PDT vs 9E
 

Hi - new to the site. What are your thoughts on Piedmont vs Endeavor. Would be commute to both (no option in base) and seem similar pay and upgrade. Both also have some flow agreement... but these seem like more of a recruiting tool. Curious about training and QOL.

Looked around and didn't see anything exactly on this topic.

Where are you commuting from?

Lol. Keep visiting this page guaranteed someone will spoon feed you despite what has been said. (There is no endeavor flow, don't get those confused)

PDT pays $51K minimum first year with no 121 experience. EDV pays $57K. Both are good companies. Consider moving to live in base, or pick another regional that is based where you live now if not willing to move, for QoL. If you commute, expect to lose 4-6 days of your time off each month getting back and forth to work. With only 11 days off at first, those 4-6 days start having a LOT of meaning very quickly, more than $5-8K of salary per year.

I agree with highflight, DO NOT COMMUTE for a regional. The QOL at any regional is bad enough but adding commute time to it will make it that much worse. With that said, only go to a regional that is offering at least a $20,000 bonus. If they don’t offer that don’t go, as far as flow throughs they are just that recruiting gimmicks.

The pilots at PDT certainly don't think the flow is a gimmick. Nor the pilots at mainline who have flowed already.

Don't think anyone is saying it is a gimmick, at least not in this thread. But I am curious... how many pilots have flowed to AA from PDT to date? How many per year?

Don't ever move for a regional unless they're specifically paying for the move. Ask around about how many people have moved or bought houses in a base for a regional only to have that base reduce or close or move elsewhere.

Flow at pdt is not a "gimmick" the timeframes are most likely oversold by the recruiters though, but they just relay what they are told, check the pdt news and rumors thread for better estimates.

Until recently the flow had been 3 per month of hiring, it went up to 4 for January because of increased pilot staffing. I believe the first class was Nov'14 so thats just about 2 full years of hiring or approximately 72 pilots that have flowed (there was no hiring/flow for this past Dec.)
At least another 48 will go this year (assuming hiring every month, not including if PDT hits staffing levels to move up to 5/month).

Thanks for sharing the data.

As for your comment on not moving for a regional... that advice is not of the same quality for everyone. Moving, for some folks, is a good move.

I didn't think Endeavor was a flow, just a preferential interview. At current flow levels i will be here another two years at pdt.. if we get to seven a month by year end, I'm out of here in a less than 1.5 years from now... i came at the right time, 2 years ago. I got into one of the first classes before they really started hiring. I am 40 percent up the seniority list in 2 years and have a insured job progression. I bought what the recruiters sold me and luckily every word they told me has come true.

With soft money and some extra overtime work, dash 8 retention bonus, fo retention bonus and throw in a pilot recruitment bonus and I will be close to 80k this year as an FO of a turbo prop. Plus, I always have at least 15 days off a month.... as frustrating as this company and job can be, I'm quite content right now.

I do hear good things about Endeavor though.

plus the flow doesn't require a college degree or being a Captain. Not that a degree isn't good to keep your options open.

PDT has no pbs or flica for schedules.

9E has Flica, but good luck finding a green day.

True but you will love the way we do vacation. Very easy to get more than half of the month off for each slot you have. My last 2 vacation awards were 19 and 23 days off for the month.

Will they keep building lines by hand with the jets?

I'm sure once they grow and become more Hub based I can see a new bidding system coming to them.

Prob for a while. The story is that because of how we do vacation with trip touching, etc that it isn't possible or would be very hard to integrate with PBS etc.. I believe it would have to involve re-negotiating our vacation procedure in the contract which would be unfavorable in my opinion.

I love our vacation system. That would come at a huge expense to the company for me to vote that away. Even on reserve you can get half the month off with just a single 5 day vacation slot. :D

There are guys who use their vacation to skip out on the worst parts of summer/winter flying. There are people who can go a whole winter without deicing once!

Is it possible to get a commutable line with a late start and early finish as a junior FO?

That doesn't seem that impressive to me, 19 days with vacation? You can get that without vacation in 31 day bid months.

You can't get that with pre-crafted lines, as we have here. Would it be more impressive to you if it wore a double-breasted jacket and a hat? 😇

I have been averaging 18 days off a month recently.. no vacation used..

Endeavor has better schedules. No way to argue it, our schedules could be a lot better here at PDT, tho the february lines were a huge improvement from what I have seen in the past year. Because we dont have longer stage lengths like Endeavor, I'm not sure we can actually build schedules with 18-21 days off without vacation.

Piedmont has a guaranteed position at a legacy, whereas Endeavor does not. I have heard a wide range of stories regarding the success rate of the SSP, maybe a 9E guy/gal can chime in with some accurate numbers.

Piednont's bidding and entire scheduling software is incredibly antiquated. The pilots here can't even log into crewtrac to see their own schedules. The systems could definitely use an overhaul, and our CEO has said it is one of the things he wants to change.

9E has ipads, we dont.

Our premium pay is much higher than 9E's.

