Air Cargo Carriers
 

Well, I just got an interview date with Air Cargo Carriers. I was wondering if anyone out there knew what the interview might be like and what to study. Other than that I was just interested in more information on the company ie. day in the life stuff and their industry reputation. I already have a pretty good idea of pay, benefits, and bases; I just want to be ready for the interview. Any help would be much appreciated. Thanks guys.

Not going there myself, but what was your background? Bow did you know they were hiring? Just curious.

I'm currently a flight instructor. I have around 1300 total time and nearly 400 multi. I meet most of the 135 mins. They were hiring on Climbto350.com

I tried them back in 09 I believe, a contact who did MX for them gave me the CP or Asst CPs number....I had about what you did Total Time....less multi though. I am always wowed at the multi some guys get...anyways...they didn't call me back. Things were really ugly in 09, so I don't take it too personally, but it is always nice to get some response, even if its a no. I have done piston 135 and CFIing. Now at a regional for QOL issues, if you can believe that! Best to you...

I interviewed there in 09, the interview went like this: Show up at 8 am and sat and waited for everyone to get their from their airline flights. Filled out paperwork for 45 minutes, took a written test ( basic IFR, Comm/ATP questions) and while you were taking the test people were getting called in for a sim eval.
The sim eval was on a PCAD simulator (very touchy dont use the rudders after you rotate). It was a takeoff, steep turns, climbs and descents, full procedure VOR approach at MSN, go missed and you brief the hold. Then vectors for the ILS 36 at MSN to mins and land. Pretty straight forward and nothing tricky for the sim eval, dont stress flying the sim perfect. They know its a hard sim to fly and just always be correcting for altitude and heading.

The panel interview was a three person, the Chief pilot, the head of training and a HR person. Again nothing too tricky as far as questions it was more getting to know you and background. Questions I remember were " what would you do if you were on a approach and the capitain was not responding to your call outs" or " what would you do if the captain was flying 200 ft high or low throughout your flight" other than I really dont remember. To be honest I wasnt too impressed at the panel interview portion, everyone seemed like they didnt want to be there and the head of training was chewing tobacco and spitting it in a cup sitting right next to me...I mean if you need a chew that bad, take a break! In a interview, you have to be kidding me:confused:. Anyway after I was finished, they gave me drug test paperwork and sent me next door to take a drug test.

I was called two days later and was offered the postion, and I turned it down because they wouldnt tell me which bases I could expect or any bases that would be open for new hires. From what they expained to me, they said we would go through training and after we were done we would pretty much pick out of a hat and we could trade with each other. I know its a stupid reason, but I would hate to be stuck in one of their hole in the wall bases and hate my job and be stuck in a 7,500 training contract. To each their own I guess, it turned out to be a good decision for me in the end. Overall it's a OK place to be at, I know a couple people working there and they dont have too much to gripe about other than the normal QQL issues and sub par pay that usually come with a cargo feeder job.

Have you applied to any 135 jobs or any regionals ? With your time you should be able to hook up with something with better QQL and better equipment * not that I'm hating on ACC here, but well you know what I'm saying.

Thanks for this info here guys. In response to that last post, yeah I have looked at the regionals and Ive got other apps and resumes out, ACC was just the first to call me back. The stuff here is pretty much what what I had heard from asking around. Im 23 and single, so QOL issues and domicile aren't my biggest concerns, I want the turbine time. If nothing else it will be good interview experience. I'm mostly just interested in getting out of flight instruction. 1000+ hours of dual given has kind of burned me out. For you guys who interviewed there: Did they use Jepp Plates or NOS for the sim?

NOS plates for the sim and the line.

Haha! That's hilarious.

Reminds me of airnet. Best thing that never happened to me!

(for the record, I have no experience with Air Cargo Carriers except for a buddy I met who tied down next to my 208)

"To be honest I wasnt too impressed at the panel interview portion, everyone seemed like they didnt want to be there and the head of training was chewing tobacco and spitting it in a cup sitting right next to me...I mean if you need a chew that bad, take a break! In a interview, you have to be kidding me"


Congratulations, you just need to get fitted for your double breasted uniform. You already have the "these people are below me" attitude required for the old school Delta.:rolleyes:

Have you ever been to a national union meeting (I'll guess no)? They are held in the afternoon and several of the freight guys are nodding off. Why? Because the rest of the world works when the sun is shining and freight dawgs don't. At a prior company, we did all of our training from sunset to sunrise to insure the new hire knew what he was getting into.

If it were up to me, every pilot would fly boxes (or haul jumpers, tow banners, or be the company president's b!tch). It teaches one that we are not just a bunch of 9-5ers: we will be away from home, work crappy hours, and miss little Billy's soccer game (Waaaa!).

