Air Canada Pay

[altiplano]

@schnitzel. Good for you that you think you're King of your hill, that's awesome, but put your dick back in your shorts because you're embarrassing yourself...

Your posts are full of wrong information and assumptions about other people.

I really like my career decisions too, I really like my job, I spend as much time home as I can, it's a lot, and I still easily crack well into the 200s. I have never worked Christmas at AC, not once, my job is secure, the pensions are absolutely protected by federal legislation and ours is grossly overfunded. I have good benefits, excellent disability, life insurance, sick days, AD&D, and more all paid for. I have choices in my career, where do I want to go, single day or multi-day, what layovers do I want, overseas or domestic, big plane or bigger plane, senior or junior, block or reserve.

Bottom line, I don't know if you're smoking something or just trying to pump yourself up by shitting on what is a damn good job, and one we're still working to make better. I'm not sitting on my hands and taking it for granted.

And these other comments are right on, anyone pointing at AC Pilots for not keeping up with the American Majors only has to read the government appointed arbitrator's decision to see why, we were explicily dragged back to Transat and Westjet wawcon in 2012 and we were forced major concessions out of a manufactured crisis. No question ACPA has made mistakes, some of them big, but despite all that we're still way out front of all the other airlines in this country... If you think those other contracts are needing to ride our coattails you better tell them to stop pulling back on them and start pushing.

[goingnowherefast]

I'm not putting my family through flat pay and a junior schedule. Until that's fixed, AC won't see my resume. If there's still a ton of applicants, that's great for AC management. I'm under no illusion that they will "fix" the schedule and pay, so I'll just stay where I am too.

Nowhere is perfect, but where I am is better than 5-10 years of junior garbage schedule at AC when my family needs me the most. I'd also be commuting for my entire career, so screw that.

If I was single I'd be all over AC. I can definitely see the appeal, but it isn't for me or my family.

[schnitzel2k3]

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[altiplano]

Pretty difficult to fix it all in one go...

A contract takes decades to build and develop, the 10 years leading up to 2012 saw ours set back significantly.

But in the last 5 years...

We got years of service on upgrades back on LOU74.
We got a real pension back for our new hires.
We got a 900 hour new hire guarantee.
Profit share proportioned to benefit the lower income earners.
We got full paid sick vs. 90%.
A bunch of other stuff too...

We've made imorovements, albeit not as many as I'd like, and not necessarily how I would have liked to achieve them, but we're pushing the right direction...

Guys like you come on here every month or two and point fingers and carry on about where we've come up short, like we don't know, like we aren't aware of where we got fucked, but this shit takes time...

What do you think you can call up a contract improvement like you can the next episode on a Netflix series?

[ShamrockPilot]

put your dick back in your shorts because you're embarrassing yourself...

Proceeds to take his dick out and embarrass himself by doing the exact same tooting of his own horn. The defender of the AC galaxy. “Hey at least we make more than the other Canadian pilot jobs”. Once you’re off the flat pay I guess its people not your problem anymore though, eh?

On the flip side.

Pretty difficult to fix it all in one go...

A contract takes decades to build and develop, the 10 years leading up to 2012 saw ours set back significantly.

But in the last 5 years...

We got years of service on upgrades back on LOU74.
We got a real pension back for our new hires.
We got a 900 hour new hire guarantee.
Profit share proportioned to benefit the lower income earners.
We got full paid sick vs. 90%.
A bunch of other stuff too...

We've made imorovements, albeit not as many as I'd like, and not necessarily how I would have liked to achieve them, but we're pushing the right direction...

Guys like you come on here every month or two and point fingers and carry on about where we've come up short, like we don't know, like we aren't aware of where we got fucked, but this shit takes time...

What do you think you can call up a contract improvement like you can the next episode on a Netflix series?

Valid points

[schnitzel2k3]

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[danield]

Wages need to increase everywhere else (WJ, SW, Swoop, Flair) for these numbers to ever have a chance at reaching industry standard.

*Deep Facepalm*

Is this the common belief at Air Canada? Why is the ONLY legacy carrier in Canada putting all the onus on the rest of the industry to set the bar???

You guys are apparently "the best", so prove it and stop apologizing for all your bull and dragging down the starting wages in the industry.

I never said we were "the best" I simply said where else in Canada can you fly an airplane for as much as you can at AC. 4 year flat pay is in fact the only thing about Air Canada's pay structure that is consistent with "industry standard" in Canada.

Trust me, the first thing an Arbitrator will look at is what other 767, A330 etc. pilots make in Canada. Not a good way to start by any means. Flat pay (and overall formula pay) needs to be addressed but very difficult to make any gains of significance when we would immediately lose in arbitration when compared to other Canadian airlines.

[schnitzel2k3]

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[danield]

*Deep Facepalm*

Is this the common belief at Air Canada? Why is the ONLY legacy carrier in Canada putting all the onus on the rest of the industry to set the bar???

You guys are apparently "the best", so prove it and stop apologizing for all your bull and dragging down the starting wages in the industry.

I never said we were "the best" I simply said where else in Canada can you fly an airplane for as much as you can at AC. 4 year flat pay is in fact the only thing about Air Canada's pay structure that is consistent with "industry standard" in Canada.

Trust me, the first thing an Arbitrator will look at is what other 767, A330 etc. pilots make in Canada. Not a good way to start by any means. Flat pay (and overall formula pay) needs to be addressed but very difficult to make any gains of significance when we would immediately lose in arbitration when compared to other Canadian airlines.

