Air Sprint Salary

[powerbrian]

Just food for thought.

I understand they are not considered an airline however they are a player in Canadian aviation who compete for pilots.

Air Sprints new pay scales now have them making more money than; WestJet, Flair, Porter ( Air Canada in some regard) Etc. To fly a light jet!

I imagine this is good news for the WestJet negotiations as this is another step up for pilot pay in our country.

Good for Air Sprint for remaining competitive.

[Dronepiper]

Looks like 30% increase across the board!

[UndisputedTruth]

Just food for thought.

I understand they are not considered an airline however they are a player in Canadian aviation who compete for pilots.

Air Sprints new pay scales now have them making more money than; WestJet, Flair, Porter ( Air Canada in some regard) Etc. To fly a light jet!

I imagine this is good news for the WestJet negotiations as this is another step up for pilot pay in our country.

Good for Air Sprint for remaining competitive.

It is an airline… for the 1%

[thepoors]

Those are reasonable rates but a 25yr pay scale is laughable.

[8895]

Yet another company that doesn’t acknowledge an FO’s YOS when upgrading lol AC will keep filling PIT courses without issue if companies keep this mindset up.

Also yeah a 25yr payscale is ridiculous.

[Pratt X 3]

You can pretty much ignore the 14/14 and 18/10 columns as you won't see those for at least a year as those need to be awarded during a bi-annual bid, by seniority. Plus there needs to be someone on the same type and seat/position that is on the opposite schedule to line up with. And those alternate schedules are very limited, as in maybe 3 or 4 of each per type and Captain or F/O.

[AirSprintInc]

Those are reasonable rates but a 25yr pay scale is laughable.

Hello Folks,

The reason we publish a 25 year pay scale is because we have a number of pilots who currently fall into the 18-23 year ranges. It's not expected that someone starting today at year 1 will see the pay as described in the current scale when they hit 25 years.

AirSprint has always watched the industry closely and made pay scale adjustments to remain competitive. Normally we find ourselves adjusting the entire scale range every few years. Those adjustments have typically seen significant increases.

As an example, in January 2022 our First Officer starting salaries was $55,000/yr with being available to operate 16 of 28 days in the schedule cycle. Today our First Officers are starting at $80k. That's an increase in starting salary of $25k. I believe that is a pretty good increase for someone in the first year and a bit of employment.

We will continue to watch the industry to remain competitive and continue to improve the overall compensation and schedule package as the company has always done.


Adam
Director, Flight Operations

[flyinhigh]

Let’s break that down. While a descent pay scale no doubt for the first few years if you sign up to be at the companies beck and call 24 hr/7 days a week, why would you.

At year 5 on the new Porter scale you are even with the Legacy. Beyond that you fall far behind with Sprint. Yr 7 at Porter is the year 10 at Sprint. At the 10 year mark with Porter you would make $212K oppose to $193.

Now, take into account (from former sprint pilots), you never know what you’re doing, cleaning exterior of the plane, doing all your own Flight Plans, etc. No thanks, the airlines are definitely were it is at.

Again, it is a descent scale but reality is an individual will most likely be making a max of $123K year one on a 14/14 schedule and dealing with a lot of external shenanigans that makes the salary not nearly enough.

[digits_]

(from former sprint pilots), you never know what you’re doing, cleaning exterior of the plane

I think they're more worried about the dumping of the lav

[Tbayer2021]

Its not complicated, gents. They stretch the pay-scale to 25 years so their payroll burden is less. If you had the same starting wage and top wage, but spread only over 10 years, current pilot roster would be paid substantially more. All this bs of "we have pilots with 20+ years at the company and we want to recognize that", is just that, pure bs. If they truly were about recognizing such loyalty, the pay-scale would be 10-12 years like its industry standard and those pilots with 18-23 years of seniority would instantly shoot to the top and not have to wait another 7-2 years till they reach the maximum.

Always great to see the creative ways management comes up with to spin pissing on their employees.

[CaptDukeNukem]

(from former sprint pilots), you never know what you’re doing, cleaning exterior of the plane

I think they're more worried about the dumping of the lav

No wonder I had a couple sprint pilots in my porter GS lol

[co-joe]

What gets me about that scale is that the pay goes up 2% per year with no CPI index, so you'll never have the buying power of your year 1 pay again in your career there. It's literally a pay cut every year after year 1.

[cjp]

Let’s break that down. While a descent pay scale no doubt for the first few years if you sign up to be at the companies beck and call 24 hr/7 days a week, why would you.

At year 5 on the new Porter scale you are even with the Legacy. Beyond that you fall far behind with Sprint. Yr 7 at Porter is the year 10 at Sprint. At the 10 year mark with Porter you would make $212K oppose to $193.

