Seniority Question

Jshutt64

Well-Known Member
Hey guys, I had a quick question on seniority and payscale.

I know that captains and FO's have payscales dependent on how many years they've been with the company. My question is this...if a 5th year FO has been promoted to captain, is he a 5th year captain or a 1st year captain?

Thanks. :)
 
Hey guys, I had a quick question on seniority and payscale.

I know that captains and FO's have payscales dependent on how many years they've been with the company. My question is this...if a 5th year FO has been promoted to captain, is he a 5th year captain or a 1st year captain?

Thanks. :)

He'd be 5th year Captain pay...
 
It depends on the pilot contract.

Virtually most places (just about all), you are a 5th year captain, but there are a few places where you become a 1st year captain. (I don't remember any specific instances at this particular moment.)
 
It depends on the pilot contract.

Virtually most places (just about all), you are a 5th year captain, but there are a few places where you become a 1st year captain. (I don't remember any specific instances at this particular moment.)

I hope top FO pay is less than 1st year captain pay at those places, otherwise you could take a pay cut for upgrading!
 
I hope top FO pay is less than 1st year captain pay at those places, otherwise you could take a pay cut for upgrading!

You take a pay cut for upgrading to a Major FO slot from a Regional captain slot, but it is wroth it.
 
Also for some reason people seem to confuse seniority with longevity.

Pay scales are based off of you longevity, while "awards" like vacation, schedule and vacancies, are awarded by seniority. Seniority is pretty much where you stand amongst your fellow pilots.
 
It depends on the pilot contract.

Virtually most places (just about all), you are a 5th year captain, but there are a few places where you become a 1st year captain. (I don't remember any specific instances at this particular moment.)



Virgin America off the top of my head.
 
I have a question i would like to piggy back on thsi one...

I was looking at a company like ASA

They fly crj-200, 700, and 900

The pay rate is different between the 200 and the 700/900

When you are an FO, does the "promotion road" go like this:

FO 200 then FO 700/900 then Captain 200 then Captain 700/900

or is it FO 200 then Captain 200 then you move on to the bigger plane??

Just curious
 
I don't work there, but assume it goes like most places, in that you can hold or have any vacancy that your sen. will let you hold. Therefore you could stay as a CRJ 200 fo at a base you liked, until you were senior enough to hold the 700/900 Captain spot.

Lots of people do this, as it makes the QOL better
 
I have a question i would like to piggy back on thsi one...

I was looking at a company like ASA

They fly crj-200, 700, and 900

The pay rate is different between the 200 and the 700/900

When you are an FO, does the "promotion road" go like this:

FO 200 then FO 700/900 then Captain 200 then Captain 700/900

or is it FO 200 then Captain 200 then you move on to the bigger plane??

Just curious

I don't work there, but assume it goes like most places, in that you can hold or have any vacancy that your sen. will let you hold. Therefore you could stay as a CRJ 200 fo at a base you liked, until you were senior enough to hold the 700/900 Captain spot.

Lots of people do this, as it makes the QOL better

:yeahthat:

If you can hold the new seat, you'll get it.

Heck, guys have been known to go from 7/900 FO to 200 FO due to the composition of trips.

But yes, there is no concrete set "promotion road" in Aviation, at least not at many companies.
 
I don't work there, but assume it goes like most places, in that you can hold or have any vacancy that your sen. will let you hold. Therefore you could stay as a CRJ 200 fo at a base you liked, until you were senior enough to hold the 700/900 Captain spot.

Lots of people do this, as it makes the QOL better

This. I could have bid straight into the -900 from -200 FO, and my sim partner did exactly that. However, I'd be commuting to about the same reserve schedule, flying less, but getting paid more. I chose the QoL over the pay. Although, if there's movement next year, I'll likely bid ATL CA since we're finally seriously looking into moving back to MCO. Depends on if the commute to ATL is gonna be easier than the commute to MEM. Seniority-wise, I'd be 7 from the bottom in either base.
 
I have a question i would like to piggy back on thsi one...

I was looking at a company like ASA

They fly crj-200, 700, and 900

The pay rate is different between the 200 and the 700/900

When you are an FO, does the "promotion road" go like this:

FO 200 then FO 700/900 then Captain 200 then Captain 700/900

or is it FO 200 then Captain 200 then you move on to the bigger plane??

Just curious

That also depends on the pilot contract in what is allowed and what is not and if there are equipment fences set up.

At one particular company - you can only get to a captain slot if you were an FO on the type or were a street hire into type, e.g. if you wanted to become a turboprop captain, you had to be a turboprop FO first or hired directly into the turboprop captain seat off the street. Even though there were several tens of turbojet FOs available and qualified to be a turboprop captain, the pilot contract did not allow those FOs to bid on any turboprop captain seats. The turbojet FOs: the CRJ FOs were only permitted to upgrade to CRJ CA and the ERJ FOs however were permitted to upgrade to ERJ CA or CRJ CA. Once you were a captain, you could move from turboprop CA to ERJ CA to CRJ CA, but not the other way. That's at one company.

At another company, FOs can move from turboprop FO to turbojet FO or to any CA seat (turboprop or turbojet) they can hold. But you can't go backward and you couldn't transfer turboprop to turboprop (Saab to ATR and vice versa) or turbojet to turbojet (ERJ and CRJ). Once you upgraded you always moved up, turboprop to ERJ to CRJ, but you couldn't go back down.

It depends on what is allowed by the pilot contract at that particular company.
 
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