You guys have perfectly normal payscales for all the jets after year 4. I'm not asking you to jam a massive across the board increase. It's really simple, 1 year of "training pay" like most US airlines that is close to the smallest narrowbody you have, then onto regular type pay. Please....stop....blaming...everyone else. That time has past. You guys are now at record historical growth and profits. Starting pay needs to be addressed. Period.

Again, I never said it was right. Flat pay is an abomination. But.... again... Compare it to WJ, AT, SW, and every other airlines in Canada new hire pay it is pretty hard to convince an arbitrator to rule in our favor. I agree, 1 year 90k flat pay should be it but hey I'm not in charge. Trust me if I had it my way every pilot in Canada would make much more but that is simply not the reality.

[schnitzel2k3]

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[altiplano]

Excuses for the arbitrator? The last arbitrator had all the excuse he needed since the Protecting Air Services Act said they had to select the Final Offer that was best for Air Canada corporate. That literally was the law. Their was no middle ground, no interest based arbitration, it was all or nothing and Air Canada took massive gains.

You make it sound so easy!!! "Just go in there and make your case and get big gains..."

What world are you living in? That's not how it goes, we aren't the teachers union here... yet we're still out in front of the Canadian industry.

And really... didn't you just say:

You don't have to worry about me coming online and bitching in your ear, I've made my bed sir and I'm plenty happy with it.

Yet here you still are...

[schnitzel2k3]

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[altiplano]

Hahahahahaha.

It amazes me how concerned you are with it all... glad I won't see you on the line - good luck with your corporate flight department.

[Old fella]

An observation from this old codger. Why do chaps make comments on Air Canada’s salary structure when they (a) do not work at that airline (b) explicitly imply they have no desire to do so. If I am reading and understanding from this site correctly Air Canada doesn’t have any issues regarding recruitment, plenty of guys/gals are heading there from some very good operations. Kinda makes the salary dick comparisons mute, seem to me.

[lownslow]

An observation from this old codger. Why do chaps make comments on Air Canada’s salary structure when they (a) do not work at that airline (b) explicitly imply they have no desire to do so.

Insecurity, I assume. Using pay and schedule as an example, a corporate pilot should STFU about how good they have it because that helps keep their own position more valuable as those around them leave for airlines. I hope it’s not a call for others to join their own martyrdom as a means of effecting a change, because that ain’t happening for a while.

[schnitzel2k3]

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[schnitzel2k3]

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[Sharklasers]

An observation from this old codger. Why do chaps make comments on Air Canada’s salary structure when they (a) do not work at that airline (b) explicitly imply they have no desire to do so.

Insecurity, I assume. Using pay and schedule as an example, a corporate pilot should STFU about how good they have it because that helps keep their own position more valuable as those around them leave for airlines. I hope it’s not a call for others to join their own martyrdom as a means of effecting a change, because that ain’t happening for a while.

A lot of these loud mouths are just trying to reenforce their own bias and feel the need to continually assure themselves that they made the right decision and it’s everyone else that’s wrong instead. Have flown 703 to 604 and then Regional to mainline I would say generally those guys are the absolute worst to fly with because they usually are as preachy in the plane as they are on the message board.

There has been many a quiet nights in the right seat when a guy like schnitzel launch’s into his “I could have worked for Air Canada and been a 777 Captain right now but I told them where to go! And here’s why I was right and you should too...”

The facts are what they are, flat pay isn’t great, it should be fixed.
In my first year I made 70800, 79000 in year 2, 90200 in year 3 and year 4 will be over 210k. I don’t do any draft and I am including the profit share and crew cycle expenses. My vacation is my own, not dictated by when the plane is broken. I am not surgically attached to my cell phone. I have a fully funded pension separate from company control that will offer me an extremely comfortable retirement. I have excellent benefits fully paid for by the company and the protection of a union. I am not going to get fired because I didn’t pick up the owners mistresses dry cleaning or buy the wrong mayonnaise. There are probably 0 corporate pilots in Canada that make what a AC 777 makes and probably close to 0 that make what a A320 captain in his or her third year on property makes. I am not talking about schintzels voodoo magic corporate hourly rate calculation for his pay either
“Average charter 605 Captain - average junior captain 130,000, @ 250 hr / annum = 520 / hr. Per diems are typically between 75-90 USD per day and not included in salary.”
25-30 year old Year 3 A320 captain 200k cash in the bank.


The fact is we are getting lots of great applicants from around the world, A380 and 777 captains and have a large backlog of applicants. HR will not miss an one opinionated chartright challenger driver. If you don’t like AC and never want to work for AC why are all your posts about AC schnitzel? We all agree with you that flat pay sucks, we didn’t vote for it, we are actively trying to fix it. There are a lot of things in our contract that should be improved but AC is a great job in the landscape of Canadian aviation and I challenge anyone who disagrees to look at the facts.

[Daniel Cooper]

I believe that is the truth for you Schnitzel but many AC pilots are forced to listen to their friends and acquaintances go through some kind of weird coping mechanism to justify why it's a good thing they never applied, or did and got PFO'd. So we tend to automatically tune out when someone starts explaining why their job is better than AC, even though I'm sure there are plenty of examples of pilots have found jobs that are better for them. So live your life with no regrets and don't look back and don't second guess yourself or it will make you very unhappy.

[MRP]

If you don’t like the pay scale, don’t apply. Simple as that. If you can do better somewhere else then go do that and good for you. If you tried AC and were rejected, try again or move on and try something else. I don’t understand the sense of entitlement among pilots. No one owes you @#$! all in life, you have to go get what you want, take your own risks and live with the results of your choices.