Airtran Lifestyle

[miaboeingcapt]

Couple of questions for some Airtran guys: What is a new hires pay during training? What is expected upgrade time currently? How long does a new hire spend on reserve? Are lines commutable? What is a typical line? Thanks in advance for any information!

 

[Fly-By-Cable]

New hires get 70 hours a month at 35.50 which goes to 37.50 on April 1. You get paid starting the first day of class. Since training is in base (ATL) you don't get hotel or per diem, unless your sim is in MIA or something, then it's 1.75
Expect to spend at least 4 month in training waiting on IOE.
Reserve...hard to say. They can't train crews fast enough for 717, so might be a month or so. DC9 reserve is about 5 month and will probably not get better as 14 of them are parked this year leaving only 16 on property.
As far as upgrade..DC9 upgrade went 8 month and 717 9 month in Feb., but I don't think company allowed that. I'm not sure how they handled it but there were no upgrades posted for March. Contract allows the company to bypass upgrades at their discrcion before 2 years of service. There were a lot of high time people, typed in heavy equipment hired here after 9/11 so I would expect upgrade to go very junior, but mainlly to those folks.
Line's differ. Many people commute. So it can be done.
Last month 717 lines had from 12 to 16 days off, and pay credit was from 75 to 100 hours with average of about 87. The pay credit is almost always higher than scheduled flight time, thanks to duty and trip rigs.
Over all AirTran is a good place to work for, especially in today's difficult times for the industry. And from what I hear from old timers things improved a lot here and are impoving dally.

 

[Ty Webb]

As a recent newhire (post 9/11) I might be able to offer some recent changes to an otherwise excellent post-

The training time has come down quite a bit since they have added a lot of Check Airmen in the last couple of months. My training was almost exactly 90 days from start of Indoc to completion of IOE. Getting 20 new B717 in 2002 and retiring 14 DC for a net gain of 6 airplanes or 10% fleet increase. The 717 has more seats, so that will create some changes in the numbers.

I was also able to bid and hold a "build-up" line the first month after IOE (B717), and that line had no reserve, was four day trips, no standups. Life is good!

From what I have seen so far, there are a lot of great people here. My class had a lot of Midway guys, and guys with mucho 121 Boeing and McDouglas time. I believe that has come down somewhat in the past few months, but they do have over 5000 resumes on file . . . .

Hiring was allegedly slowing for the rest of Q1 due to heavy hiring in Jan and Feb but was supposed to continue beginning in April with approx 250 more to be hired by years' end, for a total of 1000.

The way to get an interview right now is to have an AirTran pilot run in your stuff with their employee number on it- that is the stack they are working out of.

I have really been enjoying it- most of the people I have flown with so far have been both fun and professional. We have a few jerks, but probably no more or less than anywhere else. I have not heard too much bitching in the cockpit- most people seem pretty happy.