What do you think will be competitive for hiring at NetJets going forward? Both in flight time and background?

 

You can get hired at mins. Total time doesn’t seem to matter as much as do you have the background of customer service. Prior charter or corporate is big, plus is shows you can get a jet type.

 

Thanks for the reply. Trying to weight life choices. I don’t want to move my family for a few more years. I have no plans to commute to a 121 gig. So, trying to decide the next move. Home basing is ideal. Currently have a degree, couple single pilot turboprop type ratings, and 2K 135 ops and 1k CFI. I like 7/7 as my kids would still remember me and time with family is the goal (given my constraints). Not sure I’d stay for upgrade, but maybe it’s the end goal. Trying to weigh the QOL and predictability vs the death march to majors via 121

 

NetJets doesn’t have “home basing” per se. As a new hire, you would have a choice of just over 100 cities as your crew base.

Management and the union agree that the basing system at NJ is currently a train wreck. Problem is, nobody can agree on a solution.

Just another tidbit for your decision process.

 

Just curious, why is it a train wreck? Seems like a pretty sweet deal, you'd have to live way out in the goonies to not be able to drive to work at the base list I've seen.

 

At the end, only you can decide what’s best for you. What I can tell you, is going from NJA to a Major was the best QOL increase I have ever done. 7/7 sounds great on paper but it is miserable the way NJA operates you on the road. I never go home tired anymore, and I am no longer a zombie on the road for 7 days. By day 4 on 7/7 you are demolished, and your only relief is to fatigue, nothing is built into scheduling or work language to give you good QOL with long overnights. Your clock will be flipped, min rest overnights a lot, but 11 hour overnights being most common, huge spectrum of hotel quality. You also don’t get any of the freedoms of typical charter jobs. No rental cars, and no freedom to book your own hotels etc.

I totally get the idea of not wanting to commute, but even with a commute, you will work less days a month then on schedules like the 76 day and make more money at a major. If your goal is the airlines, stick with it. NetJets is a fairly stable job although growth and future outlook doesn’t look great, and this new IBI passed will only stagnate pilot growth further. The money is better now so that’s good, but you will earn it trust me.

 

A lot of things are train wrecks there, problem is, so much of it is the nature of the beast.

 

The company wants to decrease the number of bases, the union wants to increase the number of bases. To get either side to budge is a monumental task.

 

This is my opinion, do not do this. NetJets is not a stepping stone job. As a new hire you will not get a type rating that will unlock an awesome large cabin gig. You will be in the phenom, latitude, Sovereign, XL, or X. The earliest you will be able to change airplanes is 39 months and the best case scenario is a CL350. As I said, this is not a stepping stone job.

 

I see. Thanks