HELP! SWA or Current gig?
 

Hello All,
I have a class date at SWA but my employer just offered me 300K to stay, plus a defined benefit program comparable to the majors. I am a 44 -year old G-650 captain with an excellent resume (Fortune 100, Former major airline, former military,). I could have 20+ years at SWA but I'm gonna have to start all over (not crazy about that).

• How long until I can make 200K as a commuter?
• How realistic is it to pick up extra time as a commuter?
• I think the upgrade time will come down in coming years. Thoughts?
• Thoughts and opinions on my situation greatly appreciated.

This is a tough decision. I guess it's a good problem to have.
Thank you!

For me it was about the stabability and being “off” when I’m home (plus knowing when I will be home next month). You’ll make $300k eventually at SWA. If you’re sure you will be employed by the 650 operator for twenty years and the schedule is good, you probably would not have applied to SWA.

Alex.

Without going crazy picking stuff up, prob looking around 4-5 yrs to make 200k.

I’ll do 150k or so this year but I live in base and pick up stuff every month.

Upgrade will prob come down to the 6-8 yr range....eventually. Maybe. Right now it’s 10 yrs or so.

If you’re a short drive from work and the company is financially stable and offering that kind of $$$$.....I’d have a hard time turning it down. I’ve never done Corp so not sure how 20+ yrs of sitting in FBO’s and loading bags would be.

I don't love my current job and the schedule in any corporate gig is only good when looking back over the previous month- never forward. I envy my airline colleagues but only the ones with seniority. Commuting also sucks. 300K is huge though. Man I'm torn. If I were younger it would be SWA all the way.

Would it be a easy or a hard commute? If you’re not happy with the current gig....is that kind of $$$ going to make you happy? Or will you still be miserable but with 💰? I’d rather have less cash and be happy personally. You can’t take it with you and life’s too short to be miserable.

I live in southern NH. My goal is to commute to BWI which, is one of the easiest commutes in the airline world.....but it's still a commute. I've read that the ave at SWA is 100 per month. How realistic is 110 or even 120hours conversion per months as a commuter?

A lot depends on life/family circumstances, but if all else is equal. SWA.

HELP! SWA or Current gig?
 

What's most important to you? Money? Time off? Flexibility in schedule manipulation? Would you ever consider moving to a base? Are you confident you'll be at your current gig making 300K for the next 20+ years? These are all things that only you can answer for yourself.

Just another data point; I'm a commuter and I refuse to work more than to 14-15 days a month. I'd consider myself pretty middle of the road as far as monthly credit and I'm looking at around 175 as a 3rd year FO with a few months 4th year pay at the tail end (and that's considerably less than many friends I have hired in the same time frame I did if you're concerned about money). Next year I'd estimate an extra 20K if I credit the same. This is all excluding profit sharing and B fund contribution.




Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

110 is easy. I’m there now for Dec and I haven’t picked anything up all month. You could do 120 by picking up a day trip or 2 day pretty easily.

I'm not afraid of working hard. Corporate is easily 10X harder and more stressful than my airline days. Having said that, $$ is important to me as well. I'm willing to work a lot, I'm just wondering what the realistic possibilities are as a commuter. Everyone hears stories of FO's making 300K or Captains making 400+ but I sit and wonder if those are the few, super-senior guys living in base. I don't expect to make that anytime soon however, it's important for me to develop a good sense of what's realistic within the next few years as I will have to take a massive paycut and probably work every weekend and holiday for years. Maybe I have a skewed sense from my days at DAL from 2000-2005 which included commuting to reserve 20 days /month, furlough, 50% pay-cut, bankruptcy, etc. Thank you for your input- very much appreciated.

FWIW....if you did a 110 avg when you hit yr 5 you’ll be at 200k. A 110 avg on yr 12 is 230k. I’m finishing my 2nd yr and will do 150k or so doing a 130 avg. You’ll get 15 off on rsv and 16-19 off as a line holder so there’s room to pick up as needed assuming you’re legal.

Do you live in base?

Yeah. Once you get some seniority though you can bid lines with “desirable” trips and get rid of them and then pick up trips for 1.5x. I know lots of commuters that do that but they’ve been here 5+ yrs.

HELP! SWA or Current gig?
 

6.5 tfp avg credit per day min guarantee. That's the MINIMUM you're going to credit for a days work.

The Senior/in Domicile can average north of 10 tfp per day during the peak months.

You'll have flexibility to fly less days in the slow months and fly more in the fast months. There are junior folks working as little as 6-8 days a month in slow months, and some working FAR 117 max in the summer months crediting over 200 TFP...AND EVERYTHING IN BETWEEN. And even some outliers above & below the above.

