colgan contract
 

Does anyone know much about Colgan's 1 year sign on contract?? How does this thing work?

It is $16,000, pro rated over the course of a 12 month period.

Basically it states that if you leave Colgan prior to having been with the company for a term of 1 year, then you owe them the pro rated balance. Lots of people are breaking it and the general concensus is that they do nothing more than hold your last paycheck and send a letter. The clock starts ticking the first day of training, not after sim or IOE.

I broke mine last month after 9 agonizing months :o. I would advise against going to Colgan, especially considering all the other regionals that are hiring. If you dont have the time for SKW or RAH, XJT will take you with 500 hours.

Why did you leave?? Where where you based?? How did you leave the company knowing that you were under contract?

just do a search of his and my posts on COLGAN..................

Disclaimer:: bear in mind that the following response is highly biased and others will have different opinions based on their own personal experiences with the company.

It wasn't one single event or annoyance that made me choose to leave Colgan, it was a combination of many. In no particular order:
a) Poor Pay (rates / no per diem)
b) Poor maintenance (countless engine failures every year among other things)
c) Aircraft are old, dirty, smelly, and overall just delapidated (spelling?)
d) Flying to the same 2-3 airports get quite boring
e) No union (mgmt does whatever the he11 they please)
f) Poor hotels (Worst Western in manassas comes to mind :rolleyes: )
g) Despite what prop drivers will tell you, Jet experience is both more challenging and more valuable than TP time
h) Outstation basing (may be good for you?)
i) Lots of plane swaps
j) Junior manning
k) Min 10 days off per month
l) Irene, Gina, Dot, Tom B, Dean, and Mikey
m) Frequent pressure to break duty / rest regs
n) Scheduled reduced rest overnights .. what the hell?

United base then a newly opened Airways base in May.

a) Employment at will
b) Thirteenth amendment of the Constitution (indentured servitude)
c) Considering a and b, I told the Colgans to to fu(k themselves

---------------------->
DO NOT GO TO COLGAN, YOU WILL REGRET IT.

THEY ARE NO BETTER THAN MESA OR TSA. LAXROX, FEEL FREE TO CHIME IN. DON'T FALL FOR THE GET IN, GET YOUR TIME, GET OUT MENTALITY. UPGRADE IS AT 2 YEARS RIGHT NOW! DO YOU WANT TO RIDE SHOTGUN IN THE SAAB FOR 2 YEARS?

Here is some additional information

http://airlinepilotforums.com/showthread.php?t=12879

**** at least you got a hotel, I got to sleep in the hanger at MHT, got to ferry ****ty airplanes on my days off, got shorted pay, COLGAN BLOWS, pilot group was good, not sure how many of them are still there,


PS the F/A are very very ugly, KILO has a pic of one of them for his AVATAR

haha I forgot about that. they constantly shorted pay and per diem :mad:

Hey didn't you just start? Are you getting sick of it already? For me it's been ok because I live 20 minutes from my base, but I've been screwed a couple of days bad and know what it's like; couldn't imagine being junior and in a bad base and having those days happen all the time. I'd probably be looking to leave too. Take care

By the way, where are you based?

As others stated, it is pro-rated. Something to keep in mind, Colgan is based in VA which is a right to work state, a contract like the one they have you sign isn't completely legal.

I didn't know what "right to work state" meant so I looked it up and this website says that it doesn't apply to airline employees..
http://www.nrtw.org/rtws.htm

I thought of another possible reason the contract is not valid...

they dont have it notarized :confused:

hhahaha dont think that will hold up in court...........ok I have been on this website for about 12 hrs now, I need to go to bed and have nightmares about how terrible the YANKEES are....

My opinion is that the contracts that were signed before the Pinnicle take-over are not valid. We are not working for the same company anymore; we didn't sign up to work for Pinnicle. They could come in and change everything: get rid of outstation and change a bunch of things that make the job completely different than it was when you signed the paper.

What if Mesa told a group of its pilots they had to move to China to be part of the new operation because they were under a training contract and had to do what the company said. Haha. I doubt that contract would hold up in court

many ppl have broken the contract recently. I wouldn't depend on guesses or a 30 minute search of the internet as your basis though. It is doable though. If you are going to do it, i'd do early. Nobody leaves after yr one. Colgan is running 2 upgrades classes a month now, so id expect upgrade times to come down real soon just based on competition with other regionals. Like Kilo and saab have said, it's not for everyone. It fits some ppl real well. I've had to colgan hose job a lot, but it fits my situation better than going somewhere else. I live in base, have a side business, and a wife that makes good loot so it makes sense for me to be home every night. Not so for everyone else. Maybe I just see it as that bad. I spent 12 yrs in the army, and uncle sam screws you over 1000X worse than colgan ever could. I'm not going to plug the product here, but when I was in college my mom got me something called pre-paid legal, which is basically a legal advise service for like 60 or so bucks a yr. They will review contracts, write letters on your behalf and give advise for free. If you wind up in court it will cost more, but it was a good service for the price. They helped me close on my house, do a patent search, write a few letters to creditors, and got me out of jail a few times way back in the day when I drank too much liquid courage. Just an idea.......

haha typical COLGAN guy................just kidding, yeah for some people COLGAN just works for them...........


PS Has anybody tried that KFC Chicken bowl with the corn, chicken, mashed potatoes and cheese..............looks amazing

I think I just threw up a little.

haha bro come on...............its looks amazing, I mean its a heart attack in a bowl, but might be worth it

It reminds me of when I was a kid and I scrambled eggs with chocolate syrup; they're great on their own, but disgusting when together.

hahah thats funny, I still put Ketchup on pretty much everything............hate tomatoes though

A few years ago I was introduced to the deliciousness that is ketchup on top of saltines. I don't make it a regular snack at home, but it's a tasty snack while you're waiting for your food at the local greasy hole-in-the-wall.
...I guess that if I'm advocating ketchup and saltines, I really can't talk bad about KFC's gross-bowl.:p

When is the best time to try to get out of the contract? I'm only about 3 months in and would love to go over to ExJet. Any thoughts about waiting until the prorated amount goes down or should I just go?

The sooner the better.

In my case, I waited until the pro-rated balance was an amount I could afford ... just in case I do have to pay it someday.

How about the hot CSR's at BGR.

Cant you just bail on them and just let them try and catch up with you later? Have they been able to collect from anyone else that has left in the past?

Who knows what happened to every individual that has left prior to the full term of their training contract. I've only been gone about 1 week... when I find out anything, I'll post the info