CPP
 

Hello all,

My nephew is just starting out and is currently working as a CFI. He has about 400TT.

How does the Career Path Program work? Is it just a guaranteed interview after x amount of time at a participating regional?

Thank you.

Gup

https://www.united.com/web/en-US/content/company/career/program.aspx

Definitely no guarantees, except a guaranteed Hogan test. The rest is up to the applicant, and UAL’s hiring decision. The applicant gets to skip the technical assessment. If the Hogan is passed, then he/she gets the interview....right away. If the interview is successful, the applicant is placed in a pool based on seniority at the regional, and also based on acquiring the time minimums set by the program. Once all those criteria are met, the applicant undergoes a “final review”, where the applicant’s training record, personnel file, and attendance/reliability are examined. That’s the last hurdle. Successful review means a class date at UAL. Unsuccessful review means completely removed from program. ALSO.....and this is VERY important......if the applicant is in the pool after a successful interview, and manages to be invited for an “off the street” interview......it’s quite a gamble, because tanking THAT interview will also remove you from the program.

Hopefully that answers some of your questions, but I’d read the official documents for yourself.

You get two chances via the CPP. Or maybe not. UAL has been revamping the CPP for the last year or so and many are still waiting on their second Hogan.

That’s gotta be an uncomfortable feeling. However....it definitely bugged me that some 2nd Round guys still got to go before those of us who passed everything on the first try. Maybe this is UAL’s way of correcting that. My gut feeling is that’s not what’s happening, though.

I’d definitely look into the American Airlines owned regional partners first.

Pass the interview with one of their regionals and have a “GUARANTEED FLOW TO MAINLINE” when your number comes up (~ 5-7 years ish). Great to have that in your back pocket as one keeps updating with all the other career destinations out there.

But...then you’d have to fly for American!

I would suggest PSA or Envoy for a regional. You get a real flow to American, no interview....When your number comes up, you go. While waiting to go, push for United and Delta. If they don't get to you first you still have AMR in your back pocket. Its hard to get AMR off the street because of all their flows. The CPP has about a 50/50 pass rate from what i understand. Envoy just got a new contract too.

I think the pass rate is a lot lower than 50/50. Rumor is UA is tweaking or overhauling the program so changes may come soon.

My former company’s MEC is claiming the pass rate is 17% over there. I have no facts to back that up, but it’s definitely less than 50%.

Sounds like then participating regional carriers need to look at their own recruitment if the CPP interview pass rate is that low.

Thanks for all the information.

I think United would fit him best since their peak retirements don't really start until 2025 (the point where he'd start to be competitive).

AA flow would also be a good choice with that in his back pocket.

All good info... Thank you!

Gup

That’s what the CPP is....a recruitment tool for regional hiring purposes. UAL doesn’t need it for their own hiring.

Oh man, that's awful. I hope whatever tweaks they are making benefit those guys.

I’d be curious to know what is causing the failure rate to be so high. Is it guys failing the Hogan ? I can’t imagine that many are failing the interview process . We have one of the most laid back processes IMO.

A certain number don't get past the Hogan - that's no different than anyone getting an off-the-street invite.

A significant number aren't getting past the interview since they aren't treating it as the real deal, rather they think they just need to go through the motions so the box can get checked. Then, they wonder why they aren't accepted into the program.

CPP candidates need to to into the interview like it's a Tuesday or Wednesday.

CPP candidates need to go into the interview like it’s the biggest opportunity of their career. Because it is.

I think most is interview/ background review. Some people just show up unprepared some pass the interview and something in their employment file causes a snag. Allegedly sick calls is a big one, and maybe even issues from your training record.

Go to an AA regional with a flow. If you get hired here before you flow, great! But it’s awesome to have that flow in your back pocket in case he doesn’t get through a UAL interview (Cpp or not). My 2C.

It always amazed me how some guys didn’t prep at all for the interview and felt they were owed the job......

I’m amazed how they seem genuinely shocked when they don’t get a job offer and then complain. The CPP just allows them to go through the interview process. It isn’t like they’re already working for United and simply going through a formality to come off of C-scale pay rates. Oh well. That just frees up a slot for someone with a better attitude.

Pretty much what I meant. Street invites are interviewed on Tuesdays and Wednesdays while CPP candidates are interviewed on Thursdays (generally). I've heard that the interview board doesn't look forward to Thursdays largely due to the difference in attitude by many of those being interviewed.

It can be said over and over, treat a CPP opportunity like the golden ticket that it is and not a gimme - but too many in that pipeline don't heed the advice and then harp about how they didn't get selected, blah blah blah.

And under the previous manager of pilot selection, A LOT of great/dedicated/well prepped/great attitude candidates came through and were being shot down, just because...

As mentioned elsewhere, many simply found employment rather easily at other places.

Sure, there were some idiots that fell into the “wouldn’t have been interviewed otherwise”. The point still stands.

And naturally, some of those that fell into the “wouldn’t have been interviewed otherwise” WERE hired. Some of the most avoided pilots, substandard training records, etc.

United regional pilots have a bad attitude because of how United runs the regional airlines. Have you witnessed how Commutair and Mesa pilots dress and conduct themselves in public? It reflects horribly on United. United regionals will never attract top quality pilots like American wholly-owned regionals that offer a direct flow. C5 crashed an airplane last winter because United does not care about safety or the quality of pilots their regional partners are hiring.

There have been plenty of guys/gals that have been well prepared, good attitudes that didn't make it through. There will always be a small minority anywhere u go that will make the majority look bad. btw the CPP has been stopped from what I heard, not a single hogan has gone out since 2018, so it's dead in it's tracks. So, who knows what the future plans will be.

