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Swift Air - The truth

Old 02-17-2019, 11:16 PM
  #221  
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Originally Posted by mexipilot84 View Post
We all know what they think is competitive is a far side from reality. But you have to remember from where our pay structures evolved. We all used to be salaried employees. There never was such a thing as hourly compensation except for block hour pay. So none of that language translated well when we went to block hour pay. The only reason our guarantee is 60 is because payroll can make the math easily to compare it to a 40hr work week every month.

As I mentioned Before we speak of pay raises work rules need to be added to comply with industry standard on soft pay.

-dh Pay 100%
-min day 3-4 hrs(Mia needs that)
-rsv should count for 4 hrs
- ready reserve 6hrs
- 401K matching, cant be a career airline if we have a crappy retirement program.
- higher per diem for both domestic and intl. cost of living has gone up sometimes you can’t find cheap food in some places. Healthy food can come at a premium.
-maybe an incentive pay such as block more than 80hrs and everything after will be 150%, but this might be a crapshoot.

So again these are things everyone is aware of. People think it just gets locked away and no one talks about it. But I do believe they need to stop saying they’re competitive. I just always tell new hires it needs work. But just wanted to give y’all some perspective on the evolution of our pay here. I’ve been he almost 4 years and have seen the transition.
Make this a sticky note for anyone looking for info, my job here is done.
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Old 02-18-2019, 04:35 AM
  #222  
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I’ve been catching some flack for being a negative nelly.
Let me explain a couple of things.
I’ve met a lot of good people while working at Swift. Mechanics, flight crew, cabin crew. They good ones work hard and have pride in their job.
Without a doubt.
However, company policy is from the top down. Nobody on the ‘workfloor’ can change that or force a change without a union.
So as management you keep the union out the door and your half way there.
Then use the ‘divide and conquer’ tactics by “allowing” (actively encouraging) special deals.
The recipients of which would never go against company.
What are or maybe were the special deals? Home basing for a special group while officially Swift didn’t have home basing.
Sugar trips assigned to the same people. Overtime assigned to the same and so on an so forth.
These people had an open line to Scheduling to have trips changed or crews changed on trips.
I’ve sat there many times with a Captain on the phone with Scheduling asking them to take another off a trip to have themselves put on.
Classy.
Now combine this with an abusive management style and a business plan which is based on buying airplanes retired by other operators, sending them to C/D checks and paint in South America then have crews deal with all the subsequent issues that rise out of these practices. Allowing your mechanics to only repair what absolutely necessary for the very next flight to take place.
Yes I know they have -800’s now but that’s because they fell into that deal after Eastern tanked.

Water flows to the lowest point.
Change needs to be forced and unless there is a sufficiently strong incentive it won’t happen.
If company policy is determined by management then it won’t change with the same people still in place.
It’s that simple.
End of rant.

, enjoy March madness.

By the way, the -300/400 are freakishly fun to fly and the Caribbean offers some of the most beautiful scenery in the world.
Just a shame about the management really.

Last edited by TiredSoul; 02-18-2019 at 04:51 AM.
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Old 02-18-2019, 06:36 AM
  #223  
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Default Swift Air - The truth

Originally Posted by TiredSoul View Post
I’ve been catching some flack for being a negative nelly.

Let me explain a couple of things.

I’ve met a lot of good people while working at Swift. Mechanics, flight crew, cabin crew. They good ones work hard and have pride in their job.

Without a doubt.

However, company policy is from the top down. Nobody on the ‘workfloor’ can change that or force a change without a union.

So as management you keep the union out the door and your half way there.

Then use the ‘divide and conquer’ tactics by “allowing” (actively encouraging) special deals.

The recipients of which would never go against company.

What are or maybe were the special deals? Home basing for a special group while officially Swift didn’t have home basing.

Sugar trips assigned to the same people. Overtime assigned to the same and so on an so forth.

These people had an open line to Scheduling to have trips changed or crews changed on trips.

I’ve sat there many times with a Captain on the phone with Scheduling asking them to take another off a trip to have themselves put on.

