Background info on hiring techniques at the low cost airlines

[Lysexpat]

There is a much bigger thread to aviation security and that is fatigue! Airlines of all kind were quity happy to lobby for an increase in maximum duty times recently. As a result the EU parliament accepted the law against the advice of a technical werking group.
I also think the title is missleading: all Belgian airlines are using the same techniques as the ones described in the study and those working on "old style" contracts for Belgian airlines are amongst the worst paid pilots in the whole world.

[sean1982]

Off course they are! Why do you think JAF was doing touch and go's in oostende the other day? Another type rating complete for a bunch of cadets who paid for this rating and as "a compensation" they get 1 SUMMER employment with a small chance of an extension, but in most cases they end up back on the market with a huge debt and less then 500 hours "stick time" which means that these hours are useless when seeing employment with another company. That is almost a definition of "pay to fly"!

A lot of people here are jumping on the likes of easyJet, Ryanair and Norwegian (who all offer FULL TIME EMPLOYMENT) but they dont see (or choose to ignore) what's going on in their back yard

[Inquirer]

Indeed,

there shouldn't be any reason not to discuss similar practices used by Belgian airlines too: this topic is open to all imput and I for one am not jumping on anybody in particular, rather willing to learn more about all those practices in which employees are pushed to pay for their own training and/or work accessories, or worse even, practices where obviously fully employed persons are made 'self-employed' forever.

As an outsider, I think it's simply amazing to see how far practices in this sector have deteriorated: one can only conclude that a whole lot of young people are buying their place in the skies these days,.
Given there doesn't seem to be a lack of candidates, I can understand companies 'offering' these kind of contracts, yet the question is however: should they be allowed to?

Personally, I think that the whole idea of self-employed pilots, cabin crew, or other staff is simply ridiculous to start with. They are very much ordinary employees, just as you can find them at the reception of a hotel, in a restaurant or in factories realy.

[OO-ITR]

There is a much bigger thread to aviation security and that is fatigue! Airlines of all kind were quity happy to lobby for an increase in maximum duty times recently. As a result the EU parliament accepted the law against the advice of a technical werking group.
I also think the title is missleading: all Belgian airlines are using the same techniques as the ones described in the study and those working on "old style" contracts for Belgian airlines are amongst the worst paid pilots in the whole world.

Can you give us some examples of those Belgian airlines with self employed pilots, where cabin crew are hired and employed by an external firm.
Also to my knowledge, all Belgian airlines have contracts for crew based in Belgium and payed accordingly...

Also if you would like to start a topic concering fatigue, feel free. I honestly don't know what your input here has to do with this topic!

[sean1982]

Indeed,

there shouldn't be any reason not to discuss similar practices used by Belgian airlines too: this topic is open to all imput and I for one am not jumping on anybody in particular, rather willing to learn more about all those practices in which employees are pushed to pay for their own training and/or work accessories, or worse even, practices where obviously fully employed persons are made 'self-employed' forever.

As an outsider, I think it's simply amazing to see how far practices in this sector have deteriorated: one can only conclude that a whole lot of young people are buying their place in the skies these days,.
Given there doesn't seem to be a lack of candidates, I can understand companies 'offering' these kind of contracts, yet the question is however: should they be allowed to?

Personally, I think that the whole idea of self-employed pilots, cabin crew, or other staff is simply ridiculous to start with. They are very much ordinary employees, just as you can find them at the reception of a hotel, in a restaurant or in factories realy.

Inquirer .. they are not self employed forever at all. What FR does is more or less the same as what Belgian airlines do but with full time employment. They are recruited by an external firm, trained by ryanair and than they work for this firm who subcontracts the crew to Ryanair. They are employed full time, the pay taxes and social security and have the same protections as any crew member that is employed by Ryanair. After a certain period of time, which is dependent on the specific crewing needs in each base ... they will be offered an employment contract by ryanair and will be employed by ryanair. Needless to say that only the people who perform best will be offered a ryanair contract first.

What do Belgian airlines do? They take advantage of the fact that hiring workforce on temporary contracts is fiscally cheaper than full time employment. They will give them a summer contract usually going from april till around october. After this time they will be assessed and they might be offered a contract to come back next summer, they might be offered a full time contract, they might be told that they dont have to come back. Needless to say that only the people who perform best will be offered a contract first. People that get offered a next summer or are told not to come back will trickle back into our belgian unemployment system. This whole proces can be repeated 3 times! After the 3th temp contract they have to be offered a full time employment or they have to be let go. Needless to say that, at JAF at least, most of them will NOT be offered full time employment and will have to go and look for another airline or another job.

[Inquirer]

Yes sean,
but I am sure I needn't explain you there is a huge difference between a direct, albeit fixed term employment contract and just a subcontract employment contract.
The first one intitles the temporary employee to all the same rights any other employee of that company has for the duration of his employment, whereas the method by which one works through a subcontractor allows to offer completely different conditions, not to mention that when one finally gives them a full term contract, they are still to be considered new to the company and can claim no grandfather rights.
Compared to a fixed term direct employment contract, a contract through a subcontractor is a situation even worse to be in, which is of course the whole point as the airlines making use of it aren't exactly known to be willing to offer more than the absolute minimum.
That they have no problems filling the vacancies that way, shows to what extend people are willing to go to make their dream to fly come true. I'd doubt you'll be able to staff a reception of a hotel or the kitchen of a restaurant that way, for instance!

[sean1982]

I'd doubt you'll be able to staff a reception of a hotel or the kitchen of a restaurant that way, for instance!

