Expats/Locals Blackisted or not?
 

Hello to all, I was looking through the forums for an answer but could not find it so decided to toss the question out there.

I was recently talking to a colleague and he mentioned that a friend of his who is working for Emirates as a 777 Captain has been trying to get back to the USA for a while now. Despite his heavy experience, my friend tells me that "not even Spirit has taken an interest in interviewing him" and that (this is his opinion now) "expats who work for UAE airlines are blacklisted".
I have heard similar stuff about GoJet and Mesa pilots as well.

With the so called "Pilot Shortage" I find it hard to believe that carriers are discualifying people based on their past employers.

Has anyone here heard anything remotely similar? I would love to hear your opinion on the subject.

Once again my appologies if this has already been discussed already on some other thread.

Thanks to all for your feedback.

I've run into a couple guys that have come back from over there.

The guys I remember had come back to United, Spirit, Allegiant, and sigh Mesa. I didn't get the chance to pick all their brains (the most recent was over a year ago). But I call BS. One legit problem I could see though would be getting the time off to come back to do a job fair or interview. I hear it's pretty tough to take more than a couple days off in a row. Maybe the guy you are talking about has some other issue he didn't want to share? Like a DUI or a couple of checkride busts. Or maybe he just doesn't have any internal recs and hasn't been able to get to a job fair?

GoJet and Mesa are a whole 'nother topic for the regional thread.

I work for Emirates and I know plenty of guys that have gone to work for a U.S. Major from EK in the last couple of years.

Totally false...I have 8 friends who fly for United..All got hired from Emirates, Etihad and Qatar..All were FO's from the Middle East carriers

Yup, not true at all.
I worked for a foreign carrier and now work for a legacy-major.

got a year on the e175 sic for a regional in the usa. want to go the other way across the pond ...what would be competitive ?

As others have stated, this is simply false...! But remember that pretty much everyone working abroad and under the age of 45 has applications with the majors back home...., competition is fierce! The pilot shortage is not at the majors level, there the pool of applicants is plentiful.

Southern doesn't count :D


TP

Now TP, you know someone is going to get the wrong idea about that. So, I worked for a US based carrier after working for a foreign carrier then got on at a legacy.
And....I think you still owe me a beer.

100% false. The exodus of American's from overseas has only increased recently. No problem to go directly to a major.

Dom;
Not sure I would say plentiful. There are somewhere around 10k applicants right now at the majors. They all have the same number as they are the same 10k. It might be under that number now. A bunch of those won't be hired for one reason or another. A huge number of those are flying Rj's and will simply create another hole somewhere else if they get hired.

When I got hired, they had over 60k applicants. That, is a lot. Almost all of those had a lot more experience than the current 10k do now.

I am back at UAL now and a lot of it is HR centric for hiring, instead of just your resume. In the past I would have said this is backa$$word. After the last year working at a couple of overseas gigs, I am not so sure anymore. I might go for HR. Hard for me to admit that, but in hindsight...........

We just hired an EK guy.

Thanks to all for the feedback. Im glad we have tools like this forum and we can separate fact from speculation. Thanks again!!!

Only one I know of that blacklists expats is sadly us, FedEx.

Our postal contract has a clause where you must have resided in the States the most recent 5 years before being hired and the only exception made is for us military personnel. No wiggle room at all on this.

But I'd think you be ok applying to UAL DAL etc.

I think what you're seeing is the vast majority of legacy hiring right now is military/flow-through/furlough recall with 10,000+ qualified applicants competing for the remaining few "off the street" slots. Many of the same folks are presumably fighting each other for the relatively small number of classes at JB/WN/Spirit. I know plenty of highly qualified captains at my carrier who have had apps in for quite a while & have not gotten any calls.

For the record
UAL has 13750 apps on file and the average pilot hired or having a conditional job offer, has around 7745 hrs.
That's per stats as of 4/20/16

Which includes :

Military 30 percent , RJ drivers 60 percent and 10 percent all others



BTW the average in the late 90s was a lot less ( 3500 hrs with 1500 TPIC) as per the same HR person that has been recruiting the past 20 years at TK.

Obviously
thanks to the lost decade or so which made many stuck flying RJs

Late 90's had a lot more Mil guys, with a lot fewer hours than civilians, which drove down the average number of hours. Probably 50-60% military for a half a dozen years. The civilians tended to have a lot more broad experience than now, lots of previous jobs, and lots of time.

I think now there are much fewer mil guys, and a lot of the RJ guys have a bunch of hours.

I have never heard of any blacklisting of expats. To get the expat gig, you had to have a lot of prior experience as well.

Definitely not blacklisted out of the Middle East. I know some guys who went to UAL; some went to SWA, myself included.

My recommendation to get noticed... have someone look over your application. A number of interview prep agencies offer this service... definitely worth it.

THIS!

There are thousands of qualified guys. One wrong date can kick your app out of the stack. Make a $100 phone call to a pro to get you on the right path.

I am an expat and have had an interview inquiry from SunCountry. Could not make the interview due to workload here and logistics.

The biggest issue with coming back is logistics of travel and lining up leave with the interview dates or job fairs. Its tough.

Many are faced with the logistics of aligning the planets just so that you can make it home from overseas, get some rest, recharge your batteries, make it to the interview, go back home for a few days before going back half way round the world. I've found it positive to keep in contact by both phone and email with HR or the recruiter to keep them advised of your schedule. You will find that some will be very accommodating to your schedule and work with you too.

Then that makes two ex-ME3 at SWA and I'm sure there's plenty more.

I've been with the Japanese for three years and also have an interview with SunCountry...

Some ex-FlyDubai at SWA also.

I happily left QR for my current gig. I know of 1 guy who went to SWA, 1 to Spirit and 3 to UAL. And Atlas is currently taking maybe 5 more of us. FWIW while I have been jumpseating all over the place guys at UPS, FDX and HAL were encouraging me to apply, the others not so much.