Now, take into account (from former sprint pilots), you never know what you’re doing, cleaning exterior of the plane, doing all your own Flight Plans, etc. No thanks, the airlines are definitely were it is at.

Again, it is a descent scale but reality is an individual will most likely be making a max of $123K year one on a 14/14 schedule and dealing with a lot of external shenanigans that makes the salary not nearly enough.

At 10 years if you're DEC with Porter end of 2022, with their built in year to year growth and annual percentage addition (if they don't adjust rates again this year), you're looking at closer to $244,000 on min cred and about 9% match (the match is a little low). Seeing something like 10-15% into a CPS fund, plus a match would be better and closer mimic the U.S ULCCs.

There are some occasional flight deck rumours that with the continued expansion, further raises are in discussion to continue interest in the operation. When or whether they come to light is anyone's guess.

Air Sprint does have a good operation but sorry Adam, it's no Netjets or Flexjet even if you apply the Canadian aviation discount. And it (fractional flying) requires a lot more involvement from a pilot on a day to day basis. You should be exceeding most carriers payscales on a much shorter scale, even if a few pilots are at 20+ years. Air Canada, Transat, etc are all in the same boat, none of which rely on 20+ year scale to define salaries.

My grumbling with a lot of carriers (big and small) is how they continually avoid the discussion of long term benefits like pensions (pseudo or otherwise) and retirement healthcare. Aside from seniority there's nothing long term to keep flightcrew these days. How does one expect to maintain loyalty?

Relying on ones earnings and a CPP at time of retirement could set up most non-savvy pilots for a challenging retirement.

[digits_]

My grumbling with a lot of carriers (big and small) is how they continually avoid the discussion of long term benefits like pensions (pseudo or otherwise) and retirement healthcare. Aside from seniority there's nothing long term to keep flightcrew these days. How does one expect to maintain loyalty?

Not having the cost of living included in the pay scale and only adjusting it when necessary, means that by design you'll have an ever growing group of unhappy pilots once the positive effect of the raise wears off. Once the unhappy group reaches a certain threshold, which results in quitting, and is getting harder to replace, pay goes up.

You create an environment where complaining is very much necessary to improve your situation. Or, even more perverse, the more miserable you can make your coworkers to the point that they leave the company, the better it is for you.

Not that airlines are perfect, but at least the 'complaining' happens at set time periods, once every X years during contract negotiations. Not continually in the hope your salaries will match inflation after a year. Or at least it doesn't *have" to happen all the time. I'm sure some people still do

[cjp]

My grumbling with a lot of carriers (big and small) is how they continually avoid the discussion of long term benefits like pensions (pseudo or otherwise) and retirement healthcare. Aside from seniority there's nothing long term to keep flightcrew these days. How does one expect to maintain loyalty?

Not having the cost of living included in the pay scale and only adjusting it when necessary, means that by design you'll have an ever growing group of unhappy pilots once the positive effect of the raise wears off. Once the unhappy group reaches a certain threshold, which results in quitting, and is getting harder to replace, pay goes up.

You create an environment where complaining is very much necessary to improve your situation. Or, even more perverse, the more miserable you can make your coworkers to the point that they leave the company, the better it is for you.

Not that airlines are perfect, but at least the 'complaining' happens at set time periods, once every X years during contract negotiations. Not continually in the hope your salaries will match inflation after a year. Or at least it doesn't *have" to happen all the time. I'm sure some people still do

In this day and age I don't know any carriers in Canada that provide an actual CPI based raise, plus a YOS addition. As Porter sits, it looks like Y2Y it's approximately 4.92% +/- with the 1.5% factored for.

I believe most Porter peeps are banking on big salary bumps with the competition bumping theirs (AC, Westjet et al.), plus an adjustment to 70-80% of industry instead of the 65%. I would be surprised if YR1 E2 Captains at Porter aren't making closer to $190,000 by the end of this year as Porter has used 737/Airbus A32X payscales to moderate their scales with top end closer to $280,000 plus their CPI adjustment. Addressing the current state of training pay to entice more Captains to throw in their hats is also on the table.

FO pay will be decided by Air Canada's flat pay situation dissolving.

[CaptDukeNukem]

My grumbling with a lot of carriers (big and small) is how they continually avoid the discussion of long term benefits like pensions (pseudo or otherwise) and retirement healthcare. Aside from seniority there's nothing long term to keep flightcrew these days. How does one expect to maintain loyalty?

Not having the cost of living included in the pay scale and only adjusting it when necessary, means that by design you'll have an ever growing group of unhappy pilots once the positive effect of the raise wears off. Once the unhappy group reaches a certain threshold, which results in quitting, and is getting harder to replace, pay goes up.

You create an environment where complaining is very much necessary to improve your situation. Or, even more perverse, the more miserable you can make your coworkers to the point that they leave the company, the better it is for you.

