With the new pay scales and FO's starting at $50k salary and top step in five years of $65k it's actually a realistic job. The starting CA pay is $78k and tops at $100k in just 5 years. Try that at one of the other regionals.
Then add in Home Basing with positive space tickets to/from work and never having to jumpseat commute. Never needing a crashpad. Long Call from home. Keeping all Hotel, Air and Rental Car points. Crew Cars at most overnights. Crew Meals provided on duty days over 12 hours. CASS/KCM provided. iPads, totally electronic paperwork, release, W&B....everything by iPad. Small but growing company that plans to add larger equipment as loads increase. Basically a small Allegiant/Sun Country doing vacation and destination flying in smaller jets allowing them to reach into smaller markets.
They've got their problems like all regionals; but how they treat their pilots isn't one of them. The exception is the always late monthly schedules. The other thing I don't like is they use 18 day duty a month. This always includes 2 Long Call days at home that NOBODY has ever been called out from; but that doesn't mean they couldn't. The problem I have with it is that as you gain seniority elsewhere you are able to bid for lines with more days off. Via is the same 16 days on the road for a new hire as for the most senior guy. I think that will change as they get more guys with over two years of 121 service.
Overall I like what they're doing, and how they're doing it. It's nice to see a regional that actually treats their people as valued employees and friends instead of just saying it.
This is a repost to get into the proper part of the APC forum. The airline has moved over two years ago from Charter to scheduled 121 & scheduled 135 service. The E120 Turboprop does EAS flying on the 135 certificate allowing them to hire lower time FO's. The E145's do the scheduled 121 routes.
They suffered numerous issues when first starting. The first batch of aircraft were purchased from another regional, and that's all I'm saying about that. Since having them on property two years, most of the issues have been worked out to the point that dispatch reliability is about on par with other regionals.