here's an express jet question. the last few times I've tried to jumpseat on them, they've been weight restricted. what gives? Today, for example, houston to dallas in clear weather...weight restricted. I wound up gettin on, barely, but there were open seats and they said I got the last one. Same story a couple of weeks ago in lubbock to houston. went and got on southwest and called it a day.

As far as my two cents worth, I'll give my insight on the original question.

I would say go to the regional that has a base where you want to live. Commuting is for the birds.

Second, look for a place that has a fairly decent upgrade, yet at the same time, don't chase an upgrade. For example, don't go to Great Lakes and take crappy pay because they have a quick upgrade.

Last, look at pay from a logical perspective. Making say, $32 an hour second year (never look at first year pay) may seem great compared to $27 an hour, but look at where the bases are. If you have to live in New York or Boston on $32 an hour, you'll be poor. But if you had to live somewhere like Charlotte or Atlanta on $27 an hour, you would be OK. Make sure you examine the cost of living very closely.

As far as airlines to avoid, well, thats a personal decision. My personal opinions would be as follows:

Great Lakes: I hear they are OK to their employees, but with all the regionals desperate for pilots, why go make $15 an hour?

Mesa: I'm sure everyone knows their history and how they treat their employees.

GoJets: May not be a bad company, but alot of pilots, mainly the big union guys, will blacklist you if you work there.

Expressjet: They are currently reporting losses and the branded flying has not proved whether it will make it or not. Tensions between them and Continental as well as their earnings reports would make me wary.

American Eagle: Supposedly not a bad place to work, so long as you enjoy being a career FO.

As far as places that I would recommend:

Skywest, ASA, PSA, Comair, Piedmont, Republic, and Air Wisconsin.
I can only vouch for PSA since I work there, but I have not heard many, if any, complaints from the others I listed. If there are no complaints, it must be OK.

Hope this helps. It's utimately up to you to do the research and choose what works best for you. Good luck.

as for jumpseating on expressjet and being weight restricted you were most likely trying to jumpseat on one or two of our er's. Its a version of the 145 that isnt very friendly to high weights. When continental gave up those 69 airplanes it consisted almost entirely of XR's and LR's or the better airplanes went to the west coast. Even with our weight program we have to weight restrict sometimes. We do it less often then CHQ but with ER's, potentially bad weather in houston, and the fact that we sometimes tanker fuel... it happens. sorry if it inconvenienced you but we don't like it either.

Reference Flex81's posts on the previous page...he said it all quite well. If you are a "majors or bust" kinda guy, I really can't see a better opportunity than ol' Lakes Air. By the time all the cool kids at the "top 5 regionals" are upgrading, most Lakers are moving on to majors. That said, it's a tough lifestyle, but can be done...it just takes the ability to scrape by, and perhaps live with a houseful of roommates. Not for everyone, but still pretty tough to knock.

I didn't want to nor could I afford to work there...I had enough living like that while in college.

That said, no matter where you work you can't knock the hard work Lakers do and the BS they put up with in search of that magical 1000 TPIC.

Beacuse people like you get hired with such low time, when their number is up they dont have the time or experience to upgrade.

Airlines that are hiring "Ca's" are growing and taking in new aircraft.

Raise the compensation and the attractiveness of an organization to more experienced pilots increases.

Ultimately it is cheaper for Colgan to hire low-time FOs and street captains than it is to raise FO pay compensation to recruit better-qualified pilots...so the trend continues.

What experienced pilots? There arent any left who want to do this job....

You tell me recently what airline has raised their FO pay to attract more qualified folks.

I flew a 66 seat turboprop for $25/hr on 2nd year pay... my FA's were makin more than me.

One gets more pay for the amount of seats on the aircraft, hence more responsibility (at least thats the way its supposed to work) The saab has 34 seats, what do you want 90 seat pay?

BTW... I'm not here for the money, b/c if I was I wouldent be flying for a living.

Lets see...ASA and PNCL have both tried but since they were in contract negotiations that got biiach-slapped down as a management violation of Status Quo.

NetJets was voting on a pay package where first year FOs would make well over $65k.

Piedmont has offered $5000 bonuses for newhires, RAH offered $2500 bonuses.

Nope...but I (and many others who have and/or are considering working for Colgan) would like to see FOs get another couple bucks per hour to fly that 1900 or Saab because that would likely attract enough qualified pilots that people like yourself wouldn't have to be hired off the street as Captain.

You realize that FO pay for the Q400 at Colgan is less than half of captain rates, right?

I said raise the pay rates.... not offer bonuses.

This is a regional forum, and Netjets is a great employer, dont compare the two.

Would I like to see my FO's make a few more bucks??? Sure, but unfortnately there is very little I can do to control that.

We lost about 65 guys to the Q.... I doubt they had that many FOs waiting to upgrade.

I spent 3 years in the right seat, and I share your sentiment.

I saw a great opportunity and took advantage of it. Better to slide over then transition to another airline just to chace an upgrade.