they are, but they really are designed for line holders. Most of the carriers only offer a handful of rooms per month. My employer gives us four. Is that enough for a reserve? Probably not, depending on how busy the reserves are.
Not sure about your employer, but while my company also gives 4 per month, the rule is they can only be used the night before a block of reserve days or the night after, but not for nights between consecutive reserve days. So they aren't very useful at all for reservists.
You'd think after hanging around here for 10+ years I'd know the answer to this one, but I'm kind of fuzzy on the details.
I know that commuting to reserve is a special kind of hell and should be avoided like the plague, but lets say you have to anyway.
Do you guys pay for crash pads out of pocket? Does the airline help with any of that cost? Do you get a hotel instead - do you guys get huge discounts on hotel rooms as flight crew? Just curious. I know there's a difference between long call (6 hours? 12 hours?) and short call (one hour?) and I do wonder what kind of difference that makes....
Crash pads or hotels and other commuting expenses are paid out of pocket. As mentioned some hotels do have crew rates. However hotels tend to fill up fast, especially if there is a weather event or a lot of delays and cancellations, so you can't always count on being able to find a room. In my base (EWR), crash pads generally start at $250/ month. Commuting to reserve is unpleasant enough I moved here to avoid it; and even though the EWR area is insanely expensive a crash pad would have eaten up much of the cost of living difference with Wisconsin.
My understanding Long call is usually at least a 10-hour callout (at some companies it might be more per the contract), so you get the 10 hours minimum rest required by 14 CFR part 117 after notification and before reporting. However my company doesn't use it, so I'm not too familiar with long call reserve.
At my company, short call reserve is a 2-hour callout, but that is rarely used as well.
Another type of reserve is Airport Standby Reserve, which is what my employer uses the vast majority of the time. This requires you to be present at the airport for the entire reserve shift (usually 8 hours at my company) and to be at the plane within 20 minutes if called. However we have some of the worst reserve rules in the industry; my understanding is many airlines don't use it at all.
My company is usually understaffed and most reservists are quite busy, and so spend a fair number of nights at an outstation. As a result I know a number of pilots here have avoided getting a crashpad and just get hotel rooms or sleep in the crew room if they are stuck in base for the night.
Maybe I'm just not seeing it but... Why is commuting to reserve any different than commuting to, say, a 4 day? I did both when I was new and they felt pretty much the same to me...?
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Probably because with commuting to a 4-day, you'd most likely be in outstations each night with a hotel room. Also there's the issue that you usually don't get as many days off each month when on reserve.