Most other things are the same- healthcare, pay, upgrade etc.

Both are great options. Interview with both and go with the one you feel jives better for your lifestyle

Don't tell me you have to fly to base to pick up your schedule.

Technically we can still fax in our bids and adjustments along with pay adjustments... yes.. fax... and any changes to our schedule, you can request the crew card to be faxed to you.. yes faxed... and legally you don't have to work till you receive that fax... To get your schedule it is placed in your mailbox in your base at the crew room although it is available online...

we're so back to the future...:cool:

Endeavor had the SSP, with a pass rate around 60%. Now we have a guaranteed interview. You must be a captain for two years AND meet all current OTS requirements to get your interview. Success rate, who knows? Nobody has been eligible to go yet. It says a lot about the major when they tell pilots, you're not good enough to fly our planes/passengers, but you're still good enough to make 1/3 salary."

We can't log in to crewtrac either, our computers are terribly antiquated. We just upgraded to windows 7 a couple months ago. The only thing you can efficiently do on mobile is LMS, otherwise try to find a PC with Internet Explorer. We have Flica, but there are never any green days. All you can do is pick up on days off or trade with other pilots (rare).

We don't have iPads. We have an approval for them, but Delta legal and Apple are in a pi$$ing match right now. Who knows when we'll actually get them. We were supposed to get them in 2013, but the BK happened. Then we were supposed to get them the first week of this year. Now, who knows when.

Bottom line, come here if you want decent pay, willing to stay in New York, like noncommutable trips, and are willing to take full responsibility for your own career progression, because we have none.

If I were in a new guy's shoes, I'd go to an AA WO in a heartbeat. Why not have close to the same pay and a flow in your back pocket should you need it. This industry is very volatile, especially at the regionals. Today's golden child is tomorrow's turd. Today's turd, well, who knows what'll happen. XJT is a perfect example. A formerly top notch airline with some really great people that is now being decimated.

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I should mention one other thing: don't count on the bonus. They want to wrap it into the pay rates, but the number our own worthless "union" is throwing around would be a pay cut for more than half our pilot group.

Not sure what you mean about crewtrac login. Minus a few times (maybe 5 in the past 8 months), I have been able to log into CT just fine. Took me a minute to learn there was a new site when it recently changed, but that was a communication issue, not a site issue.

Legal disagreement about the ipads? Hadn't heard, but I guess it's possible. All I was told is that LMS training will be out this month for them, and after training is complete, we will be able to use them. I haven't had to wait since 2013, so perhaps I am more patient.

As for your comment: "Bottom line, come here if you want decent pay, willing to stay in New York, like noncommutable trips, and are willing to take full responsibility for your own career progression, because we have none. " Not quite sure what you mean. Commutability is a personal responsibility, and has a lot to do with where one chooses to live. NY is the hot place since mid-2016, but that will be slowing down pretty soon I'd wager. The focus will be on the rumored new base. And taking responsibility for one's own career progression... doesn't that go without saying for anyone anywhere?

Crewtrac does not work with Safari, Chrome, Firefox, Edge or your mobile browser. It only has full functionality with I.E. If you don't have an old version of I.E., it doesn't work. Yes, you can backdrop it by tapping schedule detail, but that's it. Those are all site issues stemming from either Sabre not getting into this decade or the company not wanting to pay for it.

Legal disagreement source, C tower and alluded to in the latest FOU.

Commuting if your responsibility, but very few of our trips are same day commutable as the OP asked. Very few late starts and early finishes, although we seem to be getting a few more 5 days, but they are very inefficient.

NYC is forecast to continue to grow, at the expense of our QOL and OPR bonuses.

Yep, I agree, taking responsibility for your own career is good advice no matter where you go. Is your career worth betting on the odds as they sit right now of 60/40? Or do you wager the odds will be getting better? RJ experience is RJ experience, regardless of paint. Have a flow as a BACKUP plan, and apply everywhere else you want to work.

Ok, you mean FULL functionality on CrewTrac, gotcha. I use it on Safari and Chrome, it works fine, minus that calendar view option. But I rarely use it, I prefer FCView.

I guess I am ambivalent on the SSP/DGI vs. the flow thing. If I am at a regional airline longer than 4-5 years, it will be because I choose to stay there for good. (Famous last words, I know...) But I don't count on either one getting me the leg up I need.

Wise pilot :-)

Sometimes. Wish I had become wiser, earlier in life. :). Then again, typically with great wisdom comes great learning and enduring.

Crew trac works with edge just fine. All functions

A week ago I would have agreed with you, but they came into recurrent yesterday for the yearly lunch and they had seemed to have changed their tune since last I spoke with anyone in ALPA 2 months ago. One of the guys was the interm chairman and the other is on the negotiating committee. They said their stance is no pilot on property, including reserves and guys with 75 hr lines, takes a pay cut. If they can make that happen we'll see but it was nice to see them actually standing up for it.

If they include NH in that, the ones who are getting the $7K for the past month or two, it should be a win for all of us. Fingers crossed.