BWI is a very productive base, even as a commuter it won't be too hard to credit 110-120 a month. Your Seniority and flexibility on days worked will dictate how many days it takes you to hit that magic tfp #.

1300 tfp is a recent annual average used by the union for you to postulate #s with. Add per diem, 14.2% NEC 401k, and profit sharing and you have a good mark regarding total compensation. There's some pretty good health insurance options.

There are folks from some very credible cabin class operators at SWA. I think it'd be perfectly acceptable to make a decision either way, just crunch some good #s so you do the financial valuation part of the decision correctly first.

Then put all the intangibles that are a bit harder to assess a monetary value to like commuting, career stability, equipment, Work environment, job satisfaction, etc

Thanks so much for taking the time to answer my questions!

How many years worth of that compensation is your boss willing to put into an escrow account, payable to you in full the day that job ceases to exist? $300k sounds great, until the airplane is sold. If they are asking for your commitment, then it’s only fair to ask the same of them.

Corporate gigs are usually just 1 death or divorce away from going away (or one new CEO, just ask GE’s flight Department). SWAs stability is something you could take to the bank.

PM sent.

Filler

This ^^^
Unless you’re flying for Walmart or Target or Coca-Cola.

I was flying for Walmart for a while. In 2007 they laid off 15% of the pilots with no notice and not in seniority order and with no opportunity for recall. Even they are not immune to the uncertainty of a corporate aviation career.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

The uncertainty and stress of corporate flying would make me choose SWA. The only upside to your current position is there's no age restriction.

Have you actually seen a swa pilots schedule? Working lots of weekends is what I saw. I thought my acmi cargo FO gig was better since I at least got 2 weekends off a month. My understanding is the lines are non commutable on 1 end.

I’d talk to some people who left swa first. 300k is a lot of cash, I cant imagine your gig is that bad.

Go ahead swa guys, flame me with your typical “couldnt get hired comments”. Hired this past summer and decided to not go.

I’m fairly junior (2 yrs) and can get half the weekend off if I wanted (Sun-Wed). Can hold weekend off rsv if I want that too. I bid weekends because I’d rather have midweek off. To each his own.

My job is very high stress. Worrying about the job going away is part of corporate flying which, is why it's good to always be making contacts and have a great resume (which I do). Getting off the bottom 10% at SWA = no more worrying but it's going to be a LONG time before I make what i make now let alone what I just got offered to stay. If were younger the choice be easily be SWA all day long. I need to sit on this a few days I think.

True to a point, but you may have missed the big picture. Probably 2 years working weekends, 2 years working half weekends, then weekends off until you choose to upgrade, depending on the senority of your base. I would guess that’s pretty comparable to every other flying gig out there. Non-commutable lines on one end is mostly true as well, but the union is working on that for 2020. Your control over your schedule gets better rapidly (at today’s hire rate) and with elitt trading. I wouldn’t make that your deciding factor for a 20 year career.

If the company wants you that badly, they need to do what they do for top execs---seed a DC plan with a couple million dollars and provide you a contract with a guaranteed severance package.

Airline work is WORK. Especially if you commute!

Your 40 years old? SWA has NEVER furloughed a Pilot! No decision here go to Southwest and never look back. The money will come

Never done corporate, so this may be worth what you pay for it but....

It sounds like you want to do SWA.

If the only real plus to the current job is money I’d say go. Nearly every major decision I’ve made that prioritized money turned out disappointing.

Big question - why did you not go back to Delta and do you regret that?


Good luck!

What does getting off the bottom 10% do?




Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

My fortune 225 company just let 31 people go and 3 airplanes. We flew a lot and the department was justifiable. Board members did not see it that way. Now I am at south west for security. The only complaint I have is $$$. And scheduling my off time when I want it not when seniority gives it to me. But I have security and time and it will get better. I was offered a job the same day I went to training the owner of the company was 72. Best case I saw 5years there and I would be where I am today. Wishing I came to SWA 5 or 10 ago.

And that means they never will? No. Seriously. I’ve worked for companies that have never furloughed - until they did. I’ve worked for places that said, “This is the last uniform you’ll ever wear! You won the lottery!” and then I was furloughed again. “In 5 years you’ll be a captain!”Nope, furloughed again.

It is a business. If they don’t need bodies to fly the airplanes, they’ll furlough too. The advantage at the airlines is that you know the rules to the game.

Let me give you an example.

If you fly for Galactic Airways, and they furlough you, and you don’t touch an airplane for ten years... you’re making French fries at Sonic... when they finally recall, they will make you a pilot again.

If you fly for Walton’s Widget Corp, and they furlough you, and you don’t touch an an airplane for ten years... you’re making French fries at Sonic... you might be done flying airplanes.

Furthermore, as an airline guy you can always look at the seniority list and see how many people you are away from furlough or recall. It’s strictly numbers.

