Originally Posted by
1013dot25hPa
I have an interview at the end of this month and have a couple of questions:
1. What does a typical month look like for a 1st year FO? I know most trips are out & backs. Is it something like 6 on 3 or 4 off and back 6 on?
2. How many pilots are you hiring?
3. More airplanes expected on the property this year?
4. Is it relatively easy as a 1st year FO to fly over guarantee, ie make extra money?
5. How are the medical, vision, dental bennies?
6. Travel benefits?
7. CASS
8. I know there was talk about providing newhires with accomodation. Did that ever come to fruition?
9. How is the training, indoc, systems, flight training?
10. For you guys/gals that flew glass before Allegiant. What was the transition like during training back to steam gauges?
Thanks and wish me luck!
I'm fairly new, so I can probably answer some of these questions.
1. Depends where you're based. In SFB I would be about 1/2 way up the FO list and could hold a line. In LAS I am near the bottom and will be on reserve for a while. My reserve line is 5 on 3 off, then 5 on 2 off, then 4 on 3 off, etc.
2. One more class of 10 in February, then no more till later this year.
3. Just got 2, probably won't get more until the end of the year.
4. Depends where you're based and how many classes hired after you. In LAS, I can't fly over guarantee. In SFB, I could.
5. About $90/month for everything. I've had good experience with the medical, but haven't used the others yet.
6&7. We have jumpseat agreements with almost every airline I can think of.
We have non-rev agreements with USAir, SWA, Frontier, Airtran, JetBlue, Spirit, other smaller airlines, and some regionals. Still trying for some of the big guys: AA, UAL, CAL, Delta.
8. Not yet. Just $2000/month training pay. Normal pay starts on IOE.
9&10. Training was okay. Some things could have been more thorough, but the tests weren't too hard and the simulator was okay. The instructors are really friendly; as long as you study, they want you to succeed. You do not need to be able to mentally build the airplane with your eyes closed like at some airlines. My favorite saying from ground school was "a predetermined value"; they don't make you memorize tons of worthless numbers like hydraulic relief valve pressures and fuel nozzle pressures.
Lot of profiles and callouts to learn.
It's not really going back to steam gauges. The majority of our airplanes are mostly glass, but older glass with seperate instruments, only some have all steam gauges. I had flown nothing but steam gauges before, so I can't comment on a retro transition.
Don't know if it's true, but heard they are getting more resume's now due to age 65 and the slowing economy and are interviewing mostly higher time applicants (guess 2007 was an anomaly for airline hiring). You really need to want to work at Allegiant to pass the interview. The interviewers really like specifics and they want to hire career pilots. If you live at one of our bases or have familly there, they seem to like that. If you're considering Allegiant as a stepping stone airline or just to get out of a regional job, they probably won't hire you.