Bottom of SWA or bottom of new American?
11-18-2013, 06:11 AM
#33
Line Holder
Thread Starter
Joined APC: Apr 2007
Posts: 97
Appreciate all the advice. Two factors I should add that have some impact.
1. I've been at US Airways about 6 months. I'll have to continue to commute but I have a seniority number. I am about 6-12 months from holding a line, which would dramatically improve quality of life. Commuting is friendly here with jumpseat reservation 7 days prior. But I will be commuting long term.
2. SWA has a mid seniority base near where I live but it would take 3-5 yrs to get based there to sit weekend reserve. Driving to work for the last 10-15 years of my career would be awesome....but I have kids at home that will be out of the house in 6-9 yrs so I'm concerned I'll miss all the weekend activities for those critical next 6 years. Particularly since SWA reserve seems to be all weekends for the new guys and forecast is for sloooow seniority movement with the AirTran pilots coming over in 2014 ahead of any new hires like me.
Thanks!
1. I've been at US Airways about 6 months. I'll have to continue to commute but I have a seniority number. I am about 6-12 months from holding a line, which would dramatically improve quality of life. Commuting is friendly here with jumpseat reservation 7 days prior. But I will be commuting long term.
2. SWA has a mid seniority base near where I live but it would take 3-5 yrs to get based there to sit weekend reserve. Driving to work for the last 10-15 years of my career would be awesome....but I have kids at home that will be out of the house in 6-9 yrs so I'm concerned I'll miss all the weekend activities for those critical next 6 years. Particularly since SWA reserve seems to be all weekends for the new guys and forecast is for sloooow seniority movement with the AirTran pilots coming over in 2014 ahead of any new hires like me.
Thanks!
11-18-2013, 07:24 AM
#34
Gets Weekends Off
Joined APC: May 2006
Posts: 2,889
Let me tell you a story about previous client...
Goes to CAL. Gets furloughed. Disgruntled a bit at low pay, no insurance, and rough treatment. Goes on mil leave a while, then gets recalled. Interviews at SWA and then takes it. Resigns...
3 years later....
Looking at bottom of SWA list for some time. Commutes from a long way away to OAK. Sees old contemporaries at U/CAL and realizes his early experience in no way resembles what he left. I always say equating your first 24 months in an airline to airline life is like comparing being a freshman in ROTC or the AFA to being an operational IP in a fighter squadron. You have to do one to get to do the other, but the experiences are very, very different.
Punchline? My former client is going to interview at UAL. Don't know his odds, but can say if given the chance wants to go, even if he will be several hundred numbers below his previous number. Why? Go re-read the above posts.
DAL/LAX/SJC/PHX are all 1 hops from DEN. I'd say its a safe bet in 5 years you could hold international WB at one of those bases, and be home more than you'd be home flying R days at SWA. And your family can non-rev to Paris, Japan, Buenos Aires, etc. Do you really think even if SWA ever does do over-water ops to Hawaii or other Caribbean destinations you will be able to hold those trips?
I predict you are 6 months from the suck being over. I think you are 18 months from things being....well....fun. YMMV. I could be wrong. But you are going to be looking up at the seniority list in frustration at SWA for a long, long time. Still some Airtran guys due to come over...if any of them are ski bums you may be further from DEN than you realize.
Or drink the kool-aid. Listen to how SWA has always taken care of their people. Re-read nuts. Rub the tummy on the Herb Kelleher doll and hope for the best... My own take is companies are constantly evolving and changing. Delta quit being a "family" in the 90s. Our own senior FedEx guys lament at times the lack of camaraderie that permeated the place until about a decade ago. Jetblue is in its own little adolescent angst as they morph into a larger company--with a union still an unknown. This is pure, ********* business and nothing less. There is no heart, there is no soul, there are contracts and business cycles. You caught the leading edge of a wave with contacts improving and a very real opportunity to advance your career. You are considering giving that up to go chase the very best place to be hired in 1994. I think you are overlooking the fact many scoffed at SWA in 94, just as you are scoffing US Air/AA in 2014. The simple fact is if you stay at AA, you may be stuck at the bottom for a while. You probably won't. If you go to SWA, you will be stuck at the bottom, and it will be decades before you see significant advancement. At US Air, you will have a choice in the type of flying you do. At SWA, your choice is AMs or PMs. Got a Vegas buddy there for 7 -8 years...holds a line and flys Sun-Tues most weeks. Works for him, but a little variety--especially when facing working for another 15-22 years--goes a long way.
In any case, you'll have a job at the end of this most guys would kill for, so that is the silver lining. I just think the lost decade of legacy flying is about to get pretty good again, and you are uniquely situated to ride the crest of that wave.
Goes to CAL. Gets furloughed. Disgruntled a bit at low pay, no insurance, and rough treatment. Goes on mil leave a while, then gets recalled. Interviews at SWA and then takes it. Resigns...
3 years later....
Looking at bottom of SWA list for some time. Commutes from a long way away to OAK. Sees old contemporaries at U/CAL and realizes his early experience in no way resembles what he left. I always say equating your first 24 months in an airline to airline life is like comparing being a freshman in ROTC or the AFA to being an operational IP in a fighter squadron. You have to do one to get to do the other, but the experiences are very, very different.
