Picesprick wrote: ↑Tue Aug 21, 2018 5:39 pm
With the new CBA just ratified, Pilots will bid 16 days a month. You now bid your stats in a 5 day block and a 4 day block, after 1 year you are alloted 3 weeks vacation, 4 after 10, 5 after 20. So you can deduct these of some of your months. This has been and will continue to be a contencious issue among the group, company wanted more days work, pilots didnt. They met in the middle. Pay saw some pretty big increases, 1st year fo 70k after 4 or 5 years your over 100k. 10 year fo tops at 119k right now with 2% annual increases across the board. Captain start is 125k 12 year is just over 200k, after 5 years your at 170k year. Overtime is 2x but its pretty hard to get.
Pairings usually start just after midnight and generally are 2-5 days ending anywhere from 1230 am till 9pm. its all about bidding days of work here so most guys will try to get the few pairings that leave at say 1155pm ( a day of work for an hour) and also the ones that get back earlier in the morning( another day of work), the few really good ones go senior. But it all depends on how many specific days off you want in there, the more guys try to nail down a schedule the less forgiving the schedule seems to end up, The first night is usually pretty tough unless you can get a good nap in the day before, but the duty days usually are not that long minus a few, so you suck up the first night and then I quote " get used to it"
. But you are usually a bag of shit the day after a pairing when you get back at 4 am or something. For some reason its very hard to get 7-8 hours of sleep when you are going to bed at 6 or 7 am. Unlike when you were a teenager. You need to respect your sleep, keep track of it, try to get it, do what you can, ie exercise, melatonin, otherwise the job will tear you apart. If you can figure it out, its not all that bad.
Perdiem 3.75CDN hour, anywhere for duration on CBA, not indexed to inflation, why?? who knows.. which means you do ok in Canada but if you go to europe better carry a cooler.
Hotels are another irritant among the group, some of the locations your options for getting food are very limited, company didnt budge much and Union didnt fight very hard to get that changed. Bw, Hampton Inns, Holiday Inns, YHZ weekend get you the Westin downtown but its a senior run.
RRSP 3%,,,, yeah thats right 3 %,....goes up to 4 after 5 I think but im not double checking, 6% after 15 was another sweet score the negotiators got.
Medical is apparently very good and paid for by the company, but it is a very hard thing to compare IMO.
Work Life balance has been pretty good, seems like lots of time off, with the extra days of work that will effectively kick in next year we will see, might be a little buyers remorse when guys are working 16 days in a 30 day month.
Commuters can DH on company aircraft to and from where they live and we are just getting started with the myid travel program, nobody knows how easy it will be to travel but expectations are low.
Union has been all volunteer work for the last 5 years, in this contract we secured paid days for union duties so we shall see if that helps solidify some people in the MEC positions, Lots of people like to bitch about how innefective our union is and has been but nobody wants to step up and do the job, because it does seem like a thankless position. The last 5 years the union was toothless maybe going forward we can grow some baby teeth.
Company itself is solid, effectivley has a monopoly. Long term contracts and there size now make it very difficult for a competetor to break into the space. The growth opportunities are very promising. Would make for a stable long term career path if you dont need the glory of walking through the terminal with your hat on signing autographs like Leo, arm and arm with a bunch of hot flight attendants. Thats what I imagine im missing out on anyways.
Upgrade times now are at about 2-3 years
excuse any spelling or garammer mistakes, Im a cargo pilot