Swift Air - The truth
 

If you’re just making that amount you’re doing something wrong. When I started here in 2015 we just had a salary and block hour pay, my first year I still managed to make $60K as an FO it’s not that difficult, that’s not including per diem.

For home based pilots summer is when we can make a lot of good money. Even get to the point you time out! Now with Europe it’s a lot more opportunity for that. Behind home based you can save a lot of money too because team flying is catered, you always end up taking extras to the hotel, saves buku dinero.

Not to mention the airline miles and hotel points that save me thousands on vacation. Took the family to Disney world and just had to pay for park fees, air fare and hotel was free! Beats non reving any day!

If you’re just making the bare minimum not sure what you’re doing wrong. The pay is not spectacular for the industry of today. Even on a 4yr CA pay I’ve managed to make over 110K a year and I don’t pick up a lot of OT. The pay is something they’re working on, is that the company was sold even the coo is realizing the non competitive pay of today.

We proposed taking the bonus away and just giving everyone an hourly raise, you can make more money with the hourly raise than the bonus. The bonus was just a start. Least they did something. Personally I think the bonus cheapens the company image.

Ive been infected with the “Tiredsoul” pathogen...I tried being a downer and thats the worst I could come up with.

They increased the number of airplanes and can’t increase the crews sufficiently, that’s what’s happened.

Well 27 acft on property. 2 in LIM getting painted and one NG from Europe.

We’re somewhere in the range of over 160 pilots right now. By summer we should have about 200. Our applicant pool has gotten better since airlineapps.

They’re definitely short captains, there’s an upgrade class going on now, mostly senior FOs. Problem we’re going to meet is no feds to do obs rides with the govt shutdown. Delaying progression ability.

13 in class from January, another 10 for feb. expecting March to be about 16 pilots.

With the iAerogroup purchase, I believe we will see Swift getting more 737NGs the way this last acquisition happened out of thin air. Keeping the current CEO in place is evidence that there is no plan to disrupt the flying or slow down. The pilot group is pretty cool. The only major issues/complaints stem around pay and scheduling. Both of these issues have been addressed by management in various company communications. The people in charge aren't morons, they know it's in their best interest to keep the labor groups happy and productive...in the modern world that means pay.



Personally, I believe scheduling QOL will improve when there are more pilots and the work can be divided more favorably. The pay will improve when the well runs dry. So basically we need more disgruntled ex-employees to leave negative reviews and bogus experiences that slow hiring and in a few months this place'll be the next Kalitta Air (Connie-not Jr.:p)


Side-note, have any of you guys seen the plus-sized models on IG?!?!:D:cool:

As long as it’s plus sized bootaes that look as good as J-lo’s!

February schedules in MIA
 

I was just curious to see if the minimum days off stayed at 15 for the Miami based pilots?

That’s so delusionally optimistic is almost endearing.

The problem at Swift comes from the top. Overall it is a good group of pilots, working with poor dispatching, good mechanics working with no parts(a fly away kit, a wrench and speed tape won't fix everything). The way the company has grown is exciting but to me it is more scary than anything, it was an unplanned growth in which OCC lagged to support the operation. Management seems short sighted, not realizing the bull market for pilots. Swift being bought out sounds like someone grew the company, made a quick buck and got rid of it. Top management doesn't have a good airline record and that is worry some, not raising pay and not investing into the infrastructure sounds like another scumbag Miami operation.
Swift Air needs a union asap.

This ^^^......
Swift is one big oops away from bankruptcy same as Eastern was.

They got 14 days for feb

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That’s not bad at all

The difference is Swift is very profitable, hence the buyout.

Not to work there it’s not.
And Eastern tanked within 6 months of running Pence off the runway.
FAA came down like a ton of bricks and contracts were cancelled.

We get it. You hate Swift and Donald Trump.

Especially the US air aircraft those are tired looking especially in the cabins, but they’re work horses and that’s why swift bought them. They do the high density flying with ICE or Cuba. The nicer Alaska aircraft with all the nice bells and whistles including HUDs, newer cabins are used in VIP.

I’d say for the most part they all fly pretty good, takes a minute to transition from efis to steam gauges but they all do the same thing. The 300s suck in the summer, only one recirc fan and weak APUs can make them a sauna. Don’t know much about the southwest 300s, but hopefully they have updated pieces on it.

The flight mechanics work hard to keep these aircraft going, since we don’t fly into hubs, parts are shipped to destinations and the type of charter operation makes it hard for aircraft to sit for days and be babied. It’s not ideal but idle aircraft don’t make money, that applies to any airline. If it’s broken write it up, easy as that. Even if they don’t like the answer because it causes a rift in occ to create rescue flights, it is what it is.

It’s boeing product and they were made to be put through its paces. Things happen, things break. Write it up if it’s unsafe and if someone coerces you to do otherwise that’s what the feds are for. So if you’re not reporting unsafe acts or doing your own due diligence you have no room to complain. This place is what you make of it and it’s as safe as it’s pilots make it, those not complying it will catch up quick.

The southwest 300s make a sauna sound good

Maybe it comes with a massage?

Definitely and the clacker will lull you to sleep

Any Updates?
 

Anyone have any updates on the company?

On going hiring, still growing. 2 planes in Lima getting painted one coming from France this week.

With March class hoping to be somewhere around 180 pilots.

