Originally Posted by
Jetjocky76
Iv worked at Nicholas Air for 3.5 years. Great place to work with good pay and benefits. I usually do not do these forms because they are just places for people to talk negativiatly. A few of us pilots heard about these negative post from a friend that was interviewing here and so figured I would chime in to defend the great place I work. I came from a large 135 operator before here. The equipment here is amazing and you will not find a company that maintains newer/nicer planes. I’m not just a number here in some union pool and the management team all the way up to the CEO cares about us. The company has very high expectations and standards, much higher than anywhere I have worked before so its not for everyone. There is some turn over but it’s because they weed out the weak links quickly, probably which is mostly where the negatives you are hearing come from. If you want to be disrespectful and not follow the policy’s then its not a place for you. The customer pool we fly is super successful therefor demands the best. I don’t know how they got some of them but you get to meet people I never dreamed I would. Its a very tight network. I plan to retire here as its a great stable job that I love. If you have a family and looking for stability its a great place to be.
The way this is written sounds just like the grammatical format of the DO Fernando. Hi, Fernando.
Let's talk about how the company will constantly mislead you and misrepresent how long you will be a "FO". They're going to hire you onto a Phenom as an FO but you're not going to get trained for a very long time. Their training program for in-house SIC's was actually revoked by the FAA because of their failure to actually have any literature pertaining to anything other than the Phenom 100. I don't know the status of it now but that in itself is pretty sad for a company that has so many people working in the home office.
You are going to fly 4-8 legs a day. Everyday is a 14 hour duty day. The 300's fly the most. There was countless times that we would have a 14 hour duty day and have to reposition part 91. They push you till your limits, and numerous times you'll be setting up the airplane to turn around for that 91 reposition and go into the FBO and find your captain passed out from exhaustion.
The pay is below industry standard. In your interview they're going to explain their bonus structure but what they fail to tell you is that VERY rarely you will actually hit it. I was pretty much told I would be hitting my bonus 90% of the time and so it was factored into my total compensation I was expecting. Most people only hit it 1-2 times a year. There is a lot of tension among pilots because of the way they do their tier pay. Lots of folks are coming on straight into tier 4 or even higher and there's guys that have been there for years still on tier 2 or 3 pay. It's pretty messed up also that a 5 year PC12 captain makes less than a straight hire tier 4 Latitude FO. Oh, and when you move up to captain, they take you down a tier. What other company in the country does that??
You don't come here to stay. You come to NA to get your time and get out. The issue here is a lot of SIC's and PIC's spent 12-18 months at the company before you get a SIC rating. So you're busting your balls working a strenuous schedule trying to perform the company, for lackluster pay and what do you get in the end? No hours logged. Don't even try to log those right seat hours in a single pilot jet without an SIC. What a waste of time.
The CEO himself numerous times has explosive outbreaks. Not the kind of guy you can be happy to say you work for. He inherited all of his money anyways.
Though I mentioned Fernando in a negative light, he seems to be the only one standing firm and trying to improve things. I hope he does well and can bring up pay, QOL and atmosphere at this company. It won't happen overnight though.
There's too many quality operators hiring now. Stay away from this place for now. It'll only lead to dreams that won't get fulfilled and come at the expense of your health and well being. I'm getting out of here the first chance I get. Might even buy out my contract.