Junior FDX reserve/line life on 757
 

What's life like for a reserve and junior line holder on the 757 in MEM? What's a typical junior pairing look like?

You'll be junior. Night flying. Working weekends and holidays. Hub turns. Oh yea, crappy night flying on reserve into every blizzard everyone else calls in sick for...

Is FedEx currently hiring? I got an email about three weeks ago from pilot credentials advising me to update my resume.

Yes if you will go to CGN or HKG. Otherwise maybe this summer. They canceled the 1st 2 classes this year to try to scare poolies into accepting a bad deal.

I don't think they cancelled the classes as a ploy. I think they honestly expected folks to be jumping for joy to get a Seniority number at FedEx and the thanks, but no thanks caught them by surprise.

Just me, but I'd be a lot more willing to sign up for HKG or CGN if we had a housing allowance and COLA even remotely comparable to what an enlisted guy gets....let alone what a mid level peon of a Fortune 500 company gets

Agree --- but let's not sell ourselves short on the training & experience required to get this job

If we're going to compare/benchmark our housing & COLA benefits to the military, I think it's much more appropriate to look at "Field Grade" rates in those duty areas

Very simple numbers to find for Hong Kong & Germany

Of course, one is going to still "take it in the shorts" on education costs -- especially if you have more than 2 kids

United new hires get 2nd year pay if they accept Guam. Along with a housing allowance.

Living in MEM or commuting would be a huge factor in your QOL. Living in MEM and sitting reserve has potential for good QOL (but, you're living in MEM and that's another discussion). However, assuming manning continues to be an issue and hiring stays slow, I think life on reserve will be busy. But, even so, if you decided to move there, your life on reserve in domicile would be acceptable.

That said, the reserve system at FedEx is one of the worst in the industry. Schedules range from your entire month's R-days all in a row to 2, 3 or 4 groups of R-days across the month. 12 hour reserve periods have a mix of night, morning and afternoon start times with the nights going junior. Call-out is 1.5 hours from phone call to show time (with an option to drop that to 1 hour if you can make it). You can put yourself at the top of the list based on seniority if you want to fly. Beyond that, you have little to no control over what happens to you. There is no bypass, no long call, no ability to pick up trips on your R-days, etc. Massaging your schedule via moving R-days or outright dropping them to pick up trips has been (and probably will continue to be) very difficult.

Very junior pilots will probably be unable to hold published reserve lines and be awarded secondary lines. These can be built with uncovered trips, R-days or a combo of both. You find out your schedule for the upcoming month 5 days before it begins. My experience with these was reasonably positive simply because as a commuter, I wanted one big block of reserve and they gave it to me on the days I wanted. The more complex your desires, the less likely you'll get anything close.

There will be a mix of short notice trip assignments and longer 12-18 hour notifications for known uncovered trips. My experience was the longer notifications were more common but YMMV.

Senior lines on the 757 consist of week on/week off flying with city purity (flying to the same destination every night). Conversely, the junior lines have less of a pattern with a "shotgun" burst of trips across the month.

Junior pairings will have multiple legs in/out of MEM each night. An example would be a ~0400 departure to COS then on to GTJ, 12 hour layover and reverse routing back. Upon arrival to MEM at about 0030L, after the two legs inbound, you may be on your way to do a similar trip after a couple of hours sit. Another junior pairing would be the am out and back. 0330L departure MEM-FSD-MEM

It's been a while since I've been based in MEM but I think what I gave you is a reasonably accurate hack at what you might encounter. Maybe some guys with more recent experience will chime in.

Completely agree. As a matter of fact, I made this same case and gave these numbers to a rep back when we were voting on the original FDA LOA for HKG & CDG. I was told I was wrong. I also pointed out that DODS schools were available to the military or schooling allowances were made for corporate & embassy types. But of course, I live in fantasy land.
Put another way, I don't have special skills! Like being a friend of Jack perhaps. No worries tho, it'll go Senior! :rolleyes:I don't think we have ever completely filled the FO seat at either HKG or CGN.
Pro Instructors whose time it is to flow over to the line are turning down seniority numbers with these slots. They are waiting on non-FDA positions to get their number.
I think it was one of the contract surveys that had a section on the FDA's & what would it take for us to go there. We got to enter a $ amount per month. The problem was that when I tried to enter it, it wouldn't take because the amount was too large. Hmmm.

I am a very junior 757 FO. 100th percentile type. I bid and hold usually my 4-5th choice of A reserve. I live in Collierville and fly an average of 5 days a month. Mostly out and backs with an occasional day in a hotel. I can't remember the last time I flew on a weekend. The other 10 days of reserve are at home with my kids. Life is good... YMMV...