I did 8 years of corporate. 3 regionals, one LCC, one major, lots of furloughs. Then went part 91 for a Fortune 500 for another 8 years.

Started out as the best job I could imagine in aviation. It was everything I hoped a flying job could be. Lots of time at home, very few overnights. Weekends and holidays at home, good money, great equipment, and the department had never laid off.... Until it did. Before long the layoffs were followed by more overnights, 28 day "tours", days off rescinded with no notice, expense control that bordered on ludicrous.

Soooo... came back to 121. Now I wonder why I left and lament the loss of seniority over those 8 years.

Corporate can be fantastic, no question about it, it can be better than any major airline by a wide margin. The problem is that there are no guarantees and, at least in my case, it changed for the worse very quickly. Went from being my dream job to the corporate equivalent of Mesa almost overnight.

I still find it sad that the management there took the best job in aviation and made the choice to turn it into nothing more than a stepping stone.

Zap,

Care to expand on why you now wonder why you left?

GF

Post 9/11 and after a few furloughs getting away from the airlines and trying part 91 corporate seemed like a good idea. Unfortunately time doesn't stand still while you experiment with new careers. During the 8 years I was flying corporate I missed out on some valuable seniority progression (whether I had accepted recall at my prior company or started with a new one).

Had I ever imagined that I was going to leave corporate it would've been smarter to do it sooner rather than later and get back on a seniority list somewhere.

That's life...you never know if you made the right decisions until you're done.

Not to derail from the conversation but AA will either catch up to DL/UA pay or even surpass it, starting next year with the JCBA.

Our Company proposed 777 pay is:
$273.00/hr 2015
$308.00/hr 2019

Narrow body FO
$108.00/ 2nd year 2015
$130.00/3rd year 2016

Not too shabby.

Considering my salary to hours flown.
My corporate job pays $200/hr.

Not too shabby. Considering that my non flight duties can't add up to much more than a 121 guys time.

You should sit short call reserve. Just flew with a guy that flew 7 widebody trips in 12 months.

Al,

I became a pilot to fly, not sit around doing nothing.

GF

Me too. At least a happy medium. Just pointing out what the previous poster was talking about.