A 10 year WJ FO just went to AC

[Apestogetherstrong]

Guys I have the latest update. A year 10 WJ Mainline FO just went to AC. This place has become shittier and shittier. Have you ever heard an AC pilot come to WJ? The management needs to get their shit together. The wages need to improve drastically! 70% Encore pilots dont have the intention to stay at WJ. Guys n gals think twice before applying at Westjet.

[kiaszceski]

Guys I have the latest update. A year 10 WJ Mainline FO just went to AC. This place has become shittier and shittier. Have you ever heard an AC pilot come to WJ? The management needs to get their shit together. The wages need to improve drastically! 70% Encore pilots dont have the intention to stay at WJ. Guys n gals think twice before applying at Westjet.

Only 70%?

[Apestogetherstrong]

The remainder 30% are YYC guys who drank the teal Koolaid so much that their blood turned teal colour

[Canadaflyer46]

The company feels like it’s imploding right now, and there’s crickets from management. According to ALPA we lost 31 pilots last month. Yet they think they’re going to be able to hire 400 next year? I’d love to know where they plan on finding them. For sure they’ll have to drop below their 1500 hour rule like Encore is. They’ve had so many chances to turn this around, but they seem hell bent on self-destructing. It’s actually really sad to watch.

[YC87DRVR]

This isn’t news, this has happened many times and some more than 10 years. The first time I heard of these moves happening was long before covid, when AC really started to spool up their hiring.

[mmm...bacon]

I’d love to know where they plan on finding them. For sure they’ll have to drop below their 1500 hour rule like Encore is. They’ve had so many chances to turn this around, but they seem hell bent on self-destructing. It’s actually really sad to watch.

200/250hr pilots flying 73s in Europe...From the Company's pov, not sure what the problem is with low-timers - not enough experience to go anywhere else, and not enough experience to get paid/demand better

[ant_321]

I’d love to know where they plan on finding them. For sure they’ll have to drop below their 1500 hour rule like Encore is. They’ve had so many chances to turn this around, but they seem hell bent on self-destructing. It’s actually really sad to watch.

200/250hr pilots flying 73s in Europe...From the Company's pov, not sure what the problem is with low-timers - not enough experience to go anywhere else, and not enough experience to get paid/demand better

You don’t have to look that far to find 250hr wonders in 737’s. Sunwing has been hiring them for years!

[Tbayer2021]

I’d love to know where they plan on finding them. For sure they’ll have to drop below their 1500 hour rule like Encore is. They’ve had so many chances to turn this around, but they seem hell bent on self-destructing. It’s actually really sad to watch.

200/250hr pilots flying 73s in Europe...From the Company's pov, not sure what the problem is with low-timers - not enough experience to go anywhere else, and not enough experience to get paid/demand better

You don’t have to look that far to find 250hr wonders in 737’s. Sunwing has been hiring them for years!

Hasn't Jazz been doing it for even longer? I'd think a 250 hour wonder in a 737 is probably much safer than in a classic dash going into Timmins, Val-d'Or or any of the countless shit holes they go into.

[IslandChuckle]

The company feels like it’s imploding right now, and there’s crickets from management. According to ALPA we lost 31 pilots last month. Yet they think they’re going to be able to hire 400 next year? I’d love to know where they plan on finding them. For sure they’ll have to drop below their 1500 hour rule like Encore is. They’ve had so many chances to turn this around, but they seem hell bent on self-destructing. It’s actually really sad to watch.

Is it really that bad? I just got my groundschool date and I didn't realize the state of affairs. I can't imagine it's as bad as the 703 I'm at now... I always thought WJ was the way to go instead of Big Red, but it's sounding like WJ is turning into the big red of years ago. Should I reconsider?

[Apestogetherstrong]

The company feels like it’s imploding right now, and there’s crickets from management. According to ALPA we lost 31 pilots last month. Yet they think they’re going to be able to hire 400 next year? I’d love to know where they plan on finding them. For sure they’ll have to drop below their 1500 hour rule like Encore is. They’ve had so many chances to turn this around, but they seem hell bent on self-destructing. It’s actually really sad to watch.

Is it really that bad? I just got my groundschool date and I didn't realize the state of affairs. I can't imagine it's as bad as the 703 I'm at now... I always thought WJ was the way to go instead of Big Red, but it's sounding like WJ is turning into the big red of years ago. Should I reconsider?

Get your type rating and 500hrs. Then go wherever you want.

