"They treat you well if you do your job."
I know everyone has a different idea of what being treated well is, but I fly with a lot of guys who would disagree with this sentence. Myself, I've personally been treated well a few times and have gotten screwed a few times, in "abnormal" situations. Most of the time, you just do your job and go home.
I haven't seen a 4 on, 10 off, schedule since I left the 727 but those were very senior and very few....and as they continue to park the 727's, it will get worse. That's why I left. I'm an ONT guy now and we don't have lines like that. There are a few 5 on, 9 off, clean lines but they go like this: YVR-BFI-RFD, sit for three hours, IAH. Talk about a killer...those go pretty junior, though they are clean lines. There are a few other clean 5 on, 9 off, lines in ONT but they go way senior. It's much more common for lines to have one or two, very short, stuffer trips, in an otherwise clean week on, week off, line. Day flying out of the west coast can be had but the show times are often very early....like 0530ish. I'd rather fly all night then get up that early....but that's just me. In general, there are a lot of 4 day on, 3 day off, lines that work you three weeks out of the month with one week off. Personally, I don't think these are safe lines as you flip flop too much....but it's in the contract.
My Capt talked to an Airborne crew the other day in Spokane. Seems they do a ball buster but then get 24 hours off to rest up before doing it again. We do a BFI-ONT (sit three hours) BFI (sit two hours if SDF is late) GEG and then go right back out after a 10.5 hour layover. Had the next night been a long one, I would have called in fatigue. It was scheduled to be one short leg but the company always says you gotta be ready to go all night when you show....never know what's gonna happen.
I'm lucky to be very senior in my seat and have bypassed the Capt upgrade for a long time. Good schedules mean more to me than money. I'm able to avoid most of the bad lines and can fly out of my home town. All in all, I'd rather be at UPS than anywhere else and it's a great job.
"But this is UPS and getting by on as little as possible is their motto".
That pretty much sums it up. There is good and bad in that. The good is they are making money hand over fist, and always have. The bad is that they push the limits (and beyond) of our contract to squeeze out every last drop of productivity. Hopefully, our next contract will force them to build more humane schedules.