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fedex schedule

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yahoo

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Joined
Oct 11, 2004
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17
Just curious.....what is a typical schedule like at FedEX? With 2-3 years of seniority, how many days a month could a pilot expect to work? Is a typical month 3 tours totaling 14 days? 4 tours lasting 16 days? Any input would be greatly appreciated. Thanks
 
Here’s the generic answer, it varies…for a 4 week bid month, 13 days off minimum, 5 week bid month, 16 days off minimum. I would say the majority of trips are week on/week off, but you can do anything from a 2 week international trip, to a 3 day trip/3 day off sked, to either AM or PM out and backs. 2-3 years in, I got hired in spring 2001, got lucky and am now domiciled at LAX, so I’m sitting at home wasting my time in the internet, and getting paid for it. A buddy of mine got hired in Jan 2002, he’s an engineer in the Boeing, lives in NYC, and all he basically does is hold hotel standby at EWR, with deadheads at both ends. In the LAX bid pack for Jan, the max days off for the 5 week period is 19, and all reserve lines get the minimum days off. Get on now, looks like you’d be ahead of the hiring wave, and that all important seniority, good luck!
 
yahoo said:
Just curious.....what is a typical schedule like at FedEX? With 2-3 years of seniority, how many days a month could a pilot expect to work? Is a typical month 3 tours totaling 14 days? 4 tours lasting 16 days? Any input would be greatly appreciated. Thanks
The weekly question appears again.

To many variables to answer your question. 28 day schedule...typically 14on/14off, a 35 day schedule...18on/17off. Most schedule are built week on week off.

Try doing a search from the many other posts asking the same question.
 
FedEx 727 schedules

In the Boeing 727 there are several different “typical” pairings. Movement has been pretty slow the last 3 years. I was hired in the summer of 02 and was on reserve for the first 2 years in the FE seat of the 727. Got my first non reserve line in Nov 04.

I could have held the back of the DC-10 or the right seat of the 727 in the last bid but would have been very, very junior in either seat so I passed. After 2 and a half years on the bottom I would like to see what it is like to hold a line for a while before I go back to the bottom of the next list. Some Sep/Oct new hires bid and held the back of the DC-10 before they finished training, so things are moving again a little more quickly now than they have the past 2 and a half years.

Bid months begin on a Mon and run for 4 or 5 weeks and end on a Sunday. Bid months are either 28 or 35 days long. Usually there are eight 4 week bid months and four 5 week bid months per year. Min line guarantee for 4 week month is 68 credit hours and 85 credit hours for a 5 week bid month. Reserve lines pay 96% of the average line guarantee. 15 days on reserve and 13 off for 4 week bid month and 19 reserve days on and 16 days off for 5 week bid month.


In general, here are some of the typical pairings at FedEx. DH equals deadhead on passenger carrier.


Majority of pairings: Week on, week off hub turn lines. DH MEM to outstation city on Mon morning. Hotel. Depart 9-10 pm. Fly 1 or 2 legs to hub (MEM, IND, OAK, AFW, EWR), arriving between 10 and midnight. Sit for sort. Sleep rooms and recliners available at hubs, but the sleep rooms go fast. Depart back to outstation from 2-4 am. Get back to hotel between 6-7 am. Sleep. Repeat each night until Sat morning, then either layover and sleep or DH back to MEM (or home). Seniority depends on the number and length of legs and the outstation city. Commuters best friend if you live in the outstation city. Pays 35-40 hours per week.


Out and Backs (O/B):

AM: Depart MEM from 2 – 4 am, fly 1 or 2 legs to outstation. Fairly quick turn around and back to MEM by 7-9 am. 5-8 hours on duty, pays 6 hours per trip. Fly 3 or 4 days per week, mostly week days. Goes fairly junior among line holders, depending on the city pairing and the number of legs.

PM: Depart MEM 2-5 pm. Fly 1 or 2 legs to outstation. Sit in ramp office or hotel if over 4 hours, waiting for the incoming freight. Fly back to MEM at about 9-10 pm, arriving between 11:30 pm and 1 am. Fly it 3 or 4 times per week. 10 to 12 hours on duty, pays 6 hours per trip. Go pretty senior depending on number of legs and destination city. Memphis folks best friend.


Day turns. DH to outstation or hub on Sun. Depart hub to outstation around 7- 8 am. Sit in other city for 5 or 6 hours. Fly back to hub or outstation city. Fly each day of the week, then DH back to MEM. Week on, week off. These go out of several cities and several hubs, although there are not that many of them. Tend to go VERY senior. Pay about 34-40 hours per week.

Hotel/Airport Standbys: Week on, week off. DH to hub city other than MEM on Sun. Stand hotel standby for 12 hours or airport standby for 5 hours Mon through Fri or Sat, then DH back to MEM. Go VERY, VERY senior. Pay about 35-40 hours for possibly zero block time.

Various weekend layover, west coast 2 or 3 day trips, and fill in trips usually make up some of the other lines out there. There are also “trash” lines that go fairly junior among line holders that have very little city stability and often flip between day and night flying.

Finally, Reserve lines. 3 types. RSV, A and B.

RSV is on call 24/7 but requires 24 hour notice for trip assignment. Same number of days per month as A and B reserve. Goes fairly senior due to commuter-friendly aspect of the 24 hour notice.

B reserve: on call from noon to midnight. 1.5 hour callout (min of 1 hour if given late call parking right next to Ops). Often assigned trips up to a day ahead of time, usually by 10 am that day, sometimes just an hour before. Can also be assigned airport standby at MEM on reserve days. Folks who live in Memphis sometimes prefer B reserve over junky lines.

A reserve: on call from midnight to noon, otherwise the same as B. Pretty much the most junior lines in the bid pack. Sometimes assigned trips a day ahead of time, sometimes just an hour or two notice.

Some reserve lines have all the days bunched together (commuter friendly) and some break them up into 4 to 7 day bunches. There is a little bit of everything, even SIBA reserve lines (see SIBA below).

So there you have it. It is very difficult to define a standard line at FedEx, there really is no such thing, but these are the types of typical lines. The most common is the week on week off hub turn type line. There is also SIBA, which in the 72 is special flying to South America, but there are only about 9 or 10 lines of that out of 225 or so regular lines.

I think most of the widebody aircraft have similar trips to these, with maybe longer and fewer legs typically to larger cities (more freight). They of course have more international pairings that I know nothing about, except that everybody says the catering and the layovers are killer (in a good way) and that the long trips can be killer (in a bad way) on the body clock. Other domiciles for the widebody aircraft include Subic Bay, ANC and LAX. SIBA in the Airbus is in Europe. I don’t know much at all about the trips they fly out of those domiciles.

Hope some of this info helps. Other FedEx folks feel free to jump in if I goobered anything up.


FJ
 

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