Stopped at ALL CCP carriers?

Stopped all CPP that’s news to me . I would’ve thought that would have gotten out in 7 ish months

Not sure where intel came from? Just today I ran into an ex coworker who just passed his CPP interview....

That is at XJT... there has not been 1 Hogan that went out in 2019. I don't know about CommutAir or the others. There is about 60 left in the pool, so from what I hear they are going to drain out the pool there.

Oh barf.

I spent a few years, well over a decade actually toiling as a commuter dog for American (Pre-merge) Piedmont (pre-merge) and then Usair. They all sucked. Any commuter dog with a bad attitude has likely earned it. The mainlines used regional feed to squash ALPA and for little else. Yes, it allowed them to suck up fares from cities like Kinston, Ithaca, Lynchburg, Moline, Baton Rouge, and Groton. But, feed was more of a cudgel than anything else. At least, that's how it looked to me. And after I took my eye off of that ball, it was shoved up my evac tube shortly after 911, just so I could reacquaint myself with reality and go back to being a commuter dog. Well, Foxtrot that.

Bad attitudes prevail because thousands of pilots who have spent a TON of money and time to get the quals are jammed into lousy spots, making lousy wages, with lousy support. And, they get treated like a big bag of offal! I cannot imagine that there is any real difference at any of them. You're there to build time and they know it. That will be used against you.

You pay a guy slave wages to fly a multi-million RJ a ton of hours over the course of a year and you think he's going to show up GQ spiffy every day? You're delusional. We used to have rolling mandatory junior man... they'd nail you at the end of a trip to fly tomorrow on your day off, your vacation even. Well, what attitude shall I bring to work on my vacation? Shall I press my slacks? I'm not talking once or twice annually, try most of the summer at the least. WHY should they care about how it reflects on U? They don't work for U. They work for peanuts.

Top-quality costs money. And money flows uphill in this industry, not down.

It's not surprising to see regional airlines growing into larger and larger aircraft, the goal of mainline management. Wait for the next major airline bankruptcy. Regionals will be flying 737s and A320s.

IMO, you're right.

Commuter aircraft 30 years ago were Piper Chieftans, Metroliners, Beech 99s, Shorts SDs, Twin Otters, etc.

Small mainline AC then, BAC 111 with 80 seats. DC9 with 80+, F28 with 50-60 seats.

Now? RJs have 70-90 seats. The pressure is still there. They play the long game and when the economy enters the next recession they'll try and take another bite at the apple.

Agreed. When a future big financial crisis hits the industry someone will end up relaxing scope as a concession and the race to compete with the new sense of normal will begin. If history only repeated itself, we could learn from the past and not keep making the same mistakes.

The response to any asking of scope concessions needs to be this:

If outsourcing more flying truly lowers costs this drastically, why stop at X amount of seats? Why not 100 seats? Why not 200 seats? Why not just outsource all domestic lift to the lowest-bidding regional, all international long-haul lift to the lowest-bidding Star Alliance/OneWorld/SkyTeam carrier, all of who’s contracts become exportable every 5 years. Explain to me why not.

That’s bad for all of us....but more so for the ones flying them for C-scale.

As somebody stuck at the stepping stone for well over a decade.....I’ll never vote for scope relief. Ever.

I personally think you are correct.
“They” only wish to sell tickets and spend as little as possible providing the product. If they could figure out how, they would have zero pilots ( and probably any other employees for that matter). All the planes would be flown by “Pilots R Us” temp staffing. No fuss, minimal cost, no long term liabilities, no insurance, etc.
Wall Street would reward them handsomely. The CEO who figured out how to do it would get his picture on the cover of Time. Or at least Forbes or The National Review.

Ding ding ding. We have a winner. Ever wonder why UAL had subbed out the flying to Aerlingus out of Dulles? The ultimate goal was to lower the cost of a pilot (ie pilot labor costs) across trans-atlantic routes. If they can get pilots to fly for shamrocks across the pond then they can lower the price of pilots, and therefore lower their networth, and therefore reduce their bargaining power. The two main costs of an airline are labor and fuel. They want to manage, lower, and predict their large costs to the extent possible. If airline X lowers labor costs across specific routes then airlines Y and Z will face pressure to do so as well.

One of the big reasons for the UAL-CAL merger was to abrogate scope of CAL pilots. UAL assumed the Aerlingus wetlease program would continue and hoped that it would expand. IMHO, the negotiators did a good job at holding the line there and good on them for giving the Aerlingus pilots the boot off of our metal.

True Dat!

Lots of dudes and dudets paid some serious dues at the minors waiting to be called up to the majors. The farm leagues that provide real-time service for the major airlines need to be shown a little love. The carrot and stick (mostly stick) of the 90's and the post 9-11 era isn't understood by management. It's not properly understood and to make my point, I introduced Oscar to my FO one day. I said, have you met "Bob"? He's 43 years old and has spent 17 years at the regionals. If we can't provide a reasonable return on Bob's investment into his career then how can we expect Bob to have any love and loyalty to UAL? Any more than 4 years at a commuter is cruel and unusual punishment and should go down as unnecessary pain and suffering.

Oscar didn't get it. Oscar... This dude is 2 years younger than me, and I've been a Captain here for over 10 years. Hello.... You can't complain about a so-called pilot shortage when you're doing everything possible to de-incentivize the profession and the career path.

As a regional captain I had Oscar on board once and after being contacted by my companies dispatch and the base administrator at the departure city explaining the importance of our performance for that flight, I still couldn't explain to my crew what we would do differently from what we had done on the four prior legs