Work for free.... Are you mad !!!!!

[Charlie Foxtrot India]

Kartin M by intitatives I meant having some ideas of thier own, rather than plodding through a pre-determined syllabus where they never go more than a couple of hours away from the comfort zone. IMHO part of the hour building should include loading up the swag and crossing the rabbit proof fence a few times, without an instructor holding their hand; eg a trip to Birdsville Races, the Outback Air Race, some trans-continent ferries, visiting rellies interstate or whatever. If they don't like that kind of flying then perhaps they are not suited for working in the bush. These hours would be more valuable than countless flights up and down the beach or two hour triangular navexs round the same old same old.

Maybe you thought I said "incentives" rather than intitatives. (Of course there are financial incentives for the loyal hour-builder as well). But nothing to do with Amway! Is that still around?!

[Rich-Fine-Green]

Industrial Relations

I Fly:

Good in theory, but quite a number of the 'freebies' or 'low-paid' guys and gals are silly enough to say, in writing, on their resume, that they will work for nix.

Some of these operators are smarter than the average bear and keep these resumes in staff files.

You wouldn't believe how many pilots do write in their resumes that they will work for free, or for experiance, or on trial etc, etc.

In the past I wouldn't employ them but of course some did and still do.

Pilot's who put this in writing have shot temselves in the foot with regard to the Industrial Relations. They can not come back later and cry foul ball to the umpire.

However, those who have a legitimate case and have genuinely been screwed - then I say go for it!.

[Rich-Fine-Green]

Job Hunting Referance.......

A good referance book for job hunting and researching good companies was;

Aircraft & Aerospace yearbook year XXXX.

It used to cost $29.95 at Newsagents. I bought a copy every year as a referance just in case. I'm not sure if it was published this year or last year. Does anyone know??

This was published every year and listed who's who and types operated, addresses, phone numbers etc etc.

I used it twice in the last decade (early) to get a job and it worked as I could target operators by name (rather than the old Dear Chief Pilot.....).

It also helped to save on postage, phone calls and gas, as I did not target flying schools that trained their own instructors (why would they want me if they train their own!) and I was able to target charter companies that operated aircraft I was endorsed on (less training costs and I.C.U.S. for them).

Anyway, for what it's worth - it worked for me when I was a sprog driver.

[marshall]

Thanks guy’s for all your posts, it has been a huge help.

What are the chances of doing an instructor rating and then being offered a job??? I heard that Port Macquarie offer and instructor rating for $6,500 and a CIR for $6,800. Does anyone know anything about these guys? How good is the training and is the course respected by operators around Australia?

Any ideas or JOBS???

[Ejector Pump]

Geez,

the way ANFO bit back at SLASHER 's post you'd just about believe he was the recipient of the N.T. style payback.


.....Was it you???

[ANFO]

Swim with the fishes.

Nah, Slash is still alive. If he hada touch my bike, itsa concreeta shoosa for him.....rememba, una size fits all, capish?

[Slasher]

Bwahahaha! Yeh but I bit back ANFO in his @rse after he recentley bit mine! Its alright mate I still like ya even though you think Im a lousey bloodey crim, bully, @rsehole, cop-corrupter, etc.

But I cant believe ANFO would stoop to cold-blooded murder by crueley drowning someone like that (even if his consigliere gave him the nod!)!! I think my testosterone-lacking mate enaires would be choking with New Age revulsion if he even READS that such force wouldve ever been considered!

[Jamair]

Slasher: Don't know you from a bar of soap sir, but your posts paint you as a fool.

All others: No-one should work for free, regardless of occupation - unless your work is worth nothing, in which case why would you want to?

Regards.

[Slasher]

I couldnt give a rats @rse what you think Jamair.

CFI your suggestion has merit but as KM implyed the $$$ factor is the stumbling block here, even with mates who are willing to chip-in for costs. And how many of them pike-out on the day of departure? And yeh Amways still around. I get the stuff in from Singapore since the home-grown Persil here doesnt cut too well.

[Islander Jock]

Questions of how to get hours aside. It looks like the 150hr integrated CPL course is not the yellow brick road it's made out to be.

At the risk of sounding like a broken record. Very few if any operators are going to be willing or able to give a start to someone with so few hours. Even a raw CPL under the modular system with 200hrs + will find it difficult. There are many aircraft owners who's insurance required minimums of 200hrs+ to hire something like a 210.

We had a student who not long ago attended a seminar held by one of the larger schools offering the 150hr course. The bullsh!t those spindoctors gave out was incredible. Things like "shortage of pilots", "big turnaround in GA" etc were just a few of the cons delivered to the impressionable with about 25k in their's or their parents bank account to kick off theri aviation career.

