Hiring Process
 

Ladies and Gentlemen, I have a couple of quick questions.

1.) I haven't seen anything about any type of background checks concerning these foreign carriers. What is the status and process concerning this during the hiring process.

2.) Do they drug test?

Just to clarify I'm not concerned with either of these personally but I must have missed something.

Thanks!

"These foreign carriers"?

These foreign carriers was in reference to what I have read recently in this forum.

Sorry. I haven't read anything concerning background checks or drug testing for any foreign carrier so far and was just inquiring. I know as pilots in the U.S. we are held to high character standards. I'm just curious if foreign carriers hold their pilots in the same regard. Thanks again.

The reason as to the question about this comment "these foreign carriers" is because to group the rest of the worlds carrier into one neat group is just not practical, standards vary a LOT from country to country and even from different companies within that country. It is impossible to give you a yes or no answer.
I guess that the best I can do is tell you that in the rest of the industrialized world, airlines have similar and in some cases, more stringent hiring criteria that airlines here in the US, drug testing is pretty much a standard practice in most airlines but the testing is done along with the medicals (even if they tell you that they don't when you ask) as to background checks, also in most cases a criminal and professional background check is preformed.
Haven said that, worldwide there is every kind of different standards under the sun, there are very professional and structured airlines but there are also your shady operators. Not sure as to how else to answer that question???

Sorry for the ambiguity behind the question. I guess my thoughts are that U.S. carriers are able to contact the FBI for background checks, credit agencies, and the DMV. Basically an airline in the U.S. has vast means to obtain info about it's potential employees. I'm just wondering if foreign companies take the same precautions. How are they able to obtain that information to have the same standards?

The same way an airline in the US does! The information access is not predicated on the geographical location of its offices, but rather in the nature of the job. Some companies do the background checks through Interpol, and if you don't know this organization, I can assure you they have access to anything and everything an airline does and then some. But again, it is impossible to generalize here because the standards of Emirates, ANA, British Airways are not the standards of "we fly you for less" mi point is that although there are airlines that will follow all due process, there are others that just want warm bodies, specially now with the high demand of experienced pilots, I doubt that an airline in a non developed country will care if you had a DUI 20 years ago. Like I said, everything under the sun:cool:

To expand on what I said, background information on an individual is readily available to anyone. Back in my corporate/charter days I ran a flight department based outside of the US and hired several pilots including a few US guys, I was able to get a complete and detailed background information on these individuals and that was before 9/11 and the Internet. Now as to who goes the extra mile, who doesn't???

Oh c'mon Dom, you know that all of us who are working outside of the "glorious" US airline industry are a bunch of criminal, loser, can't hack it, wannabe's. After all, that is why we aren't working for the legacies back home. :rolleyes::rolleyes::rolleyes:

Great info... Thanks a bunch...

Sarcasm noted... That being said I've seen some pretty shady repair work on airplanes in the past from other countries. I'm not saying I haven't Jerry rigid something to get by for a flight but not to the level I have seen in planes from other countries. So I believe my question is relevant.

How do foreign carriers feel about prior military guys? To clarify I was never a military pilot.

I get where you are coming from. However, at AJX, we have some of the best mx I have ever been associated with. In the 3 years I have been here I have had less than 5 MEL stickers on airplanes, and 4 of those were on the freighter aircraft. Our aircraft are also some of the cleanest I have ever seen.

But when I look at some of the Chinese aircraft it is hard to tell if they are painted white or brown. Not sure how their MX is. I can only speak for my experience in Japan. :)

But as far as flightcrew go, I have had some conversations with legacy carriers where they were wondering why I was working overseas. They actually asked if this was just to pass the time until the legacies hired or if I couldn't get hired at a legacy. They couldn't believe that someone would rather work at a foreign carrier than at their legacy.

For what I have seen, typically military only times are not accepted at most airlines that hire US pilots on the international market, but coupled with airline times then they do consider it as part of the pilots overall resume.
This is most certainly another area in which generalization doesn't work, maintenance in airlines in the Middle East, Japan, South Korea, Singapore, and many airlines in China (yes, China) have an excellent maintenance program. The maintenance here at the ANA group is far beyond anything that I have experienced in any airline in the US, I come across an MEL here 2 or 3 times a year, in the 6+ years that I have been here, I have never done a cross bleed start, not even once, when AD's come out, they do them right away and none of that asking for extensions nonsense and threats from the FAA to ground the airplanes and fines due to shady maintenance record keeping that you have seen in the past against many airlines in the US.

Simulcast:D

This is very true, It doesn't bother me, I actually find it rather amusing but you come across some folks that just cannot comprehend that you are satisfied with your job, sure there are many challenges, cultural differences and the likes, but the notion that the only people that seek employment abroad are the guys that can't get a job in the US is very silly. A few months back I had a conversation with a FedEx pilot here in town over some beers, after the usual "how do you like it" chat, he asked if I was keeping my apps updated for the upcoming hiring spree, when I told him that I didn't have an application anywhere, he got rather annoyed, started giving me the "ALPA" lecture yadda, yadda! Why do you want to work in a place with no union protection? Contract work that can be terminated anytime? rather uncomfortable situation even for his friend because this guy was borderline shouting! I just answered, I'm enjoying myself:D

So your saying that MX in USA is far better then the rest of the world?... Ive done both, and MX in the USA is the worst... the norm in the USA is not to fix its to MEL, try to fix, break again, then MEL again.. repeat about 7 times.
Personally I think the US right now has the worst MX practice overall.

My observation on Airbus MX

Australia - not very good. Many MEL's
Singapore - not too bad.
Hong Kong - not very good, probably the worst. MEL city!!!
China - very good. Very few MEL's.

This observation is without listing the particular airline and as someone said above, airlines vary within these countries.

Never flown airline in the US.