Not that airlines are perfect, but at least the 'complaining' happens at set time periods, once every X years during contract negotiations. Not continually in the hope your salaries will match inflation after a year. Or at least it doesn't *have" to happen all the time. I'm sure some people still do

In this day and age I don't know any carriers in Canada that provide an actual CPI based raise, plus a YOS addition. As Porter sits, it looks like Y2Y it's approximately 4.92% +/- with the 1.5% factored for.

I believe most Porter peeps are banking on big salary bumps with the competition bumping theirs (AC, Westjet et al.), plus an adjustment to 70-80% of industry instead of the 65%. I would be surprised if YR1 E2 Captains at Porter aren't making closer to $190,000 by the end of this year as Porter has used 737/Airbus A32X payscales to moderate their scales with top end closer to $280,000 plus their CPI adjustment. Addressing the current state of training pay to entice more Captains to throw in their hats is also on the table.

FO pay will be decided by Air Canada's flat pay situation dissolving.

Can confirm. We’ve been told at porter that they will run benchmarking at least once a year, and if something drastic happens, then as required.

[Minimums]

What gets me about that scale is that the pay goes up 2% per year with no CPI index, so you'll never have the buying power of your year 1 pay again in your career there. It's literally a pay cut every year after year 1.

Nailed it.

More pilots working at smaller operations need to figure this out. Basic economics.

[Checkspeed]

Let’s break that down. While a descent pay scale no doubt for the first few years if you sign up to be at the companies beck and call 24 hr/7 days a week, why would you.

At year 5 on the new Porter scale you are even with the Legacy. Beyond that you fall far behind with Sprint. Yr 7 at Porter is the year 10 at Sprint. At the 10 year mark with Porter you would make $212K oppose to $193.

Now, take into account (from former sprint pilots), you never know what you’re doing, cleaning exterior of the plane, doing all your own Flight Plans, etc. No thanks, the airlines are definitely were it is at.

Again, it is a descent scale but reality is an individual will most likely be making a max of $123K year one on a 14/14 schedule and dealing with a lot of external shenanigans that makes the salary not nearly enough.

Quite a bit of bad info in this post. You’re not at the companies beck and call 24hrs/ 7 days a week. You have a preferential bid schedule that comes out every month or you’re on a rotation. Your days on/ days off aren’t messed with after the schedule is published and when you’re off you’re not expected to answer your phone. When on days on you have a 2.5 hour call out.

Also, the “never know what you’re doing” isn’t very accurate either. I work at Airsprint(shocker) and I’m on the 16/12 bid schedule. My schedule almost always works out to 8 on 6 off. In my 8 days on I usually know what I’m doing 3-4 days in advance. Yup, sometimes things change and those 3-4 days will completely change but that really doesn’t bother me, guess I’m just less sensitive than most here.

Pilots don’t do their own flight planning anymore.

Yes, you have to keep your plane clean when you’re on the road. Every private/ corporate operation is like this. It’s not hard work. If one pilot tackles the inside and one the outside it’s 15 minutes or less.

And lastly, you won’t be making $123k your first year as a captain, everyone starts on the 16/12 bid schedule so every captain on the CJ starts at $135k, every Embraer captain starts at $145k.

Do I wish it was a 12 year scale like everywhere else? Sure.
That being said, I’m still pretty happy the way things turned out and it’s a great place to work, especially for those of us that have no interest in airlines.

[LegoMan]

Let’s break that down. While a descent pay scale no doubt for the first few years if you sign up to be at the companies beck and call 24 hr/7 days a week, why would you.

At year 5 on the new Porter scale you are even with the Legacy. Beyond that you fall far behind with Sprint. Yr 7 at Porter is the year 10 at Sprint. At the 10 year mark with Porter you would make $212K oppose to $193.

Now, take into account (from former sprint pilots), you never know what you’re doing, cleaning exterior of the plane, doing all your own Flight Plans, etc. No thanks, the airlines are definitely were it is at.

Again, it is a descent scale but reality is an individual will most likely be making a max of $123K year one on a 14/14 schedule and dealing with a lot of external shenanigans that makes the salary not nearly enough.

Quite a bit of bad info in this post. You’re not at the companies beck and call 24hrs/ 7 days a week. You have a preferential bid schedule that comes out every month or you’re on a rotation. Your days on/ days off aren’t messed with after the schedule is published and when you’re off you’re not expected to answer your phone. When on days on you have a 2.5 hour call out.

Also, the “never know what you’re doing” isn’t very accurate either. I work at Airsprint(shocker) and I’m on the 16/12 bid schedule. My schedule almost always works out to 8 on 6 off. In my 8 days on I usually know what I’m doing 3-4 days in advance. Yup, sometimes things change and those 3-4 days will completely change but that really doesn’t bother me, guess I’m just less sensitive than most here.

