Hello. I am an ASA dispatcher and will give you some info. First, ASA will be hiring, and hiring a significant amount for us over two classes in the next few months, with the first hiring round opening any day now. 14 new dispatchers is officially on the budget. Since i’ve been here (covid) there hasn’t been hiring in almost two years…so I am of course very excited. Also, i’ve been told that ASA is not going to just fill all the slots with QX people, and that there is actually a percentage cap on the amount of dispatchers from there that will get the job.
I am a newer dispatcher here, and I have heard stories of the VX / AS tension, but that has been gone since i’ve been here. It seems it was all contractual grievances that have since been rectified.
What Affirm said about being hourly is absolutely true. We work 4 on 4 off 10 hour shifts, so we lose out on a good chunk of pay only working 1820 hours a year. In actuality we work 9.5 hours as the last 30 minutes is our “break” or “lunch” dispatchers notoriously don’t get.
Pay scale keeps changing and even i’ve lost track of what it is nowadays, but it’s roughly 40-75 dollars per hour base pay. Overtime has been rather plentiful, and you get paid for several different things including shift differential, being State of Alaska qualified, etc. We voted to extend our contract during covid, so there’s no new contract yet being discussed.
The shifts are pretty damn good. There is a black out on shifts starting after 9pm, and ending at 5am - so there’s no absolutely awful midnight or 1am or 2am starts that I have been subject to in my past lives. I’ve got a better shift now than I did at my last LCC after being halfway up the seniority list.
HQ is located right next to Seatac in a brand new office that was just recently finished this year. You can see the south end of the runways / airport from our floor which is kind of neat.
