Originally Posted by WEACLRS
How do you block 55 hours and get paid for 102? Typically I block 78 - 85 hours and get paid 90 - 100 (I averaged 93 pay credit hours per month in the last year). I've heard this before at other regionals and have always wondered...
I worked Long Call days, basically reserve where you sit at home and have 2 days to report if they need you. We're never needed, so I never fly, and then I pick up trips on the days that I'm released and get paid for them over and above my monthly guarantee (I get paid the days' credit and the LC credit of 4:30). So less work and more pay. Works for me. In addition, if you pick up trips out of open time they are paid at 1.5 pay. The downside right now is there isn't much open time flying, because we are fat on pilots. However there is still a lot of action for trip trades, but that's only 1:1 pay.
If we overblock on ANY leg, and underblock on the rest, we still get the over block pay for that leg, and block pay for the rest. There are days I overblock one leg by almost 2 hours (wx delay sitting on the ground) and that's above and beyond our credit for the month. A typical month will have 5-10 hours of extra time this way.
Also, we have duty and trip rigs. For every 2 hours of duty time, we are guaranteed 1 hour flight pay. For every 4 hours of trip time (used to be 3.5 hours, oh well) we are guaranteed 1 hour of flight pay.
So a 4-day that has has 80 hours of TAFB we're guaranteed to credit 20 hours. If the same 4-day has 48 hours of duty time, we're guaranteed 24 hours of pay. Now, if you block >24 hours, you get that, but if you block, say, 18 hours then you still get 24 hours pay, and get another 6 hours of credit.
That's how I turned 55 hours of FAR block time into 102 hours of credit time. And I still ended up with 16 days off
. After that, however, I just bid for normal lines crediting 95 hours and lots of per diem.
For me, I am 24, so I wanted some QOL while I am still young enough to be able to afford taking my time. If I haven't upgrade by the time I am 27 I will most likely get out and find another job (be it small freight or whatever) for the PIC time. Who knows.
I agree, upgrading quicker is definately worth it. That being said, if most of the people leaving Colgan have 4-5 years with the company, that is no different than here. There are some people that have been here much longer, but they are staying put, not trying to get out.