Classy.

Now combine this with an abusive management style and a business plan which is based on buying airplanes retired by other operators, sending them to C/D checks and paint in South America then have crews deal with all the subsequent issues that rise out of these practices. Allowing your mechanics to only repair what absolutely necessary for the very next flight to take place.

Yes I know they have -800’s now but that’s because they fell into that deal after Eastern tanked.



Water flows to the lowest point.

Change needs to be forced and unless there is a sufficiently strong incentive it won’t happen.

If company policy is determined by management then it won’t change with the same people still in place.

It’s that simple.

End of rant.



, enjoy March madness.



By the way, the -300/400 are freakishly fun to fly and the Caribbean offers some of the most beautiful scenery in the world.

Just a shame about the management really.


Swift isn’t the only airline that sends their acft south for heavy checks. The same issue ensues at the majors as airlines look to cut costs with a loss of quality. I don’t think I’ve ever heard anything good from any airplane coming back from south of the border at any airline.

Change is needed as mentioned im with ya on that. Some things have changed for the better, but we still have a long way to go. My point is we make the best of the situation.

Before home basing came alive we were told if you can make your ticket cheaper from your home airport they would buy the ticket from there than your base. For me 99% of the time it was cheaper from home. Worst case the one or 2 times I’d pay the difference for a ticket from home and call the airline myself. $20-40 isn’t going to kill me vs having to commute to just travel.
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Old 02-18-2019, 08:05 AM
  #224  
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When in Nicaragua last week, I saw several AA and JB aircraft there for mx.
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Old 02-18-2019, 10:30 AM
  #225  
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Word is they’re upgrading guys now right off the sim.. there were 2 DEC and they’re upgrading guys that have 121 time and experience.
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Old 02-18-2019, 04:16 PM
  #226  
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I understand that Indoc is 2 weeks in GSO. Then, I assume approximately 3 weeks in MIA. What is the schedule like once getting to MIA? Any ground schools there, or is it just a few procedures trainers and then a few sim sessions? How many hours per day? Around the clock type of sim schedules, or is it mostly daytime sessions? Thanks.
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Old 02-18-2019, 06:53 PM
  #227  
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Originally Posted by PICsf340 View Post
I understand that Indoc is 2 weeks in GSO. Then, I assume approximately 3 weeks in MIA. What is the schedule like once getting to MIA? Any ground schools there, or is it just a few procedures trainers and then a few sim sessions? How many hours per day? Around the clock type of sim schedules, or is it mostly daytime sessions? Thanks.


The first days are oral prep with the 1step people apparently. Then your oral so pretty much 9 to 5 schedule on those. Your oral could be scheduled at any time during the day after 1step.

Sim times vary by availability. Sometimes you might even get the graveyard one, just haven’t seen one of those in a while. Obviously all sim sessions follow a rest period. Not sure how frequent your sims will be again depends on sims and instructors. If a sim goes down obviously that creates a domino effect.

A normal sim is 4hrs, 2hrs for you and 2 for your partner. One hour prebrief followed by a post briefing. Pretty straight forward like any airline.

Went I went through back in the day pretty much was like 4 days on maybe a day off then back it again. Remember you’re sharing sim availability with guys going through recurrent too.

So as mentioned plan on 2-3 weeks in MIA. 2 in the January class went to LAS due to sim availability. They had to fly back to MIA to finish.
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Old 02-18-2019, 06:54 PM
  #228  
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Originally Posted by Toby Flenderson View Post
Word is they’re upgrading guys now right off the sim.. there were 2 DEC and they’re upgrading guys that have 121 time and experience.


Apparently short peeps again.
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Old 02-20-2019, 05:33 AM
  #229  
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Originally Posted by mexipilot84 View Post
Apparently short peeps again.
Or bypassing eligible FO’s in favor of buddies from the street?

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Old 02-20-2019, 05:42 AM
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Originally Posted by TiredSoul View Post
Or bypassing eligible FO’s in favor of buddies from the street?

Nope. Not true. You should work on getting your facts straight.
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