Marshall,

WRT the instructor rating. It could well be the way to go but as I have said before, don't do it as a vehicle to get your hours up to go off and fly 210s or Barons in charter. Your students will only suffer for having an instructor who is constantly dreaming of being somewhere else.

Don't spend your money yet on an IR yet. For the reasons I have mentioned above, you are probably some way off getting a job whereby it will be of any use. In addition you will have to incur the added expense of maintaining currency.


Slasher,

All very well using AMWAY soap powder. But be very concerned when you get home early from a trip away and the missus has left the OMO box on the laundry window

[TIMMEEEE]

OK guys - I've heard alot of arguments here and we all know there are times such as ferrying an aircraft a couple hundred miles for positioning purposes that people dont get paid for.

The thing that myself and others such as Slasher are vehemently opposed to are those individuals that come to an established company with established work practices and then threaten that pilot groups' livelihood by offering to work for nicks!
Is there any form of human being lower???

How would you guys out there in aviation or any other industry feel if someone rocks up and offers to work for free and progressively lower your job worth to the extent that it's non-existant?

I'll tell you one thing - there would be blood spilled on the apron in every case!!
To not be opposed to this is tantamount to blatant lies.

Yeah - we all know there are cases where your employer pays you the award wage and when things are slow they may get you to paint an office, mow lawns or do SLJ's - (****ty little jobs) etc etc etc.
That's something we all lived with but at least you were being paid to be a profesisonal pilot and were when you performed flying duties to a good standard.

So a little bush justice was administered in this case by Slasher's mates some years back - big bloody deal.
The guy's just lucky he didn't cop a physical hiding and still carries the scars and mended limbs - that at least would serve notice to others willing to venture down this dangerous path.

Grow up some of you guys that seem to support this selfish behaviour of offering to work for free!

To those of you that have resisted the urge to do so,congratulations - you have done yourselves and all those in the industry a huge favour.

A letter of warning to those young guys out there that are willing to make such an offer - certain respectable organisations out there condemn this behaviour and you just may be talking yourselves out of a potential job.

Besides that having been a professional pilot for the past 18 years and having flown overseas and in Oz this industry is so incredibly small that if you develop a poor reputation such as being a "free flyer" so to speak this stigma will follow you for as long as you remain in aviation.

Good luck to all those jobseekers and let's hope this back-stabbing self righteous behaviour is some day erradicated like the disease it really is.

[TwinNDB]

Couldnt agree more with timeeee. We all realise that at the lower ends of the GA spectrum we may be asked to do some occassional office jobs etc but thats part of the territory. I have been lucky enought that even when working in the office etc I have been payed for the work i have done - as do all our guys but on the flipside the boss knows that we work hard for the company.

What gets me is when there are guys out there who come in looking to undermine a company that pays its workers and therefore their security by saying they'll work for free when i can honestly say that no one in our company got their start that way.

Basically it just gives me the $hits. If they're not going to do the industry a favour or atleast NOT undercut those who actually work in GA and not prostitute themselves, then they should f*ck off.

We're working hard to find out their names - not to hurt them but to give them a bit of a talking to as to how this is f*cking up our world. All they had to do was for ALL of them to tell their boss to shove it and then they would have been getting paid to do the same work!!!! Its not that hard to figure out - it only takes one little greedy $hit to undermine a whole company and the boss laughs all the way to the bank

grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr

[The Goss]

Suggest you get your facts right before inserting foot into mouth.

[enaires]

I'd say flying schools have a bit to account for in providing students with little or no REAL perspective on the aviation industry. Yes its a catch 22, but some blatant lying LURES seem to be spread around the place!

Slasher...ugh I not going to bother, you are a wind up, and if not...well maybe a loser? Get real mate. Your attitude stinks.

[Flintstone]

AV8 says "Name one instructor who has not worked for free....".

Me.

Sure, I had days where I only flew an hour or two and did other tasks but I was lucky enough to be paid a salary so it didn't matter how much I flew, briefed or whatever, I still got paid.

That was at Phoenix Air Training at Coolangatta before it was sold to MBA. It was then run by two true gentlemen, John Chesterfield and Peter Hay without whom I might not have got to where I am now. A lot of schools and GA operators could learn a lesson or two from these men. Their 'more carrot and less stick' approach encouraged all of us to go the extra yards

because we wanted to . It was a sad day when they sold the school.

As for discussing the idea of working for nothing with students, I always did. I made it quite clear what I and many other people thought of this. Whether or not it made a difference remains to be seen. I hope so.

So it's easy for me to throw stones because I've never been in the position where I've had to fly for free? Not really. I was offered 'free flying' many times but turned it down on principle. It wasn't easy but I know I can walk in to a crew room or on to a flight deck anywhere and look everyone else in the eye.

