MESABA guys @ Cityjet

[Flyingdutchman]

At Colgans HQ

 

[GidgetDog]

You must have a poor marriage to WISH that it was over with, so you could do a "better" thing, such as flying a short contract for an airline in a different country.

That is like saying- "I wish I had no legs so I could be on the Special Olympics basketball team."

I hope your wife knows how you feel.

I wish I had no arms and legs so I could be second base at the world series

 

[SplitBar]

The chickens are coming home to roost. After years of silence, its all coming out now.
Whos going to be next out? Management claim that only a minority were looking elsewhere. Oops, got that one a bit wrong.
Seems that maybe something should change. But that would be to admit they screwed up, so looks like we’ll getting more of the same. The military geniuses in charge seem to think that if bullying works as a control method on the parade ground, itll work just as well with civilian pilots and cabin crew. But looks like the feckin civilians dont appreciate such good management and all the ungrateful feckers want to do is leave! Wonder why….

To those Americans and other prospective joiners who wonder what’s wrong, where to start?
Firstly management style is like George Bush, you’re either with us or against us. With us means you will happily see your life screwed up on a whim, will never ever ever complain, will pretend management mean it when they act all friendly. You will pretend cityjet is a great company with great prospects and that you have no interest in joining Aer Lingus or Easyjet (after all, who really wants to fly an Airbus?), that you never want to leave and that unions are a very bad thing and that management really care about you.
Failure to adhere to any of these traits means your against us and your life will be made hell.
You will also be treated like a child. For example, you are not allowed into the CDG ramp office on turnarounds and if you dare go in, you will be reported by the work-shy HR rep.
Rostering: You may be in command of a passenger jet airliner, but your life will in the command of an untrained 20year old who previously worked in Pennys. Cityjet is great if you like 6 and 7 day weeks followed by 2 days off. There is no pattern and no predictability, rosters are only published at the last minute, then will be changed regularly. There is no work practice agreement at all. Turnarounds are very long, so a 3 short sector day can take over 10 duty hours. If you do them a favour, you will never see a return for it. The company love to talk about “flexibility”. This means, in reality, that they have carte blanche to f**k you about as they see fit. You have no comeback except to go sick.
Leave: impossible to get (not enough pilots to give everyone leave). Allocated according to if youre liked or not.
The Chief Pilot: Hard to know whether to laugh or cry. Impossible to talk to (unless smart ass comments count as conversation). Likes to do things like fail pilots for removing their tie after push back on line checks. Also thinks that emergency checklist need not necessarily be followed in certain cases if its commercially better to continue. Health and safety: Cityjet is great if you’re on a diet, cos you wont be fed on board. Constant hunger is a companion. Mostly you’re parked on remote stands to getting food in the terminal is impossible. And bringing your own is not an option as by day 4 of a trip, its not going to be very hygienic. It is almost impossible to get food to eat on board downroute due to staying in airport hotels with no shops nearby. After a 10 hour duty day with no food, its not exactly very safe. Numerous reports have gone in, but the company claim every time they never heard about it before. The IAA of course say nothing. So everybody flies around tired, hungry and fatigued.
The aircraft: The aircraft are in a terrible state, all at least 20 years old, the MEL is needed on almost every sector. There is pressure to take very bad aircraft. How about no autopilot into Zurich on a bad winters night? Or across the Alps with only 1 pack? The contract engineers have been heard to say they wouldn’t put their families on the aircraft.
There is also fuel pressure which some people listen to. What kind of a company has the engineers flag that aircraft were regularly arriving in with very low fuel loads?
Training: You are not trained with knowledge, knowledge is beaten into you. The training philosophy is that you are either military (and therefore a total genius) or not (in which case you are totally unable to fly). The main method of correcting mistakes in training is being shouted at. In fact, there is no such thing as training, its actually an extended line check starting from day 1. Unless your military again, in which case an inability to pass line-training in under 100 sectors is not considered a handicap. Not surprising I suppose considering the head of training has difficulty with FL100 v FL110 and a senior training captain thinks landing in CDG with no FO and no call to ATC is good behaviour (both ex-military of course).
Command upgrade: No seniority here. Interviews are held, but in reality its pre-selected. Military is a decided advantage, no command checks required. How about an FO from other company, on another type, getting direct entry command with no command check and then getting a sim job within weeks? Guess what, hes buddies with the right people. On the other hand, many FO’s have been told by the chief pilot that they will never get command.
Pay: Very poor, people leave to go Ryanair to improve it!! The overnight allowance hasn’t increased in several years. The basic pay increase is less than inflation. Management call it a pay “agreement”, although not one pilot was ever consulted. We need IALPA NOW to fix the situation.

So why do they act like this? The answer is Sigmar aviation. The management of cityjet and sigmar are one and same. Guess who supplies the contract pilots? So permanent pilots leaving lowers the payroll and allows more contractors in, so more kick back for the bosses. And guess who owns the houses they live in? And why do DUB crews do so many overnights? Guess who takes a commission for booking all those hotel rooms?

 

[XJohXJ]

Yikes!

 

[Flyingdutchman]

nice copy past from pprune....

 

[SplitBar]

Your right. I do believe it is up on PPRune as well. Much more intel on that website for foreign airlines and contract jobs. I just posted it since somebody was looking for some insight towards flying at cityjet.