Punchline? My former client is going to interview at UAL. Don't know his odds, but can say if given the chance wants to go, even if he will be several hundred numbers below his previous number. Why? Go re-read the above posts.
DAL/LAX/SJC/PHX are all 1 hops from DEN. I'd say its a safe bet in 5 years you could hold international WB at one of those bases, and be home more than you'd be home flying R days at SWA. And your family can non-rev to Paris, Japan, Buenos Aires, etc. Do you really think even if SWA ever does do over-water ops to Hawaii or other Caribbean destinations you will be able to hold those trips?
I predict you are 6 months from the suck being over. I think you are 18 months from things being....well....fun. YMMV. I could be wrong. But you are going to be looking up at the seniority list in frustration at SWA for a long, long time. Still some Airtran guys due to come over...if any of them are ski bums you may be further from DEN than you realize.
Or drink the kool-aid. Listen to how SWA has always taken care of their people. Re-read nuts. Rub the tummy on the Herb Kelleher doll and hope for the best... My own take is companies are constantly evolving and changing. Delta quit being a "family" in the 90s. Our own senior FedEx guys lament at times the lack of camaraderie that permeated the place until about a decade ago. Jetblue is in its own little adolescent angst as they morph into a larger company--with a union still an unknown. This is pure, ********* business and nothing less. There is no heart, there is no soul, there are contracts and business cycles. You caught the leading edge of a wave with contacts improving and a very real opportunity to advance your career. You are considering giving that up to go chase the very best place to be hired in 1994. I think you are overlooking the fact many scoffed at SWA in 94, just as you are scoffing US Air/AA in 2014. The simple fact is if you stay at AA, you may be stuck at the bottom for a while. You probably won't. If you go to SWA, you will be stuck at the bottom, and it will be decades before you see significant advancement. At US Air, you will have a choice in the type of flying you do. At SWA, your choice is AMs or PMs. Got a Vegas buddy there for 7 -8 years...holds a line and flys Sun-Tues most weeks. Works for him, but a little variety--especially when facing working for another 15-22 years--goes a long way.
In any case, you'll have a job at the end of this most guys would kill for, so that is the silver lining. I just think the lost decade of legacy flying is about to get pretty good again, and you are uniquely situated to ride the crest of that wave.
11-18-2013, 07:35 AM
#36
Gets Weekends Off
Joined APC: May 2006
Posts: 2,889
Apples to oranges. SWA is union. SWA has better contract. Both with have a long upgrade. SWA offers more bases. From a pure business perspective, I think SWA wins hands down. You will give up some international flying but as SWA backfills Airtran routes its probably a wash.
SWA pays more. Considerably more. That's a big deal.
JB Management has shown they will change rules at will. (No animals shall walk upright on two legs...) like the Pigs in Animal Farm. If we go with the proven theorem that all airline managers are cost cutting machines that care nothing about individuals, then the best place to work is the place with the best protections against same. In that arena, SWA wins hands down.
Again...anything I say could be 100% wrong...
SWA pays more. Considerably more. That's a big deal.
JB Management has shown they will change rules at will. (No animals shall walk upright on two legs...) like the Pigs in Animal Farm. If we go with the proven theorem that all airline managers are cost cutting machines that care nothing about individuals, then the best place to work is the place with the best protections against same. In that arena, SWA wins hands down.
Again...anything I say could be 100% wrong...
11-18-2013, 08:11 AM
#38
La Familia Delta
Joined APC: Oct 2006
Position: B-717 FO / C-17 AC
Posts: 2,467
I personally 2 guys who have been hired by SWA who are not going to take the job. I congratulate those who accepted the job at SWA, but I think people are taking that job knowing they will be at the bottom for a long, long, long, long, long, long, long time. They'll make ok money as FO's, but QOL will suck for omg forever.
11-18-2013, 08:26 AM
#39
Line Holder
Joined APC: Mar 2011
Position: B737 FO
Posts: 61
Originally Posted by ghilis101
I personally 2 guys who have been hired by SWA who are not going to take the job. I congratulate those who accepted the job at SWA, but I think people are taking that job knowing they will be at the bottom for a long, long, long, long, long, long, long time. They'll make ok money as FO's, but QOL will suck for omg forever.
11-18-2013, 08:30 AM
#40
Gets Weekends Off
Joined APC: Oct 2010
Posts: 127
You caught the leading edge of a wave with contacts improving and a very real opportunity to advance your career. You are considering giving that up to go chase the very best place to be hired in 1994. I think you are overlooking the fact many scoffed at SWA in 94, just as you are scoffing US Air/AA in 2014. The simple fact is if you stay at AA, you may be stuck at the bottom for a while. You probably won't. If you go to SWA, you will be stuck at the bottom, and it will be decades before you see significant advancement. At US Air, you will have a choice in the type of flying you do. At SWA, your choice is AMs or PMs. Got a Vegas buddy there for 7 -8 years...holds a line and flys Sun-Tues most weeks. Works for him, but a little variety--especially when facing working for another 15-22 years--goes a long way.
Albie, as a 13 year AAI guy, soon to be a 10-yr SWA guy, I couldn't agree more. I'm considering trading my "10 years" at SWA for the bottom of DAL, AMR or UCAL myself, for the same reasons you listed above. Thankfully, I'm financially secure and don't have to chase the money anymore.
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