A good friend of my family is a retired Engineering Test Pilot for UAL. I can assure you that they do a lot more than ferry perfectly good aircraft. They all have extensive test pilot experience and do things that most line guys would rightly refuse to do, like three engine ferries of 747's, initial acceptance flights of new aircraft, etc. UAL is the only U.S. carrier left that has it's own cadre of test pilots, and in my opinion we should be grateful for them. I, for one, have no interest in doing the type of flying that they do. As an aside, my retired friend spent an inordinate amount of time at TK in order to stay current in all the aircraft that he is typed in (everything UAL ever flew from the DC-3 to the 747)