Guys, get some more hours.

Not to be discouraging- there's nothing wrong with being enthusiastic, and you're likely not doing any damage by applying early. But they're not going to talk seriously to you until you have at least 400-500hrs. Even if they did, you seriously don't want to be the guy in training with half the hours of the next least experienced pilot. And you are really not ready to be in the cockpit of a 5 ton turboprop in the middle of a winter storm at night flying into some small, ****ty uncontrolled field carrying ice, near mins, and next to a captain with barely more than 1200hrs.

There's a huge difference between a 300hr pilot and a 500hr pilot. Even more with an 800hr pilot. The company knows this. Sure, you might get through training with 300hrs- people have done it. But it's a poor bet.

In my time with the company, I don't think I met a single pilot for whom Boutique was their first job in aviation. The company doesn't like to hire pilots who haven't had another flying job first- with good reason. Please do yourselves a favor- get CFI and a few hundred hours teaching, fly some powerlines, tow some banners, fly a meatbomber. Try for Boutique as your second (or third) flying job.

Hey guys, a couple of questions I’d sincerely appreciate if you could answer. I’m a United Captain, trying to help out one of my friends I’m mentoring.

What are competitive hours for a FO position? How many hours a month do you guys average? Can FO’s legally log SIC time with the autopilot operative?

Thank you!

700-800 is realistically competitive. Some get hired with a bit less.

FOs at my base were typically flying about 80hrs/month. WX/MX cancellations would sometimes bring that number down (especially over the winter). FOs who picked up trips at other bases sometimes were doing over 100hrs/month.

FOs definitely log hours (even when the autopilot works), as per company GOM/Op Specs. ASEL, CC, IMC, and night- but very little PIC.

Your FOs are never the pilot flying?

They do some of the flying yes.

i think he is saying they need a commercial, asel with IMC and night but dont need a lot of PIC to be competitive to be called

I read that that the SICs hardly log any PIC time. Any time you are the PF should be logged as PIC, that was my confusion.

How many hours does it realistically take to get on with BQ as an FO?

pretty sure you would log PIC time only if you were the PIC assigned to the flight, otherwise it would be SIC time. yes?

The average experience of the new hire FOs in the most recent classes that i am aware of has been about 500-600 hours total time

There are a couple of FAA legal interpretations about this.
When Captain is PM and SIC is PF, Captain logs PIC time as acting PIC, SIC logs PIC time as sole manipulator of controls. This on a single pilot airplane such as the PC12.