Originally Posted by
Macjet
I found the commuting at NJA to be intolerable and one of several reasons that I left. It is for sure better than 121 commuting but it's much, much, much worse than 121 living in base. I absolutely couldn't stand a three leg WN hop to get to a bird and then hurried to go fly a leg or two. And the return trips were even worse. If NJA could save $5 on a two leg hop with a four hour sit instead of a direct flight then they'd do it in a heartbeat. I couldn't have cared less about the miles. Who wants to fly on a day off anyways?
I know several have the opposite attitude but if you're looking for facts the NJA commute isn't the rainbows and daisies some are advocating.
Depends on where you live. I'm in CLT and very rarely had anything other than a 1 leg airline to my jet. Was "gold" on AA. Now coming home was a bit different, they will go cheap. I can non-rev on AA and used that a few times to get home when booked on an airline other than DL or AA. And you can always "dummy" the ticket and make your own arrangements that'll be reimbursed up to what they paid for the original schedule. And because I'm in CLT I can count on my fingers how many times I rode SWA in 14 years.
Edit: forgot to mention the miles. They're very nice to have. I blew all my Delta miles on a trip for my wife and I to Hawaii. Went 1st class both ways. Spent a week at a nice Hilton property, all on hotel points. Would have cost us many thousands of $$$. All I really paid for was the rental car and the tourist stuff we did like the helicopter tour over the lava flows which was awesome.