What exaggerations?

I get that the AUS base is way understaffed. Every complaint I’ve heard, staffing has been the solution. So telling people not to come here doesn’t help anybody does it? It simply continues the problem creating the things you’re complaining about.

Do Pilots have to commute to base or are they given positive space real tickets to/from work? They get real tickets.
Do Pilots sit 8-10 hours daily doing airport standby? No
Do Pilots ever have to pay for their own crashpads? No
Do crews get crew cars to use while off duty? Yes
Do crews get crew meals? Yes

Do any other regionals do that?

Yes, the schedules/scheduling suck. However all the problems these complaints stem from are staffing related. Get more bodies here and what are the complaints then? If you think staffing isn’t an issue at most regionals these days then you aren’t paying attention.

I’m really not getting how trashing your company publicly is going to help solve the issues you’re complaining about? In fact, it’s actually counterproductive. Telling people to stay away because of bad schedules just ensures the schedules stay bad, since the solution to them is increased staffing.

Nope, it’s far from perfect. It’s a regional. Don’t think I ever said otherwise. The glass can be 1/2 empty or 1/2 full; it’s your choice....

YMMV

how about pilots not getting paid!?!?!? How about the company saying one thing about hotels and doing something totally different. . how about not having a life because of scheduling. . . how about being pressured into flying planes that have serious safety issues . . . How about ALWAYS getting the runaround from management on EVERYTHING . . how about the company NOT telling crews (trying to hide it) that the 121 flight is NOT a 121 flight!?!?!? How about broken promises after broken promises. . .. how about being the pilots in the terminal where pax are CRYING because of scary air returns that freaked everyone out (and see how many air returns this company has had in the last few months). I'm just saying, that folks should have eyes wide open when coming here... management paints this place like it is a great place to be, however, it's not! If it was HALF of what they claim, the pilot group would happy!!! There are a few pilots here that commute and have a great life . . they work 14 days or so a month, and that is it. . . that is not the norm.

Yes, having more pilots here would solve the issues, but the new training pay is a sick, sick, sick, sick joke! They just lost guys in the training class because they weren't getting paid!

I’m not defending their pay policy. I think the training pay is stupid, and having sent a bunch of guys home for two weeks unpaid after the first week of Indoc was dumb. I think they learned their lesson on that.

They’re a regional like all the rest and regionals suck. They’re 2.5 years old as a 121 and are still learning as they grow. Management run around is normal at regionals; at least you don’t have management targeting employees like at other regionals.

There’s two sides to every story. If their MX program was unsafe they wouldn’t be flying. If something isn’t right, then write it up and get it fixed. Machines break. That’s why we train pilots for abnormals and emergencies.

Those old TSA planes are/were buggy though in my opinion.

Yeah, I had 8h sits. I fought for free meals on the 6 leg/12h duty days because no breaks were scheduled. We got a sandwich.

If you think staffing is the only problem, you either don’t understand or it’s part of the exaggeration. It’s not my company anymore. I’m long gone. Why else would anyone trash their old company....cause they still owe me over $10k.

Have you filed a labor complaint for unpaid wages? If they owe you, then they owe you.

A sit due to a mx delay is not doing scheduled airport standby.

Yes, they have lots to learn and improve on. All regionals do. Pilots just need to pick their priorities and which aggravation they want. All these regionals have something to complain about, go read the message boards.

In this company’s case, 85% of the issue is staffing related... and telling guys to go elsewhere isn’t going to help fix that.

I’ll say this. It’s a stepping stone job. Get in, keep applying to bigger better LCC’s, ACMI’s and legacies and move the hell onto better places when you can.

There have been no exaggerations

Cujo's position is and has always been, the we need more staffing (suckers). If they could just increase staffing, the airline would be amazing. He would say that even if all the airplanes were parked and the doors shut.

From what is sounds like, the incompetent management team would just use additional staffing to further stretch the operation. They wouldn't staff it properly, they would staff it as lean as possible to get the absolute most out of labor so as to extract more gains and growth.

Not true at all. I’ve said what their problems are. I’ve also said that all these regionals have their issues, and pilots need to research them carefully to decide which type of aggravation they want to deal with once hired. There are far fewer issues at Via than at most, but they’re different than the typical regional issues. Most problems at Via are related to growing too fast and not increasing staffing fast enough. That’s poor management planning in my opinion, but it’s still a better problem to have than a regional threatening missed assignments if you do not accept extra flying, or a missed assignment because flight loads were too heavy and you couldn’t jumpseat commute to work, or being harassed over calling in sick more than 3 times a year, or being told since you refused an extension you must file a fatigue report.

They aren’t perfect, they’re far from it actually, but they are better than most regionals IMHO. If you argue your case logically, they’ll listen.

Anyone do a recent interview here? If so, what was the experience like? Lots of info about the interview process for other regionals but not for Via.

Not really an interview. . . you might get a skype . . . do you have a pulse? If you are already at a base and have some sort of time in a jet or something then you are good to go. Just ask lots of questions!!! Come in with eyes wide open!

Elite has a class at the end of this month. It pays more than VIA and seems like a better place. something to check out.