This job requires a bunch of sacrifices. Some of us understand them and are willing to make them. But the crybabies and homebodies that only see "I will be making a zillion dollars and have free travel" have torn down the industry because they thought they found a shortcut.

Professionalism has many definitions. Chewing Tobacco isn't in my definition (assuming he hits the spittoon).

By the way, many 121 companies won't be able to tell you which base you will get.... some won't even be able to tell you which airframe.;)

Wow, the three guys I knew who went there would disagree with you.

Thanks for your words of wisdom. I was trying to help, with a insight to the interview, which was what the OP was asking for...

Still hiring?
 

Are their mins firm?

Apply! They are hurting for pilots so I believe they will look at anything. I know a captain who works for them.

I am at 675tt and 90 me, and have not received a call yet. Keeping my info. Updated, so we will see!

Interested to hear what your friend said about working for them.

I worked there several years ago so you may find fresher info but I seriously doubt what I'm going to tell you has changed much:

QOL and morale are low, turnover is high. You will fly stinky, old, worn out freight planes full of god knows what to some of the more backwater destinations you could ever think of. Planes will break frequently; they will be fixed less frequently. You will fly in weather that you never thought possible. Arriving late is completely unacceptable. You will grow to dislike the sight of the sun and daytime flying. All of this BTW, is SOP in the 135 cargo would.

At ACC, the good news is: The checks always clear and they don’t have a history of laying people off. You cant say that about many 135 cargo outfits. And you get to fly the SD3, the Irish Concorde. Anybody can fly a round plane; it takes a real pilot to fly a square. Seriously, the Shorts is a great first multi turbine. Easy systems, slow ref speeds. Pretty tough to get into too much trouble, with that thing.

The bad is: ACC used to be the "Best of the worst", from what I hear; it has now slipped back toward the middle of the pack. I hear the company is struggling financially. (Which one’s aren't) I also hear that the airline side of the business has been in bad shape for some time and the end of the Iraq contract has really hurt the company overall. (That is at least "third-hand" info, so take it for what it's worth.)

It's true, you wont know where you will be based until ground school is over or almost over. This is due to their route structure and will likely never change. The big difference between this situation and the regionals is, you can’t commute. You work Mon night thru Sat morning (most routes). Good luck jump seating home and back in 48 hours. BTW, if you don’t get back in time for work Monday night, you'll be fired. If you go there be willing to move to any of the bases. (Don’t know what they are now but rest assured, you won’t find too many "garden spots") Beckley, WV comes to mind.

If you get on one of the higher flight time routes, you can build time quickly and upgrade or move on. Also, be ready to sign a non-prorated training contract. They take this very seriously and have gone after pilots who didn’t pay.

Typical 135 cargo stuff, there is a reason very few people stay with this kind of flying for more than a year or two. My time there was very valuable. I'm happy I did it, but even happier I got out.

Good luck to you

BTW, In my opinion, Chewing tobacco during an interview is incredibly unprofessional, and the fact that the CP and/or HR person didn’t stop it tells you something. 135 Cargo or not, If I'm expected to be in a suit, you shouldn't have a dip in. Have some respect for the other people in the room. Not to mention what a disgusting habit that is in general. Just my opinion.

How come they make you were ties? It's 135 freight for gods sake.

I've heard this also.

Back a few years ago they furloughed a couple completely out of seniority and at the time fired a few guys on pretty luke warm grounds. The Chief pilot at the time is now gone but I hear the new one isn't much better.

The tobacco chewing guy is actually one of the better people they have there.

I remember hearing about thoses layoffs and firings, and you are right they were questionable at best, from what I heard. The CP who pulled that job was not liked or respected by the pilot group, for good reason. I have no info on the current guy.

What I meant was they dont have a history of mass layoffs, like after loosing a contract, etc. This isn't uncomon in the 135 cargo world. If they loose a single route they are big enogh to absorb 2-3 pilots until they find a place for them. That typically wont take long considering the high turnover.

The ties are required by UPS, I believe. (this gives you some insight into what a pain in the a-- customer UPS can be) So when the guys who were flying into the SDF hub everynight got them, so did all of the other scheduled run guys.

It's not fun loading #6,000+ of freight in a shirt and tie. I cant confirm this, but I have heard some load and fly in street clothes, then change upon arival in SDF.

Wow, slightly angry:eek:

Thanks for posting this info about ACC.
Question is where can you go after this?
I know it's multi turbine time, but where do pilots typically go after this?

Again let me preface this by saying, my info is a few years old and things may have changed a bit. I know a few guys that still work there but dont stay in touch with them regularly. With that said:

Where people go post ACC depends on a lot of things but I'd say most fall into two catagories:

1. Fo's that leave prior to upgrade. These guys normally split with 1k-2k total time and 0PIC. They end up at the regionals. Considering some were hired with < 500 total time, thats not a bad move if you want to work for the airlines. Probably a faster way of building time than CFI'ing and you'll learn a heck of a lot more.