Because the pay offered by the airlines even to subcontractors is about double of that what you mention for half the amount of work.

which is of course the whole point as the airlines making use of it aren't exactly known to be willing to offer more than the absolute minimum.

And that is factually untrue btw ... Fr cabin crew earn more than people at BA or Virgin Atlantic for example.

[OO-ITR]

And that is factually untrue btw ... Fr cabin crew earn more than people at BA or Virgin Atlantic for example.

Not difficult to earn more than BA crew mixed fleet...

[sean1982]

And that is factually untrue btw ... Fr cabin crew earn more than people at BA or Virgin Atlantic for example.

Not difficult to earn more than BA crew mixed fleet...

That's not the point ... The point is that inquirer is claiming that FR and the likes are offering minimum wages which is wrong as they pay more than most legacy airlines.

[Inquirer]

You need to read more closely what people say before commenting, Sean.
it is clear ryanair -and others, let there be no doubt about it- are making use of certain constructions in order to reduce the COST of labour for them.
The assessment this comes down to minimum wages for the people concerned, is entirely yours.
Labour costs are more than just salary alone in most western countries, especially for employees of big firms, and so it's exactly that rather thick layer of extra costs on top of the salary itself which they target through the various subcontracted and fixed term constructions debated here.
Norwegians CEO doesn't even have a problem stating this publicly, you know?

[Inquirer]

A little bit surprised no link was posted to this news yet, so I will just post it in this related topic:

Pilots at Norwegian start their first strike ever this weekend, as negotiations between unions and management over new pay/labour conditions broke down earlier and pilots fear for their social security in future:
http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/02/ ... 0W20150228

Norwegian plunged deep into the red last year in the wake of their effort to launch long haul flights. It hopes to operate most of its flights over the weekend by using staff pilots, but the unions plan on increasing the effect of the strike by Wednesday by incrementally increasing the number of pilots on strike if no agreement is reached.

[sn26567]

A little bit surprised no link was posted to this news yet.

I wanted to post the news in the Strikes topic, but since it did not affect any Belgian airport, I passed.

[sean1982]

Hmm, I wonder which company this is?

http://jobs.flightglobal.com/job/140141 ... media&cm=0


What was all this crap about "straight onto our payroll" .. "The pride of belgium" .... "Driving belgian economy with REAL belgian jobs" .... Meh

[EBBRbase]

And it's not only captains... This month a number of German A320 F/O's coming from Lufthansa will join the company. Meanwhile they continue to advertise their real 'Belgian touch'...

[flightlover]

Sean, maybe you didn't know this, but as it happens, interim is the new trial period for full employment in Belgium. As of the last big legislation change there is no longer a trial period at the start of a contract.

So an advertisement looking for an F/O on interim bases is just a first step towards a full contract.

And real Belgian jobs...
Common, even you get that, right?
They pay the wages in Belgium for jobs offered on Belgian territory. In this case Brussels.
No mater what nationality the employee has, if those two conditions are met they are real Belgian jobs.
And yes Ryanair or any other airline with staff based in Belgium has to do that now, for new contracts that is.

[sean1982]

Flightlover

I get that. And it's totally fine! That's how the industry is evolving. But captains via a contracting agency are exactly that. Self employed through a contracting agency flying for Brussels airlines. They are NOT on the payroll, they are NOT paying taxes in belgium (as it is a UK agency)

What I hate are all these SN hypocrits that are pissing on FR and the likes in this topic and most other topics, while their company is doing exactly the same thing!

[Passenger]

Sean, maybe you didn't know this, but as it happens, interim is the new trial period for full employment in Belgium. As of the last big legislation change there is no longer a trial period at the start of a contract.
So an advertisement looking for an F/O on interim bases is just a first step towards a full contract.
And real Belgian jobs...
Common, even you get that, right?
They pay the wages in Belgium for jobs offered on Belgian territory. In this case Brussels.
No mater what nationality the employee has, if those two conditions are met they are real Belgian jobs.
And yes Ryanair or any other airline with staff based in Belgium has to do that now, for new contracts that is.

Flightlover. I get that. And it's totally fine! That's how the industry is evolving. But captains via a contracting agency are exactly that. Self employed through a contracting agency flying for Brussels airlines. They are NOT on the payroll, they are NOT paying taxes in belgium (as it is a UK agency).

What I hate are all these SN hypocrits that are pissing on FR and the likes in this topic and most other topics, while their company is doing exactly the same thing!

This topic is about a study of the University Ghent about dangerous labour contracts in aviation, and the study contradicts the above statement about Brussels Airlines. Quote from page 15 of the study: “Of the respondents stating to be self-employed and stating to have no say in the amount of hours they clock, 77,1% stated to work for a LFA (Low Fare Airline) and 5,6% for a network airline."

Just a reminder – the study - pdf 7 Mb:
https://www.eurocockpit.be/sites/defaul ... -111960405

I’m no Brussels Airlines employee (have never been), but what I hate are untrue insults like …all these SN hypocrits that are pissing on FR while their company is doing exactly the same thing…

[sean1982]

And what exactly mr Google aviation expert is the difference between being a contracting captain for Ryanair or being a contracting captain for SN?

[OO-ITR]

Hmm, I wonder which company this is?

http://jobs.flightglobal.com/job/140141 ... media&cm=0


What was all this crap about "straight onto our payroll" .. "The pride of belgium" .... "Driving belgian economy with REAL belgian jobs" .... Meh

Yeah Sean seeing your post in this topic means you acknowledge that SN is a low cost airline then ?

[sean1982]

In practices? Yes. That's what I have been saying all along.