[Greasy Greaser]

Have you ever heard an AC pilot come to WJ? The management needs to get their shit together.

Yes, before your time.

Get off telegram, this isn't ground breaking news with how current working condition are over at WestJet, happened before, relax.

I'm assuming you're Encore with how much you post over there so I don't know what you guys have planned in the future but our guys are working relatively hard over here to show how things need to be improved.

Good luck to that FO, hope things work out; they'll be a quick upgrade unlike a lot of people jumping over if recession doesn't hit us too hard.

Maybe we can get individual threads for the 31 pilots who jumped over.
lol

[Greasy Greaser]

The company feels like it’s imploding right now, and there’s crickets from management. According to ALPA we lost 31 pilots last month. Yet they think they’re going to be able to hire 400 next year? I’d love to know where they plan on finding them. For sure they’ll have to drop below their 1500 hour rule like Encore is. They’ve had so many chances to turn this around, but they seem hell bent on self-destructing. It’s actually really sad to watch.

Is it really that bad? I just got my groundschool date and I didn't realize the state of affairs. I can't imagine it's as bad as the 703 I'm at now... I always thought WJ was the way to go instead of Big Red, but it's sounding like WJ is turning into the big red of years ago. Should I reconsider?

You're coming in at volatile time, our contract ends this year and we're in negotiations right now. A lot of hot heads on both sides. Management not playing any ball and being totally silent on one of our largest outages ever (which isn't reassuring right now) and some pilots expecting almost executive pay.

Overall, it's not as bad as some people make it out to be, definitely not great at the moment though.
703 to 705 mainline jet (assuming you're talking about WestJet) is a pretty darn good move no matter what. Ignore all the doom and gloom, stand by those who are fighting for better WAWCON.

Someone said this to me and made a lot of sense, joining right now is like seeing a certain share price of a overall good company tank because of some bad news but you invest anyway since a restructure plan has been announced (which is good but execution has been sub-par atm) and now you're getting in at a cheap price for the future. It could keep going down though so take that as you will.

Turning down guaranteed job at WJ for a chance at AC from a 703 is also really stupid.

One huge negative for new pilots especially those who don't live in YVR/YYC/YYZ is the reserve system. Couple of years at most to get out YYZ reserve, almost ten years for YYC and I think about 7 or so for YVR FOs. That's with current Seniority 'issues'; things can change. Lots of guys/gals don't know that here. Hopefully you live at base.

[cheeky cough]

The main advantage of coming to AC is the demographics of the pilot group.
At least 100 retirements a year .
In my opinion, there is going to be a huge amount of retirements in 10 years from now.

Another advantage is the diversity of the fleet. There are so many different flying jobs that cater to different people and suit their current situation. One could be narrow body, wide body , senior, junior, union, management , dog f@@ker, etc..

The Westjet pilot group is much younger and has had little movement in recent times.

Interesting times, if the US border opens up, geez, last pilot here turn out the lights.

[ellinas]

The main advantage of coming to AC is the demographics of the pilot group.
At least 100 retirements a year .
In my opinion, there is going to be a huge amount of retirements in 10 years from now.

Another advantage is the diversity of the fleet. There are so many different flying jobs that cater to different people and suit their current situation. One could be narrow body, wide body , senior, junior, union, management , dog f@@ker, etc..

The Westjet pilot group is much younger and has had little movement in recent times.

Interesting times, if the US border opens up, geez, last pilot here turn out the lights.

Are companies seriously hurting for pilots and I guess I’m including business charter companies too? Are things that grave?

[mmm...bacon]

Are companies seriously hurting for pilots and I guess I’m including business charter companies too? Are things that grave?

*Experienced* pilots...250 hours are, and always will be, a dime a dozen...

[ellinas]

Are companies seriously hurting for pilots and I guess I’m including business charter companies too? Are things that grave?

*Experienced* pilots...250 hours are, and always will be, a dime a dozen...

That I know for sure, what are the probabilities for someone with 600 hours like myself? Any hope at
Places like Private Air or Ornge that fly the PC12?

I love to instruct and I’m in the process of renewing my expired class 4 but I don’t know how the hiring for instructors looks like now. I’ll keep chugging along

[Aspiredtofly]

I don't get the irony here like seriously guys its not funny. Shits getting real, everything has changed since covid came and went out from flight training getting expensive to how much you could afford things before but you can't now. If we won't stand up for better wages and work conditions then I'm not sure if getting my licences would be worth right now, like I'm genuinely worried about where I would end up after training. Any suggestions should I quit training or stay and wait for the future?

