El Peso

Have to give yourself one flight.

I like our reserve a lot. Don’t know how it compares to other carriers but I’ll often bid it in leu of a line. I live in base however. Long call is 12 hours, short call is undefined. So if you’re in Nyc and need 3.5 hours to report, so be it. We use a bucket system so the more you fly, lower bucket you go into for getting called again. Vacation credit shows up as flight time too, so if you have a week vacation in the beginning of the month, you start the month with 25.40 hours and in the lowest bucket. It’s very feasible to only get one trip or nothing all month in this scenario (probably not during the summer busy season). Short-call reserve plus a week of vacation also nets 89 hours min guarantee in a 31 day month. That’s a moving target depending on number of days in a month. You also have options to pass on trips, depending on who else is in your bucket.

“Sick if needed” is great too. Its exactly what it sounds like. You’re on reserve and get sick. Don’t want to use sick time if you weren’t going to be used anyway. Call in sick if needed and you’ll only be docked sick time if they actually needed to fly you. A good variety of trips on reserve ranging in length. Lots of out and backs, in my bid status anyways. Had a busy month lately but only spent 3 nights in a hotel all month. Just a crap shoot really.

We have over guarantee flying for reserves, and Premium OG which is time and a half. Depending on how bad they need you. Obviously we haven’t seen too many of those lately as we’ve been flying a 50% schedule most of last year. Should start picking up again though.

I read a lot of our own pilots on here who seem to have no shortage of things to complain about. Maybe commuting is taking a toll on them. I live in base, and I’m honest when I tell you that I wouldn’t trade my job for any pilot job in the world.