Oma4545

I chose the 737 when I started in December. I’ve not made it back to Denver yet and I don’t see the opportunity for me to do so anytime soon. On the vacancy, there are zero openings in Denver on either fleet. And they really are not letting people out of the coasts at all for any of the interior bases. I would pick the type of flying you want to do, expect to commute for some time and be pleasantly surprised if you don’t have to do it.

RNO Flyer

Anybody heard anything yet for placement in one of the April classes?

hummingbear

I don’t know how long you’ve been here but this vacancy and possibly the next 1 or 2 are just cleaning up the staffing levels for summer ‘22. That makes them kind of underwhelming, but it’s cyclical & happens like this most years- spring/summer is busy for flying & quiet for bidding. Starting probably around late summer to fall you’ll start seeing big bids again with CA & widebody options that create lots of downstream vacancies. Unless the company changes their growth strategy, they’ll need a lot of upgrades & NB FO seats are going to be open across the system. The 737 is the primary growth airframe, so I think your bidding strategy is strong, even if you did hit it during a bit of a lull.

Dave Fitzgerald

Uhh....yeah, no.

threeighteen

Man you really don't know your history?

United went bankrupt in 2002. Regionals were flying long long before then. They just got more jets during bankruptcy.

Dave Fitzgerald

You misunderstand....uhhh, no, it was not before my time. You assume much.

threeighteen

Well, you've been out here saying a lot of incorrect stuff like ALPA didn't agree to a contract out of bankruptcy that allowed non seniority-list pilots to fly United-branded flights and that millennials were toddlers during 9/11 despite that being impossible. So naturally I assumed you were hired post bankruptcy since you thought the regionals came about from a bankruptcy instead of an agreement ALPA made with management while not under duress.

nene

Pilots are very myopic in their view of regional airlines. There are a lot of benefits to the major about having a regional/mainline relationship. Generally everyone at a regional from the ramper, bag thrower, gate agent, thru mgmt is paid less than a major would pay. It allows the company to maneuver quickly as the regionals are just contractors so opening/closing bases isn't much of a problem for mainline when it only effects regional employees. The regionals have a lot of turnover in many of their jobs so that keeps the costs down as well and allows future mainline employees to be trained and then when they come to mainline they start at year one.
Just pointing out some of the myriad of benefits the company sees by having contractors service the RJ fleet. Trying to negotiate that away at this point would be costly.

nene

Regionals were more an inadvertent happening when the majors moved on to the jet age. Focused on the Jets, many little airlines would start up to serve small towns to bring them into the hubs with cost effective props. Eventually the mainline carriers wanted more control to coordinate so they began buying up the regionals and rebranding them as express/connection carriers. Then came the invent of the RJ and people wanted a quicker, smoother experience to get from College Station to Dallas, so the regionals largely switched from props to small jets.

Then ALPA took notice and the debate began, LONG AGO, do we move to try and force them into the majors, or keep them separate. There were lawsuits, threats, scope negotiations, mergers, BK's etc. Nothing happened overnight with one grand bargain.

I know it's hard to believe, but it was once so hard to get started as a commercial pilot, there were pilots who would sign for training bonds at their RJ companies that had to be paid back if they left. There were even instances where pilots paid to get trained for a job up front. There were RJ pilots who could qualify for food stamps even though working full time. When there is more labor than work, things can get ugly pretty quick.

The world didn't start yesterday, and it won't end tomorrow. Best we can do now is make it better for those who follow and preserve the quality of the job as much as possible.

Without cabotage laws, the US airline industry would have gone to cr%p long ago as every airline in the world would love to have a piece of the US domestic market and our companies would be more than obliged to help them.

BirdOn

After getting the CJO they send you an application to fill out which I'm assuming is for the background check, at the end is a Becoming United video and another online assessment, is that normal?