Gulfstream First Officer Program

[bobbysamd]

As always, I cannot resist a P-F-T discussion

Someone above used the cutting-in-line analogy. Thank you. I'm glad that I'm not the only one who thinks that way.

Part of the P-F-T problem is that people are in so much of a hurry. They cannot wait, or they don't want to wait. Some of these people are older and perhaps envision an age discrimination problem. So, they hurry!!

What makes older career changers any more privileged or deserving than a 21-year-old starting his/her career? Nothing. I was older. All I ever wanted was to be treated the same as others. That's all anyone wants, really. Male or female, younger or older.

I was 37 years old when I landed my first full-time flying job. It was instructing, at ERAU. It promised the opportunity to build experience and hours. I did so in about 1½ years. In my case, I had about 1100 hours but was extremely light on multi. I built about 580 hours to 630 of multi during that time and still had plenty of single-engine students.

I was not the only somewhat-older career changer at ERAU. We had another instructor who was a couple of years younger than me. He earned a degree at Riddle and got on with Bar Harbor about a year after I was hired. Now, this person may be flying for big Continental.

I will write again that I could have P-F-T'd. Around 1992, about the only way to get a regional airline job was to P-F-T. I was still a relative newcomer to professional aviation. All the ethical considerations aside, common sense and experience told me that you do not pay an employer for a job. P-F-T sounded like a scam to me. It still does - in more ways than one.

As far as I'm concerned, there is never an excuse to P-F-T. Especially being older. It's okay for me to talk about "older"; I'm 52 now.

Good luck with your decision.

 

[bobbysamd]

DAY ONE GROUND SCHOOL...

Ladies and Gentlemen, thank you for contributing to the Gulfstream Bottom Line. Our goal, as always, is to take a position in which most airlines have to pay a professional to work and sell it to you, thereby removing one paid employee per flight. Your generous contribution has allowed us to continue in this manner.

In today's class we're going to start with check lists. Please memorize the following and we'll test it out tomorrow when you take your first revenue flight in the vaunted Beech 1900.

Flaps Up - RESPOND WITH "Flaps UP"

Gear Up - RESPOND WITH "Gear UP"

Shut Up - NO RESPONSE NECESSARY

And that concludes your training. Good luck on the line. And, ahhh, ohh, please remember, as your flight time nears 230 hours to renew your contract for uninterrupted flight time. I've got bank routing numbers if you need them. Thanks, my name is Tom and if you would please fill out your Ground School Evaluation forms and deposit them in the slot at the door.

Very funny post!!

 

[SpocksBeard]

thats freaking hilarious!!

 

[SRMairlines]

My Advice:

You are taking the easy way out. I don't think what you do in the short term will matter, but it will cost you $$$$$$$$ in the long term. Airline hiring isn't happening and you will only support an airline that craves the most out of one of it'sworkers..... AN EMPLOYEE WHO IS WILLING TO PAY HIS/HER OWN MONEY TO WORK AT AN AIRLINE...

PEACE... But make better decisions than your peers

 

[d.fitz]

just a thought here....

What would all of you people who hate PFT say if he said he was spending $25,000 to rent a multi-engine airplane and fly around the country for 250 hours. Its exactly the same thing - he is supporting a flight school and paying to get a job.

I DEFINITELY think pilot pay sucks and would like to offer a good idea to help improve it (if I had one) - but I dont think Gulfstream really is the reason (or even a contributing factor) in why regional pilots get paid so little. These places exist because they can - they are making money at it...

Maybe one factor is regional airlines being limited by scope. Lets face it - a regional jet can handle every line in this country and do it cheaper on alot of the shorter runs - so scope by its existence - helps and hurts (in terms of competition).

That in combination with supply and demand - and the fact that pilots will accept these jobs at such a low pay. If no one took the job they would have to raise wages. This certainly happens in the aerospace industry when they need engineers - a few years back no one wanted to move to Wichita, KS - so the pay went through the roof to entice people here.

Not trying to start an argument - just offering a viewpoint.

What do you think?

 

[T-Gates]

Ahhh, this thread hath sufaced............