[Apestogetherstrong]

I don't get the irony here like seriously guys its not funny. Shits getting real, everything has changed since covid came and went out from flight training getting expensive to how much you could afford things before but you can't now. If we won't stand up for better wages and work conditions then I'm not sure if getting my licences would be worth right now, like I'm genuinely worried about where I would end up after training. Any suggestions should I quit training or stay and wait for the future?

Dont quit! We are spreading awareness about low
Wages/shit conditions for your tomorrow. We will fight hard for your future. Hopefully by the time you get your licenses, wJ bcomes a great place to work at. For now its a shitty place where management is really incompetent. They cant run this company. They have made their employees despise this company. Now there are a few pilots who are die hard WJ fans and will accept grooming the cabin and load baggages but the majority are now fed up. Let the message be crystal clear. WE WILL NOT ACCEPT ANYTHING OTHER THAN DELTA WAGES.

[ZBBYLW]

The main advantage of coming to AC is the demographics of the pilot group.
At least 100 retirements a year .
In my opinion, there is going to be a huge amount of retirements in 10 years from now.

Another advantage is the diversity of the fleet. There are so many different flying jobs that cater to different people and suit their current situation. One could be narrow body, wide body , senior, junior, union, management , dog f@@ker, etc..

The Westjet pilot group is much younger and has had little movement in recent times.

Interesting times, if the US border opens up, geez, last pilot here turn out the lights.

FWIW our third party scheduling/bidding/calendar provider has be going up just over 1300 numbers in 10 years. I am mid seniority.

[daedalusx]

Certainly a bold move but not a necessarily a bad time to get in to AC before the next hiring wave and the upcoming economic troubles. I certainly wouldn’t do it if I was based and living in YYC but if he/she was based out east and had a bit of savings to afford the pay cut, why not. Hope it works out
There were some super senior SWG drivers who went to AC pre-Covid and that was quite the gamble but now that SWG and WG are merging then I guess it was a probably good move.

Shit, I know a guy who left his WJ GS to go to C3 ... that was probably the right move back then but didn’t work out for him. It’s always a gamble.

[FlyAlberta]

I think the bigger news is that the Encore MEC chair (with 6-7 years at the company), who took to flow to mainline Nov 1, is now a new hire at AC just a few days later. This in addition to the vice chair leaving the company earlier this year. Just shows that even those with the most inside info have zero confidence in the company for a long and prosperous career.

[YC87DRVR]

I think the bigger news is that the Encore MEC chair (with 6-7 years at the company), who took to flow to mainline Nov 1, is now a new hire at AC just a few days later. This in addition to the vice chair leaving the company earlier this year. Just shows that even those with the most inside info have zero confidence in the company.

Mic drop on this forum as far as I’m concerned. The whole when the border opens south last out, shut the lights out thing, we all know that’s never going to happen and the Federal government will fight tooth and nail to make sure of that. With that said, last one at encore, take a huge steamer of an upper decker and then shut the lights off.

[cheeky cough]

Lol, well said.The government will do what they can to block any movement to the US.

American pilots are making DOUBLE of what we are making!

The airline industry changes every 10 years.

The regional model seems to be dying.

AC just bought another 15 A220s, in my opinion to cover regional flying with mainline pilots.

Do not count out the new ULCCs, there may be a few ugly mergers in the future.

No wonder nobody wants to be a pilot.

[JBI]

I think the bigger news is that the Encore MEC chair (with 6-7 years at the company), who took to flow to mainline Nov 1, is now a new hire at AC just a few days later. This in addition to the vice chair leaving the company earlier this year. Just shows that even those with the most inside info have zero confidence in the company for a long and prosperous career.

While the Chair's departure definitely made an impact to some in Management, this Company does not care about any particular individual pilot leaving; they care if they can staff their flights. The departure of ~60+ pilots since August who started the year at Encore (i.e. current Encore pilots and pilots who recently flowed to WJ/Swoop but then left) makes more of an impact. When it comes to recruitment and retention, there has been very little proactive planning, any impetus to try and improve retention is only reactive (and so far, underwhelming).

For anyone considering their career options, maybe coming to/staying at WestJet/Encore/Swoop does make the most sense (it is not an awful job by any means). But don't stay/come because you hope or wish that wages/working conditions/schedule will improve. There are lots of options out there.

[sstaurus]

I think they're sitting around being apathetic because they are banking on (or hoping) that they will soon have ~400 SW pilots.