Man I hate to even say this, but many others have already said it. The "flow" is not your friend in today's hiring market.

A little background. I'm a second career guy, long time AA pax, Exec Plat even for several years. LOVE the brand... it feels like home. When I switched to professional flying and got a CJO at Envoy I was over the moon. Get to fly an amazing jet with the logo I prefer, winning..

BUT, I picked the absolute worst way to get to AA while the hiring frenzy is going on. When my captains joined Envoy 4/5/6 years ago, it made complete sense as hiring at the legacies wasn't really a good option for them as the minimums were much higher.

All of us that joined the regional FO ranks in the last 12-24 months are in a different world, not of our creation, just blind luck of timing. This legacy hiring frenzy, AA peaks last, will peak in the next 12-36 months and calm down (age 67 will affect this somewhat). "Flow" is over 6 years.

Of my new hire group, a couple of us absolutely hammered to get hours.. picked up extra, picked up when we go displaced, etc. One class mate hit 860 hours flown in his first 12 months.

None of us can get AA to talk to us. That's fine, I get it, there is a "flow"... don't rob Peter to pay Paul. BUT, AA is hiring people with lower qualifications/experience/resumes because they are somewhere else.

Two classmates (with about ~550 hrs) are already at SWA. I am at a little over 700 with a SWA CJO and class date. My class mate over 800 hours just got his UA CJO. Another class mate has DA and SWA interviews next week. AA won't talk to any of us so they are losing all of us.

I'll keep my AA app up to date as I leave, but maybe SWA will be awesome and I'll just stay.

Just know, if you come to Envoy and wait for the flow, 6000+pliots will hire in before you. Time is not your friend in this market.

I have sincerely enjoyed Envoy, the people I work with, especially the E175. I do not want to leave, but to stay in this hiring market would be insane. Being comfortable is less important that senority.

NOTHING is more important that getting your # at your final destination airline. NOTHING.

Take the path that leads to your final destination in as little time as possible.

If you want to work for DA/UA/SWA, Envoy is great. Come get good training, fly a great airplane, 98% cool Captains, upgrade at 950 hours, and then get hired where you want.
If you want to work for AA while hiring is hot, do not come here.

Good luck and choose well.

 

I hear ya. Congrats on SWA ! You could go there and then to AA faster than the flow if you really wanted to go AA, but it shouldn’t be that way. I was 2 yearish to flowing and left and never looked back, wish I had gone sooner, but I did thoroughly enjoy my time at Envoy. Just not enough to give up massive seniority to wait for flow.

 

8 months ago I had an email telling me to pick a class date as a DEC to Envoy. 100k check waiting. Almost twice the pay I was about to get a a CA at my airline. I almost jumped.

I'm glad I didn't. I would still be on reserve and only nearly a year i to a 6-7 year flow.

I start class at AA in a month. And I'm coming from a non-wholly owned AA regional. It is truly remarkable how the industry is working right now and the different hiring practices between ULCCs, Majors, and Legacies.

 

Smart move. In your hiring date group the world was so different. You may not have had the same opportunity to leave earlier.

Congrats on making a move that worked for you.

 

Very smart, you didn't let that fat check distract you. I am told that most of the DEC candidates have been picked over pretty well and there just isn't a lot of solid candidates left. Something is going to have to change.

Congrats on making it to mainline.

 

not sure if it still is happening, but two pilots in my NH class last year leveraged a CJO with UA and DL to get a class date almost 2 years ahead of their AA flow. FWIW they had PIC time from a prior job and Envoy wasn't their first airline but still has low time. Also I know that his happens at Endeavor for the flow to DL also. (Had two Endeavor Captains in my class that couldn't get to Delta sooner so bailed to AA.).

 

You're right on all counts. Nothing in this industry beats seniority. Nothing in this industry impacts your quality of life more than your ability to bid for schedules, hold the equipment you want, base you want, vacation you want. Also for second career (ie older than the early to mid-twenties guys who are just starting out a first career) getting in sooner to capitalize on the direct contribution for retirement is HUGE. When you have 40 years or so to compound the interest of a 401k, you've got time to build a base...discounting any previous retirement package, comparing just what you will have from an airline career of 25 years at a major with 16% direct contribution, vs 40+ years, the difference can be staggering. Also with the wave of hiring catching guys in their 20s for the majors (having many friends still at the majors, they've all commented that many of the newhires are coming from 1-3 year FOs at regionals and are still in their 20s), the guys hired ahead of you may be considerably younger and thus won't drop off the seniority list before you do.

There are so many reasons to get to the final destination as soon as possible, you're making the right move. For end-of-career guys like me who've already been there, and only came back to work to kill the last couple of years and make a little more money, it's not important. We can ride out moving up the list here (I've moved up 400 numbers in the 9 months since I started, and have 400+ guys below me as well,) take our 4 weeks of vacation starting next year, and have some fun flying with younger guys who haven't lost a small piece of their soul to the frustrations that lead to burn out in this business.

Good luck at SWA. Even if it ends up not being the place you want to spend the rest of your career, it will open doors at every other major out there.... and as someone else pointed out here, there is the possibility of leveraging the class date with AA to get hired if you know someone in recruiting. You never know until you try.

 

I was very torn as to holding on a few more months to upgrade to get some TPIC or just taking the SWA offer. I'm taking the SWA offer.

 

Are you one of our DECs? Cool. Glad to hear you have a great outlook on it. Yeah the numbers have moved pretty damn fast.. I can understand people getting comfortable with bidding power. I consistently get weekends off and would likely be a line holding CA by early next year. If things were slow at the legacies I would happily life it out here, but that's not the case obviously.

Thanks for the well wish. I know it's the right move, it's just a bit scary to leave something you enjoy on the chance of something better.

 

I had to make that choice in 2006, after 12 years at Eagle, to go onto what was in essence still a startup carrier (only 5 years old at the time), or ride it out to see if the flow-through didn't completely dissolve. It was a scary choice to give up 12 years at a solid company to go to work for a growing but unproven airline, so I get where you're coming from on giving up a stable, for-sure thing. Then I made the even more scary choice after 16 years there to retire when the opportunity came about, even though it was years early for me, but I needed the break. I had become one of those crusty, burned out, hate to come to work Captains I never intended to be. As you said, it's the right choice given the times. Now is not the time for anyone who has the ambition of moving on to sit and wait for it to happen. If the door is open, walk through it now.