Everyone is eagerly waiting info on European flying this summer. They still say 3-5 month tdy in Europe.

March madness begins next month and starts the wind down of ncaa and into hockey playoffs.

Sounds like 4-5 airplanes doing vacation express in the summer.

1 doing VIP for a concert tour.

Further expansion in MIA.

DOD approval completed.

New company doing hotel bookings replacing travelliance(Indian mafia) in the next couple of weeks.

Also aproximately 5 captains have resigned in one month, no pay raises in sight.

This seems promising. Has training and crew scheduling improve... and all the other issues? Also, how long is upgrade?

Training has mostly been brought in house, trying to get away from panam instructors. Have our own TCE and our own sim instructors which is helping bring standardization from the get go.

Crew scheduling is still evolving. They’ve hired a lot of new people. MIA schedules have improved to 4on 4off patterns this month they have 14 day off lines. New hotel vendor which I hope will improve from the garbage we had with travelliance. It’s not perfect but I’ve yet to hear of an airline where no one complains about crew scheduling for one thing or another. They increased home basing slots to 42 crews(84 Pilots)

Every thing else is just evolving as it goes, we have our problems like everyone else. Despite the challenges in growing they’ve been able to stay afloat. Blue one is still being worked on for our scheduling needs. I guess we’re going to a new dispatching software away from navtech.

Every department has increased in size from HR to payroll. It’s not easy tripling in size in the last 3.5 years.

Don’t think we’ve lost anyone that made a detrimental impact. I expect more to go especially those in MIA probing that new relaunch of world airways. They can have it! We still have a very good amount of people who do a lot of good here and I am definitely proud to say we have a lot of young hungry blood in our ranks now going through training. You probably need to see the full story on why some of these people left, definitely more to it than pay. We have FOs making 70K a year. Some CAs making close to 200K. If you’re not making money here I don’t know what you’re doing wrong. My first year here even on salary back then with overtime made about $65K

We’re supposed to get some sort of bonus in the spring as a retention bonus for the cadre that’s been here. New hires have their 25K bonus.

In recruiting we’ve been trying to make waves on the pay side as competition around us evolves. I think the hardest part is trying to sell the company while you do pay increases, doubt that helps sell if you have a high over head especially for the new owners to be attracted. So I understand that from a business stand point.

I think before pay raises we need an increase in soft pay. That can raise pay quick. With basics like this when a pay increase happens you can make more than with a bonus.
-100% deadhead pay
-min day guarantee(those doing 1 Cuba can feel that one).
- credit push over a credit threshold to get add pay for the month after going over like 85hrs would be nice.
-per diem increase
-401K matching.
-min pay for a ready reserve day

We’ve had discussions with the COO about it. I don’t think we’ll see anything till after the spring. But I think this is where we have to start solidifying work rules for the future. What we have now is a vast improvement over our salary and block pay we used to have. Just needs some tweaking.

I appreciate your reply as it adds solutions to the current problems.
I think the min day credit is a must, especially for home based crews.
Deadhead pay I don't think it's possible because of the ACMI nature of business.
With the new company and discounted hotel rates, it will be common practice to not get points for stays.
I did hear a rumor of a $30/hr raise.
Bottom line, pay attracts people and work rules make people stay.
I'd like to see more accountability and time lines on the crew scheduling department. Last minute, middle seat bookings are far too common.

Thanks for the reply, guys! Swift has been on my radar since I live in MIA and it wouldn’t be a bad gig for my situation.

For the MIA and IWA it’s a great easy gig. Home every night. Can’t beat that!

Until that base shuts down. Nothing is a guarantee in ACMI

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People seem to forget that nothing is guaranteed in aviation-EVER. It is always the ACMIs. Delta, American, United, Continental, and US Airways were the big dogs of the day. They all had pilots on the street at one time. Not to mention TWA, Eastern, and Pan Am. Some top tier airlines that have turned to dust. Just because you may be at an “elite” place does not make any pilot anywhere close to being safe.

+1 EVER filler

Who knows, could it happen? Absolutely. The only thing swift has going in MIA is multiple contracts. So you lose one you still have others. The one thing I will say is at least they don’t have their eggs in one basket. They don’t depend on just the Cuban flying. ICE in MIA is a strong possibility too, world Atlantic is shaky at best right now. Wouldn’t doubt seeing them being absorbed as well.

But then again tomorrow is another day!

No enterprise wants to lose a contract, unless the client is high maintenance, or the contract is being serviced at a loss.

Also, a loss of a positive revenue contract could put the company into an income loss, and thus the spiral begins with the mindset that “if we lose a contract, we still have others.”

Very true, but I will say at least the sales department is very aggressive. Hell they sell planes when we don’t even have the man power to do the flight. Then it’s scrambling time in GSO.

Good to read that there’s more business than capacity. Does Swift subservice if there’s not sufficient lift to support the business?

We’ve had our old sister company dynamic before doing sub service for us. This last summer was brutal and with airplanes in Europe some of our flying was subbed out to dynamic.

What do schedules look like for home based pilots? Also what’s the upgrade time? Saw aero crew saying sub 1 year. Is that true? How hard is it to get one of the home based slots?

You won't break min guarantee.
First year FO 66*60/month.
First year captain 117*60/month.
Sit unpaid reserve at places like ACY.
Team flying is often late nights.