[Slasher]

enaires the reason I picked on YOU pal was your temerity to assume we didnt try talking to this little sh!t first. ( What did you expect me to say? "Duh....we didnt think of that enaires!"). You read my post, noted the language, instantley made your assumptions, then insulted my bloodey inteligence by assuming we didnt at least try talking to this d!ckhead first! Sorry but I dont take that lying down matey!

The fact your ball-less attitudes were also spruked as well as your contempt for us having trustworthy cops as good mates were just side-issues. I couldnt give a stuff about your false stereotyping of tech crew. But what I got p!ssed off with too was your judgement that professional drivers are supposed to lack the balls to protect what little they have back then, even if it required it to be done the NT way right up to white-anting his woman (which Ive subsequently admitted was over the top ok?). We HAD to hit hard in order to save what we had, and thank christ it paid off. Talking reasonabley to this little pr!ck did absolutley nothing. I only had 200 hours twin time and halfway through a CIR whos funding relyed heaviley on my present job, because I and my colegues werent born with silver spoons up our bums like this little sh!t was. And TIMMEE was right when he said the little bastard was luckey he didnt hobble away with a few broken limbs. A few of the more bolshie amongst us were itching to break out the cricket bats! But Im thankful I stood with them when it came to colectively making a tough stand, rather than your ilk who simpley "walk away in protest".

I can take criticism on the chin if Im wrong as equaly as I can rabidly dish it out pal. I know your just a set of pixels to me but your initial "criticism" was more a bloodey insult than anything real. Thats why I particularley bit you back hard!

Ok that feels better! Ill shut my bloodey trap on this if you will. Agreed? Good. Case closed. May you go in peace and find spiritual and sexual fulfilment.

[TIMMEEEE]

Slasher - it's quite amazing in life (and different groups of people in all walks of life for that matter) that if someone is being a "pratt" and unreasonable to a group of rational common-sense individuals that a good 'ol belting in a car park or somewhere private for that matter can achieve alot, as opposed to letters,memos and walking away in disgust as some of our other contributors suggest.

These sanctimonious types that preach a holier than thou attitude (about pilots not being allowed to fight no less!)are forgetting one important thing - pilots are human beings as well.

What we do for a living means zip!

What we do however in terms of our actions speaks for itself.

These types have obviously never had their livelihoods threatened by an unreasonable individual that will not listen to reason.
To offer to work for free is a direct insult to those that do and shows not only disdain for other pilots but also shows what little self respect they have for themselves, let alone others.

Belt the crap out of the little bastards I say - it'll knock some bloody sense into them.

[ANFO]

Ah, Slash, yer a charming rouge!, but I dont agree that one should break the law and damage property. There are other ways and means; ya just gotta be creative. I've got ideas that I wouldn't spell out in this forum; nuthin' too sinister tho'. You are right, I am a softy when it comes to the C/C shoes;I always think of their poor Mother . (Actually, I think that even Slasher has a Mother ,.. maybe). However, there is a couple of members of the New Zealand cabinet that I would like to take out on me boat some day, so as I can "sea" them off.

[enaires]

Timmee, I hope you are not interpreting my criticisms to slasher's responses as myself being and advocate of the work for free party...because Im not. I have been bitten and my livelihood HAS been threatened more times than I care to recall, and trying not to be self-righteous, violence has never solved MY problems.

Slash, it was not meant as an "insult" to your intelligence; my original idea was to criticise the decision to revert to violence (under the banner of the "NT local justice system" or whatever other EXCUSE) to "teach" a spoon fed brat that was offering his/her work for free in a situation that hurts all other pilots. Sure, Ive barked at YOU, but is that not the same as what was coming your end? Honestly, I very much like a good discussion.

Im quite happy to give it rest, but I'll NEVER agree to the alleged violence perpetrated in that situation. Call me new age (bit old for it) or whatever, but I've yet to see a punch on the face have the same effect as talking and re-talking...not saying you didnt try communicating, cause I dont know the facts. Make it a blooddey good discussion of words, place your facts and your reasonings on an equal table, I'm in on that "fight", because I too see the problem being argued in this forum's topic. But a group of guys against one or two....naah.

Enough.

[Ang737]

Not naming names but I have spoken to someone who said they are happy to work for free to bridge that gap between 250 - 500 TT to meet some operators minimums. I know this may have been done to death but why on earth would someone intentionally work for free after paying an exuberant amount for their training and also stuff it up for the next guy to come along after they leave.

Lets keep serious about this issue. It seems to be popping up at an alarming rate. What other industry does that Answer None...