I wonder if some of those guys are furloughed now and cant get jobs at places like pinnacle b/c PFTers have there slots?

Why don't you ask the 5 furloughed NW Mainline guys in my class at PCL. How many of those furloughed guys are you talking about are willing to give up thier seniroity at a major to make 1st year F/O pay at Pinnacle?

And your comments about the Senior Capt vs. 1200 hr. CFI are well taken. You are right, when my family friends told me thier opinions they were telling me to go PFT because it didn't affect thier position one bit. While my friends who were CFI's were guding me towards the traditional route of CFI'ing because they were paying thier dues in the right seat of a 172, and didn't want someone to cut them off. Very understandable. In hind sight, mabye I would have done differently. But I will never look back and worry about the fact I PFT'ed. If someone confronts me about it I just hope they are professional enough to discuss it without becoming confrontational.

--03M

 

[KingAirer]

Nicely Put. But, My point about the furloughees is that some of the folks that would be getting the job at Pinnacle, for example, are not able to b/c of pfters.

I agree with you that, what is done is done and you cant change anything. I am glad that you see who you did and did not effect. I would just like to educate those who are considering it about the pros and cons of it all. Thanks for your input.

 

[bobbysamd]

Renting v. P-F-T

What would all of you people who hate PFT say if he said he was spending $25,000 to rent a multi-engine airplane and fly around the country for 250 hours . . . . .

I would call it foolish. Anyone can buy flight time. The hours might be in the logbook and be legit, but because they were purchased the experience would be seen as less valuable thatn building it via employment. The more cynical would see this flight time purchase as another way of trying to cut in line.

$25K is enough to live on for a year for many people. Keep that thought in mind.

ut I dont think Gulfstream really is the reason (or even a contributing factor) in why regional pilots get paid so little. These places exist because they can - they are making money at it...

(emphasis added)

And that is the root cause of P-F-T. The places that peddle it are the root cause of the problem. Obviously, you can't snuff them. What you can to is to urge those who hear the P-F-T lorelei to resist it.

 

[airbaker]

Well as someone who was around during the first downturn of the 90's and is now intimately familiar with the this downturn (ie furloughed from AA) I'd like to chime in on PFT'ing. Don't do it.

It reared it's ugly head in the early to mid ninties (thousand were on furlough then too), and it's sure to make a comeback. Just an FYI, Pilot877 said:

"Just a thought: PFT as a practice is a bad thing. Back in the early 90's, PFT was probably the only way to get a job at a regional airline. Thank God and good pilot groups that it does not exist anymore. I do, however, consider that the pilot who PFT'd at a regional in the '90's went on to make full pay for his/her position and was able to move up the ranks to captain.
To me, there is a huge difference between that and the GIA student who paid a lot more $$ for a 250 hr program that left them out on the street and only made $8 an hour as a First Officer."

I just wanted to comment on that statement. It was wrong to PFT then just as it's wrong to PFT now. It doesn't matter that a particular pilot "went on to make make full pay for his/her position"... There were jobs in the mid ninties that didn't require you to PFT. Off the top of my head it was Skywest, Eagle, Horizon, West Air, Trans States, Allegeney, and maybe a few others. Not all of them were hiring, but it wasn't impossible to not have to PFT. All you had to do was work a little harder. I know I "paid my dues" CFI'ing and flying single pilot freight for over 4 years just to get the hours to be competitive at a non-PFT airline.

Those of us that didn't PFT during that era will always remember. Hell, we're probably all furloughed because we weren't able to take the shortcut; I guarantee you though that if any of us makes it on a hiring board you'll get a veto.


So my final advice would be to gain some real experience before you PFT; you'll never have to question that.

Signed,

A proud CFI, Freight-Dog, non-PFT'ing Commuter puke, and now Furloughee

 

[Pilot877]

Thanks for the insight, I was under the impression that all of the airlines ran things as PFT back then. Was it looked down upon at the time or was PFT just generally an accepted practice? There are a lot of pilots still here at ACA who had to pay for their training because that used to be the only way in. I'm sure it is the same way at Comair and a lot of other express carriers out there.


Pilot877
(former CFI- but once a charter bum, always a charter bum)