have a bunch of friends going there and just wondered how the pay/work rules/ contract ect. are. I'm already at another regional but people keep asking me about Commutair and I realized they are not talked about too much on here so I figured I'd ask. Seems like upgrade is pretty quick. I have a bunch of old friends asking me if they should go there now from instructing or hold out for the RJ. How is QOL there? any info is appreciated thanks.

 

Pretty junior FO on the Dash here. I commute, so I cannot give an accurate QOL assessment, however, they do fly you-whether you are on reserve (ready or regular reserve). I only had 2 1/2 months of reserve. The way they work reserve is that they mix it with other scheduled trips so that you do not have an entire line of it.

Last I knew the upgrade was running approx. 1 1/2 years depending on time and seniority.

The Dash is great and the weather experience you get is invaluable. Obviously no company is perfect-and like everyone else we have our problems with bidding and pay, however, overall I am glad that I opted for CommutAir.

 

Oh, god forbid they would have to fly a turboprop...

 

Any more input from anyone? I'm near the base and am pretty confident I'd like to apply with them. What's the out and back life like? Repetitive?

 

anyone? anything?

 

I'm on the way out, been here for a couple of years, I don't want to label my time here as a mistake but there are better choices. I have been reading a lot of books about airline history and in some ways I wish I would have chosen differently. Recent problems include chronic poor staffing that forces every pilot to work 2 extra days a bid. Their mistakes, our pain. Scheduling is hiding trips and off days during bidding. Example I wanted certain days off and didn't get them, while junior people got them for no logistical reason(too many consecutive work days or too many hours). Some rumors have the head schedulers taking bribes. Every year I've been here and gotten my yearly pay bump, my share of the health insurance goes up. If you live near cleveland and don't want to move it will be hard to get around that. I don't know how senior the expressjet cle base is. I know chautauqua airlines has a lot of overnights here. Again I had a good time with good pilots and planes but now with a kid on the way, looking back I think there may have been better choices.

 

This is a little weird story from a ground school instructor. A former flight attendant with about 200 hours as a pilot(pre-solo), is now the pilot recruiter. This person is now conducting pilot interviews, solo. I guess the plane cleaners weren't interested in evaluating the pilot candidates’ knowledge and qualifications.

 

Sorry I didn't answer your question. You won't see the out and back lifestyles. They reworked the schedules back in september. To give you any idea I have probably spent more nights out from sept till the present then the previous 2 1/2 years combine. In the position you'll be in after you get off reserve, you will only get 4 day and 5 day trips. I actually told my wife I might as well be commuting with all the 4 day and 5 day trips. Because of the poor staffing the 6 day reserve period will be like a 6 day trip. You will be lucky if you time out before the end of the reserve block because they will pull you off round trips in order to have enough time to send you on the overnights.

 

Do many of their pilots commute?

Is there a commuter clause?

How much is a crashpad in CLE?

 

The majority of our pilots commute, however there is no commuter clause. We will be voting for ALPA in the next few weeks and with any luck we would love to eventually get a clause. I commute, but don't do the crashpad route. There are quite a few crashpads available in our crew room, so I wouldn't worry about finding one.