it).

We have Brexit imminent (potential effect unknown) and if you’ve read the papers recently you’ll see reports that one or two major economies are starting to look a bit wobbly...worth bearing in mind when a lot of BA’s passengers travel for business, not leisure reasons.

Fundamentally, and despite all the optimism displayed by many here (hopefully and probably justified) there is zero, nil, no guarantee in reality that BA recruiting will continue “as is”...so if you have are read up on things like engagement freezes, T&Cs, rostering/lifestyle under JSS and still want to join BA then I’d honestly recommend you take the first post offered, regardless of fleet, and get a place on the Master Seniority List.

Unlikely but it’s a bit of a “that depends”.. luck in and join on a new fast growing fleet and you can do well ...until the senior pilots pile in above you (been there, seen that). On a largish fleet probably the worse that could happen is your level of control stagnates, though I guess in extremis it could reduce if for some bizarre reason people below you on the Fleet transfer off. Probably the bigger threat to meaningful livestyle and lifestyle control over the years on any fleet would be a change of routes/destinations for your Fleet (happened on the 747, then again on the 744).

Correct...at the risk of outing myself I’ll make the observation that it has been demonstrated that it perfectly possible to sit one off the bottom of a Fleet senority list, be gaining company seniority, but at the same time, since it is an new, expanding and suddenly popular fleet see the number of pilots above you on your fleet go from about 100 to several hundred.....

That’s exactly the thought process that I went through in 1997. Luckily for me, only DEP 744 was on offer, so I eagerly took it.
Sometimes I wonder whether I would have joined if only SH had been offered? Probably not, which may have been a mistake.

I think, given your situation, that you have sussed it out quite well. LH looks to be expanding in the short/medium term and there will always be a requirement for a greater proportion of LH FOs than on SH, due to three/four crew flights. So, as you say, take the first spot. Even if it’s SH, you could well be on a LH fleet within five years. Your decision may depend on whether you can afford the pay-cut until you catch up with what you’re earning now. That in turn may depend on how keen you are to take a SH command. In any case, barring any future “events” such as 9/11, SARS, Wall St crash, etc. you should be much better off in terms of life-style and earnings in the long run.

I gave up a charter 737 TC job for BA 744 FO and yes; it was financially very tough for a few years. More time off at home and staff travel benefits helped to convince the family that it was worth it. To be honest, once I was in I never had any regrets. Floating around the world and being paid to sleep in a bunk, or lie on a beach, seemed far more desirable than LGW-TFS-LGW. Opportunities for training or management roles are also open to all, no matter how junior. I was a 747 TRI/TRE within three years of joining.

As I’ve said before, this was all 22 years ago, so please take with a pinch of salt.

Bon courage! (as they say over here).

Scrap logic. Seniority rules. Senior pilot gets the gig, no questions asked. One thing you can rely on in BA is your number. That just about answers all your questions. “Oh you’ve got 1 million hours on the 787 and you want command?...sorry but I’m more senior and I have zero hours...step aside”.

Frustrating. But thems the agreements. And we love agreements no matter how illogical they may seem.

You will however see shifts in management not quite in accordance to the rule set. “Such and such tech airbus manager is now promoted to tech chief super boss of the 777” for example.

Yes. Once you’re a captain in BA, you can be a captain on anything, provided you have the seniority.

My glittering career-path was: FO 744, Capt A320, Capt 787.

When I was a Training Copilot on the 744, I converted some 737 Captains onto the 747.

There were some restrictions when the A380 was introduced (some Airbus experience required).

Sorry, I should have explained more clearly.

Training Copilots (TCP) are a cheap way for BA to get TRI/TRE for sim duties without having to pay a Training Captain’s (TC) training emoluments (which are pensionable). By contrast, a TCP’s emoluments are not pensionable and in any case are much lower.

The scheme originated at a time when Copilots were stuck in the RHS for years and years and Command slots were scarce. It was seen as a way of giving copilots something interesting to aim for and also prepared them for future TC roles.

Selection is by merit and interview. ‘Merit’ being evidence of a reasonably clean training record and interview being a Q and A session and a pre-sim briefing in front of a panel of senior trainers.

The successful candidate then undergoes the ‘Core Course’ to learn the fundamentals of teaching and learning, followed by a full TRI course in the sim. They then observe a number of actual sim sessions (preferably conversion courses as opposed to LPCs) before being formally assessed for the TRI Rating. They are then able to give sim instruction towards the grant of the Type Rating.

After a variable interval (in my case almost immediately), they are sent to the CAA to undertake the TRE standardisation course. This culminates in an Assessment of Competence in the company sim, after which the TRE Certificate is issued.

So far, exactly the same as for a TC.

The difference is that TCPs are not Captains, and so cannot undertake line training duties in the aircraft. This causes the TCP’s roster to be somewhat ‘sim-heavy’. In my day, we did five training months in a year, during which we would be rostered about 17 sim sessions in the month plus an actual trip for recency. I think things have changed since then.

When there were periods of few conversion courses, it got a bit tedious running the same sim check 17 times in a month! One certainly got to know the common pitfalls in the procedures. I also learned a lot about my own capabilities and picked up lots of good stuff by watching others, far better pilots than me.

One looked forward to running a series of conversion details with the same crew. It was very gratifying to see them advance and improve over three or four days, learning how to operate the Queen of the Skies.

The TCP contract was limited to three years which meant that BA didn’t have to pay for a revalidation. It also meant that others would get a chance to apply. In my case, due to a particularly busy training programme, a few of us were asked to extend by one year, so we did revalidate after all.

All in all, an enlightened programme which used the latent talent in the P2 community and was a great starting point for many a TC’s subsequent career.

With the joys of JSS, I can well imagine the standard BA career progression changing to R-L-R-L in the fullness of time. Brought about mainly due to any senior Longhaul FOs moving to LHS shorthaul promptly having their medicals taken away for psychological problems. :E

Permanent LHS longhaul. Why anyone would want to move junior after 20 years enjoying decent roster control, I don’t know. Money isn’t everything and BA FO pay is still pretty amazing

Do you mean RHS?

yep sorry. Meant RHS!

I’m certain there is a lot of truth in that but nevertheless if somebody asks you:

“should I join BA today because I have been offered a Short Haul a slot, or wait until a Long Haul Offer comes, (delay undetermined)”

what would you recommend?

or, enjoy longhaul with its benefits for 5-10, then take SH command with seniority, or go SH LGW command with a lot of relative seniority on fleet and have the same improved lifestyle and salary?

Depends where you’re coming from and what your aspirations are, unless you’re about to lose your job. If you’re escaping from the desert, it depends how quickly you want to escape.

If you’re coming from one of the bottom-feeders, same answer.

If you’re coming from Ryanair or Easy (or equivalent) LHS, I wouldn’t bother coming at all unless you really want Longhaul.

If you’re coming from Ryanair or Easy (or equivalent) RHS, only come for longhaul or stay where you are and go LHS.

If you’re coming from VS or longhaul charter RHS, see whether your time to a longhaul command is any better (and you’d better like shorthaul in the meantime).

If you’re coming from VS or longhaul charter LHS, you’re barking.

or a 10 year wide body captain that even with pp35 will see their gross income with allowances increase by 20k.

And it’s pointless comparing with KLM and lufty, the brexiteers have seen to that.