Pilots don’t do their own flight planning anymore.

Yes, you have to keep your plane clean when you’re on the road. Every private/ corporate operation is like this. It’s not hard work. If one pilot tackles the inside and one the outside it’s 15 minutes or less.

And lastly, you won’t be making $123k your first year as a captain, everyone starts on the 16/12 bid schedule so every captain on the CJ starts at $135k, every Embraer captain starts at $145k.

Do I wish it was a 12 year scale like everywhere else? Sure.
That being said, I’m still pretty happy the way things turned out and it’s a great place to work, especially for those of us that have no interest in airlines.

Is the PBS for rotation selection like 7/7 or 8/6 or is it just for booking vacation? Like can you go 8./6 one month and then 7/7 another?

Not sure what all the hooting and hollering is about. I have friends flying charter that have zero schedule. 24/7 on call only on a 2-man crew and don't get paid anywhere near this. Comparing AirSprint to Porter is just dumb, sorry but it is. At the end of the day there have been several pay raises in the last few years (I've been following Air Sprint) and I believe making $12k a month (after completing 3 years in the left seat) to fly a small business jet is in Canada is pretty darn good. Show me a company in this sector that pays equivalent or more for same size jet. It covers the inflation on the old pay scale +13% ish.

I think some of the whining on here is just envy. Most FOs with minimal work experience are not making $80-90k to start to sit right seat on a CJ-series jet, job security and get 10-12 days scheduled off. I'd rather be the highest paid small jet FO in Canada than the lowest paid heavy jet FO at Air Canada. Hell I will make the appetizers myself for the customers for that kind of money.

[LegoMan]

Let’s break that down. While a descent pay scale no doubt for the first few years if you sign up to be at the companies beck and call 24 hr/7 days a week, why would you.

At year 5 on the new Porter scale you are even with the Legacy. Beyond that you fall far behind with Sprint. Yr 7 at Porter is the year 10 at Sprint. At the 10 year mark with Porter you would make $212K oppose to $193.

Now, take into account (from former sprint pilots), you never know what you’re doing, cleaning exterior of the plane, doing all your own Flight Plans, etc. No thanks, the airlines are definitely were it is at.

Again, it is a descent scale but reality is an individual will most likely be making a max of $123K year one on a 14/14 schedule and dealing with a lot of external shenanigans that makes the salary not nearly enough.

Quite a bit of bad info in this post. You’re not at the companies beck and call 24hrs/ 7 days a week. You have a preferential bid schedule that comes out every month or you’re on a rotation. Your days on/ days off aren’t messed with after the schedule is published and when you’re off you’re not expected to answer your phone. When on days on you have a 2.5 hour call out.

Also, the “never know what you’re doing” isn’t very accurate either. I work at Airsprint(shocker) and I’m on the 16/12 bid schedule. My schedule almost always works out to 8 on 6 off. In my 8 days on I usually know what I’m doing 3-4 days in advance. Yup, sometimes things change and those 3-4 days will completely change but that really doesn’t bother me, guess I’m just less sensitive than most here.

Pilots don’t do their own flight planning anymore.

Yes, you have to keep your plane clean when you’re on the road. Every private/ corporate operation is like this. It’s not hard work. If one pilot tackles the inside and one the outside it’s 15 minutes or less.

And lastly, you won’t be making $123k your first year as a captain, everyone starts on the 16/12 bid schedule so every captain on the CJ starts at $135k, every Embraer captain starts at $145k.

Do I wish it was a 12 year scale like everywhere else? Sure.
That being said, I’m still pretty happy the way things turned out and it’s a great place to work, especially for those of us that have no interest in airlines.

Is the PBS for rotation selection like 7/7 or 8/6 or is it just for booking vacation? Like can you go 8./6 one month and then 7/7 another?

Not sure what all the hooting and hollering is about. I have friends flying charter that have zero schedule. 24/7 on call only on a 2-man crew and don't get paid anywhere near this. Comparing AirSprint to Porter is just dumb, sorry but it is. At the end of the day there have been several pay raises in the last few years (I've been following Air Sprint) and I believe making $12k a month (after completing 3 years in the left seat) to fly a small business jet is in Canada is pretty darn good. Show me a company in this sector that pays equivalent or more for same size jet. It covers the inflation on the old pay scale +13% ish.

I think some of the whining on here is just envy. Most FOs with minimal work experience are not making $80-90k to start to sit right seat on a CJ-series jet, job security and get 10-12 days scheduled off. I'd rather be the highest paid CJ jet FO in Canada than the lowest paid 787 FO in the world at Air Canada. Hell I will make the appetizers myself for the customers for that kind of money.