Dumb Pilot
Well-known member
- Joined
- Apr 8, 2006
- Posts
- 1,570
How is the contract gig with ANA Cargo? I visited with the guy from Crew Resources at the Vegas job fair last month, and I am interested. Online it shows contract length of 5 years, but then a bonus $ for completing the contract. So, is it 5 years, or is it less with a completion bonus if you choose to stick around longer? I would like to hear from someone actually doing this how the days off works as well as commuting. 10 days at home/month the first year sounds dreadful. Yes, the pay is 3x what I am making now, but holy cow thats a lot of time away from home. Any experience/guidance would be very appreciated in helping me make an informed decision. I can't wait forever for my dream job to call me for an interview, and I can't continue to live on poverty wages.
Oh yeah, any info on medical insurance coverage? I heard it's good, but how good....
PM's are welcomed as well
THANKS!
SL
I started another thread since it is unrelated to the theme of the thread you posted the question on.
The contract duration is 5 years and at the end of the contract term there is a contract completion bonus. The contract can be extended if you so wish (and the company) for a new contract of 3,4 or 5 years duration for the second contract, you should inform the company within 90 days if you wish to continue the contract or not. There is also a stipulation that you should resign within 90 days of the effective date of such resignation if you want to leave the contract before its termination date. With CREW, there is a penalty if you leave in the first year of 15,000 I believe, after that there is no penalty. There is no penalty with any of the other contract companies that I know of.
There are three commuting options available, the company will pay you an additional $2,000/ month commuting allowance and you can either buy your own ticket, 2) travel with ZED ticket subject of space availability or 3) waive the 2k commuting allowance and get a confirmed business class ticket round trip in any of the star alliance carriers with ANA as a primary choice. This is the way that I have been doing it since I have been here for over 5 years now, I just like the fact that I don't have to worry about loads nor am I chasing the best deal year round, besides, by the time you pay for your ticket (north of $1,000 USD in most cases) or you pay for the ZED ticket (anywhere from $200 to $400, depending on time of the year) and you pay taxes on that additional income, there is not much left of the 2K so I don't even bother with it. Besides, you get to keep the miles while traveling on business class and I do put them to good use when I travel on vacation with my family. This may seem obvious to some but I will say it since this question pups up from time to time, you will lose your jumpseat privileges since there is no jumpseat in Japan, not even within AJX nor in ANA.
Your days off can be as follows (and this is from day one on the line, not after the first year as you mentioned) you will have 10 days off, plus 2 blank commuting days and in top of that you can ad your vacation days (2 vacation days at a time per month) and have a stretch of 14 days in a row, you will however commute on your time, you will be released the last day of your duty roster early enough that you can commute the same day, so you get 12 days @home without counting the day that you arrive since you will cross the international date line, you will arrive the same day you left. What I do to take my vacation (since I use my vacation days in a monthly basis) is that I combine days off back to back (the end of one month with the beginning of the other) and I get 28 days in a row. Scheduling is pretty good at accommodating your requests 90% of the time, but you will be asked to move your request a day or two on occasion to accommodate scheduling needs, more so these days since we have had a few pilots leave for other contracts in SE Asia (the pilot poaching is alive and well out here)
Flying the line: you will be assigned anywhere from 50 to 70% of freighter flying and the rest of passenger flying, I have to say that the quality of life in the line has decreased dramatically since they merged both the cargo and passenger operations because the freight has most duties with two sectors in the middle of the night that include a few hours in the sorting station in Okinawa. You will be doing most of the flying with other expats and with mainline ANA management pilots from time to time.
Let me know if you have additional questions.