Should I stay or should I go?
 

Hey fellas,
I need your input.
6 months to flow and got a CJO from Delta.
I live in Chicago, can relocate to one of the Delta bases in a couple of years, but I don’t really want to.
Accepted the retention bonus.
Should I stay or should I go?

Go. Don’t even think once.

What do you want to do with the last third of your career at AA/DL? If you want to be senior on reserve flying some widebody you should really ask yourself if you're going to regret having 1200-1600 pilots senior to you at DL down the line. On the other hand, if you're staying in the narrow body aircraft it probably wouldn't hurt so much. It would be much easier to forget about it in the new BMW you show up to class in at AA.

That’s tough, I’d say stay for the flow (and no I’m not drinking the kool aid, envoy and AA are two entirely different airlines contrary to popular belief) only reason I say stay for flow is one you’re only six months away, but also you already use many of the same company procedures and applications American uses as well, and honestly operate much the same way American does (which could definitely help ease the learning curve) and you also already live in an American base (and yes I know you said you can relocate to a Delta base). However at the same time all airlines have their own issues and there is certainly no perfect one, but I know of a few Envoy (and honestly there’s probably been a lot more than a few) guys/gals that left for Delta so honestly it comes down to where do you want to spend the rest of your career? (Also for what it’s worth, I think it’s well known Delta has much better profit sharing)

6 months is an eternity in this industry. Anything can happen. And with the situation in Europe seemingly devolving by the week and a looming recession of unknown length/severity, I would go get the mainline seniority number ASAP.

American is going to have a rough several years ahead. And I have exactly 0 faith in APA securing anything close to an industry-leading contract for the pilots of American. Who cares if you have more relative seniority if it’s at an airline with an inferior contract and massive issues? Delta will still leave a pilot very senior by the end of their career and they’ll have made far more money along the way.

Also, everyone is making assumptions about AA and Delta widebody flying based on the numbers out there as of today. What if Delta grows its widebody fleet and AA shrinks theirs?

Definitely don’t recommending staying at the WO a day longer than you have to. It’s a sinking ship. Go to DAL and keep working on that United application.

Take the Delta job, update your United and AA apps to show Delta and you’ll get invites. If it’s only a few months to get a class at those two jump, if more then I would stay at D. This racket is musical chairs bro, don’t be at a regional when the music stops.

How much longer do you have to fly?

But seriously, taking advice from strangers from the internet on a potentially multi-million dollar decision???

Seriously? 6 months to flow and you are thinking about leaving to go to Delta? Really, really bad decision IMO.

If you had any doubt, this post is definitely the best reason to go to Delta!