As a corporate pilot, when you find out the department is going to lay off, you have to wonder... “does she Chief pilot remember when I complained about that hotel expense report he denied 3 years ago?”

That said...

Corporate flying was MUCH more gentlemanly flying. I fly airplanes that were generations more advanced than the 737. I flew one or two legs a day. I took mid day naps at he FBO. The FBO lady made me warm cookies. Used clean bathrooms at the FBO. Had lunch on an expense account. Got to go to Osh Kosh on the company dime.

Would I go back? Not a chance. The ability to bid a schedule around all of the important events in my family’s life is invaluable.

Good luck with your decision! It isn’t an easy one! My advice is get a job offer. Until you have a job offer there is no decision to make.


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

Or GE, Pfizer, General Motors, General Mills, Kellogg's . . .

When you are flying under a Collective Bargaining Agreement your work life is laid out in black and white. Furloughs will only happen in seniority order. You have guaranteed seniority order in bidding for everything. There are rules governing mergers and acquisitions. ETC. ETC. ETC.

If you worried at all about job security over the long term go to SWA. $300,000 is a huge salary by almost any yardstick but if there is a chance of the flight department folding or being furloughed out of seniority order with no right of recall, then that salary is no longer a factor.

Could Southwest fold all together or furlough.....of course they could. But, the balance sheet is the strongest in the industry and a furlough would only touch a small portion of the seniority list with right of recall at the end.

Nothing is a certainty in this industry but if I had to put my eggs in one basket or the other, it seems that the airline basket (not just SWA), is the much safer choice in the long run.

Thank you. I do have a class date at SWA for 1/9/18. I'm not wiling to move so I would commute for 20 years. I hear that the morning flights from MHT (NH) are full of commuters. This would make getting to work stressful. There is so much opportunity in corporate right now due to lack of experienced captains. This is really giving me pause.

Huge regrets in some ways. I was hired at 26 and would've retired #4 in the company. Post 9/11 I was furloughed for 25 months, came back to 50% paycut, no retirement, no vacation and commuting to reserve in a crash pad 20 days every month. The straw that broke the camel's back for me was a voicemail from 2-year old daughter, distraught that i was not answering her (LOL she thought the recording was me). I thought to myself that in the next 6 years I would be gone for 4 of them from her. What kind of dad would be by doing that? At the time no one would hire an airline pilot that still had a seniority number so, I resigned and went to work for LMG. I should've lied and kept my number but, hindsight is always 20/20. I made the best decision i could at the time.

LOL.... You saw one weekend line and assumed that was all we have?

I haven't involuntarily flown a weekend trip in over a decade.

Commuting is never easy but the commuter policy is fairly liberal. If you are listed on a SWA flight scheduled to arrive one hour prior to show time you are covered. Any combination of two flights scheduled to land prior to show time is also acceptable.

COMMUTER RULES The following sets forth the rules concerning a pilot who lives in a city other than his domicile:

1. A pilot who chooses to designate himself as a “commuter” must designate a city as a point of commuter origination.
2. A pilot must attempt to commute on a minimum of two (2) consecutive scheduled flights on Southwest or off-line from the designated city. If, because of flight cancellations, delays, lack of available seating (cabin or jumpseat), or delays beyond the commuter’s control (diversion, etc.), the pilot will be unable to arrive prior to the scheduled report time, the Company will be notified immediately. Alternatively, the second scheduled flight is not required if the primary flight on Southwest is scheduled to arrive in domicile at least one (1) hour prior to check-in.

HELP! SWA or Current gig?
 

Been there my friend. I was hired at 26 and then furloughed for about 7 years after 9/11. When they finally recalled, the major was still bankrupt and had closed one of the largest domiciles. The contract was a shadow of what it had been pre 9/11. Taking a recall would have meant a paycut and a challenging commute to the Northeast. So I turned them down. Who would’ve guessed that after a mega merger the job would have been entirely different a decade later.

I left corporate in 2013 when things started looking bleak at the department I was working for. I couldn’t plan any life events with my family, and I was getting sideways with my boss frequently enough that I worried about my longevity.

Commuting from MHT shouldn’t be too bad. Between MDW and BWI you have a variety of options. Nobody says that you have to commute on line either. If MHT isn’t looking good, there are 15 flights from BOS to BWI on weekdays on a variety of carriers. Plus Amtrak if you get in a pinch.

The commuter policy only requires one flight attempt on line though. If you make it great. If not, so be it. Don’t sweat it!


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

Wow great insight from someone who's been in my situation. I'm 44. What do you think about starting over at SWA at my age and the current industry hiring scenario?

Will your current gig give you a 20 year contract with COLA raises? What stops them from reducing the $ later once they have you trapped? What kind of loss of License plans do they have?


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk