Originally Posted by EMB120IP

Will there be a uniform allowance and "Top Gun" stickers as well. What about backpacks, will you allow backpacks? I'll need special earbuds for my Ipod, and can I put extra APPS on it so when I'm in cruise I can do something fun? Also, on each paycheck can you reduce 25 dollars per month and send a 25 dollar ITUNES card?

Originally Posted by TonyWilliams

Why not a salary? Seems simple enough (I've worked as an airline pilot on salary).

Days off, vacation, trips on seniority.

To the original post, I would want to blow out the pilots after 2 or 3 years, and get some new, cheap, eager beavers, with plenty of mommy and daddy's money to "invest".

I wouldn't care whether they can, or will, get hired at a major airline. Not my problem.

I'd have them sign a three year contract, with a HUGE termination clause. You could actually make money on pilots who would jump ship before the end of their contract, getting either flying for free, or the equivalent of "pay to play".

Like virtually any flying job that becomes available, those seats don't and won't get cold !!!

FO's would be strictly pay to play, and I'd expect to terminate 75-95% in training. The beauty of pay2play is that the airline can make huge profits off most folks who will never sit in an airliner. Some cream will rise to the top, and for those, we have a carrot.

If qualified, you become a direct entry captain, and I will pay a salary that far exceeds anything else in the USA for a new hire, but never gets to anything above about typical 5 year pay in the industry. Therefore, the airline will never have high priced pilot labor.

FO's are "guaranteed" a captain job in 18 months, if qualified, to expect to get their 1000-1500 PIC in the next 18 months. These are the things pilots drool over, and I'd want to "give it to them". Because you weren't qualified as a captain at new hire, your pay will remain the same for the captain job, per your contract. You can always quit, and my airline would encourage it, since you won't be around in 3 years anyway, should you leave in 2 years, I make money. Win, win for me.

I guarantee that virtually NOBODY would turn down that captain PIC opportunity, even though there's no additional pay. Pilots who fail the PIC training are fired, and forced to pay their termination bond.

The cadre of pilots who end the 3 year contract MAY be offered a renewed three year contract or a training job that pays some HUGE (compared to the industry) salary for another 3 years terms. Same termination clauses.

Because the number or training pilots is small compared to the line pilots, the overall cost to the airline is relatively small.

I don't know how any potential union might affect the 3 year contracts, so assume that any future union would mean an alter ego airline in the waiting at all times (on paper, to be launched upon serious threat to the airline).

Edit: purging pilots every 3 years should all but guarantee no union.

Summary:

Even though the pilots will work to the maximum duty limits allowed, and the chance of a PRIA training failure is very high, and the job only lasts three years, they will be "paying their dues", getting almost guaranteed PIC turbine time.

The airline is primarily geared toward bringing in LARGE numbers of unwashed masses to filter out a few of them to hire, all of which are paying for the privilege. This should be an overall profit center for the airline, as opposed to the burden and expense of recruiting rated pilots.

When pay2play gets difficult to find enough suckers, and I can't find qualified captains off the street, I hire other company's FO's for direct hire captain. Ya, they'll JUMP at that. Pay them FO pay, but they get that magic PIC turbine time. Same 3 year contract with termination clauses.

I can run captain/captain crews, since I'm not paying that much anyway. Actually, I'd prefer that everybody was captain qualified and current, just like business jet flying. I won't have to have as much reserve since most pilots can do either job.