Originally Posted by
flymyplane1
I have an offer from F9 and NK but trying to see the pay difference if any… management says frontier pilots are the 2nd highest paid Airbus pilots in the industry behind American because of their credit system. Any truth to this ? It seems like it’s easier to credit a lot of hours at frontier and not actually fly that much, why is this ? With a little hustle how much monthly credit can a you expect ?
I would not go as far to say we are the 2nd highest paid 320 drivers in the industry. You can look at a lot of metrics and see that is a false statement. I’d also like to point out that both NK and F9 have steeper pay scales than most of our competitors. Legacy pay goes up about $2/year of longevity whereas some of our jumps are $8/hr. This makes the top pay scale look competitive whereas the middle band of pay is at a discount compared to our peers.
We can credit exclusive of the override, about same amount as almost any company flying domestic NB. What our company does well (and SWA for that matter) is incentivize flying more than the minimum per month. With the 1.25x override on credit over 82 it makes it possible and rewarding to trade a few days off for more money. It is possible to do about 16 days off per month at about 95-100 hours of credit including the override.
While NK has similar pay scales than us, they get a 321 override which boosts the actual straight pay a little higher than ours. They do not have the 125% override though which means we are rewarded exponentially for working harder if you choose to do so.
As far as premium flying is concerned, NK pays at 200% and we pay at 150%. Our premium pay is subject to incentive credit which is an arbitrary amount of credit added to the pairing at crew scheduling’s discretion. The 150%+ incentive credit is then subject to the 125% override as well which can be rewarding.
That being said, don’t count on premium pay to be something you can achieve with any regular success unless you are willing to commute to other domiciles or have a flica bot.
I am not an expert on NK’s contract so if there’s anything I said incorrectly, please feel free to chime in.