2. Guys that that stick around, upgrade and get the 1000 PIC Turbine. They have lots more options. Flexjet, Avantair, Corporate jobs, Qatar, Kalitta, etc. Depending on how much time you had when you come in and what route you get, this can take a few years.

I dont know of anybody who has gone straight from ACC to any legacy carrier or SWA, although many have tried. If anybody tries to tell you that ACC is the fast track to working for UPS, dont believe them. Many have tried this, I know of only one guy who managed to get an interview, and he was there 5+ years, in the SDF hub everynight. A couple of guys have gone from ACC to FedEx, but they had major internal recomendations. Working at ACC had no effect on them getting hired there.

All of this depends upon the pilot hiring market of course.

Qatar? Interesting... Do they consider Turbo prop time? I've heard, TP time overseas is as good as piston time, meaning almost useless. Looking at jobs overseas, they all require jet time.

I personally know of 2 at Qatar and one waitng for a class date. Don't believe any of them had any prior jet experience.

Good to know, Qatar may well be the exception...

I'm one of those guys that have managed to get a decent job straight from the Shorts. In retrospect i probably would have preferred going to a regional when I was an F.o but at the time no regionals were hiring. It worked for me but it was a long time coming and yes I was one of those guys who loaded near 7000#s of freight by hand in their uniform every night.

Absolutely don't think working there will help you get on at UPS. There was rumors of a flow through from management years ago but make of that what you will. A lot of guys form a genuine disillusionment with boxes and UPS (ask any former feeder pilot how difficult it is flying as a feeder for brown) and would probably stack shelves before applying there.

I guess a year out of your life isn't bad (1yr training contract) and it is good flying experience, so if you are at around the 500tt mark you could probably do a lot worse than to fly the old box for a while. I guarantee when you get a real job you'll still be telling stories from your freight days.

ACC will have a "flow-through" to being the pilot of Air Force One before they have one with UPS. For several reasons, it's simply not going to happen.

Yea, 2-3 (or more) years is a long time in that kind of work. Working for ACC was a pretty good choice for most of the people I know who went there. If you're young and single (you can afford to live on next to nothing for awhile) and you're willing to work hard under less than ideal working conditions, I'd say its a decent choice for somebody with 500-1000 total time looking for their first turbine job.

It's an especally smart choice if you wan to fly corperate or fractional. There is probably no faster way to 1000 Turbine PIC. Way faster than the regionals.

Oh, I forgot, quite a few guys at Omni now also.

Good Luck

I may just try it since I am really low on the multi time (50) to go to a regional. Pay seems to be better than a lot of Regionals if the data on APC is correct (25000 1st year FO, 17000 or less for many B1900 regional operators).
However, their website is not showing that they are hiring. Somebody posted they were desperate for pilots???

I think they have a link on their careers section where you can either upload a resume or do an online application.

Good luck! It seems if you get a base right away life isn't so bad. If you happen to live near MKE get used to hearing the phone ring at random times of the day!

ACC is good if you know what you are signing up for. Runs i flew were pdx, gsp, sav. long story short i went from an sd360/330 to Airtran. So YEs you can go from there to the majors.

Good to know! Thanks for the feedback!
How long did you stay there? I believe they have a base in DTO? Do you know what the bases are? APC doesn't list them.

hired in 05 left in mar 2010. i think dto is another airline, and bases for acc basically still the same minus pdx, gsp, and some stuff in the midwest. hey, good news once you are awarded a run its yours! more senior guys can't displace you, only issue is if your run closes and acc is good about finding stuff for you to do.

You are correct, Alliance is the one based in DTO...They operate Shorts too.

Any word on when interviews are going to happen or when the class will be?

Can anyone please provide any info regarding how many they're hiring this yr and when classes are going to be going on? Also, is 1200TT pretty firm? Thx!

Anything going on at ACC? Classes?

There's been 3 new hire classes so far, for a total of 16 new FOs, I think. There's also been 2 upgrade classes, so 4 new captains. That's it.

Air Cargo Carriers
 

I have made it through the initial phone interview and I have been asked to come for the in person interview next week!! Any advice for a first time applicant would be appreciated. I am looking for things such as the written exam (what does it consist of) and the interview itself. Also, what goes on during the Sim ride??

Regards,

JW

It is mainly a instrument written. And interview was very laid back. I thought the HR lady was very friendly. THere was some technical questions asked about current aircraft. Alot of Tell me a time when? You have to pay for the hotel yourself for the interview, not bad about 50 bucks. Sim ride was takeoff imc steep turns, airspeed, and intercept for a ils into jfk or lga.