coex?

[starvingcfi]

just wondering if anyone had any good info on continental express. haven't really heard anything about them.

mostly wondering about pay, quality of life, *upgrade time*, and bases.

any thoughts? good company? also, it's owned by continental, right?

that's it. thanks a lot.

 

[Saluki Dawg]

Well, you asked a lot of questions, so I'll answer what I can. The reason that you haven't heard very much about COEX on this board the last few years is because there hasn't been much good news to report. We have about 300 pilots on furlough (don't have the exact number in front of me). The company just announced about 144 recalls between Nov '03 and Feb '04. This just happened yesterday, so I don't even know if the recall letters are even in the mail yet. CAL Mainline has about 250 pilots that flowed back to Express after 9/11. We are expecting some of those pilots to be recalled by Mainline sometime in '04, but I have no idea how many will be recalled. Some of our furloughed pilots accepted flying positions at Commutair, and Skywest, which are operating Turboprops as Continental Connection out of IAH and CLE. Depending on how many of our furloughed pilots accept recall to COEX, it is possible that we may start hiring off the street again sometime late next year.

Upgrade times right now are averaging 4 1/2 to 5 years. I don't expect that number to come down anytime soon. If you are looking for a quick upgrade, then COEX is definately not for you. We are just about finished negotiating our new Contract, so needless to say that our pay rates will be going up substantially in the near future. However, I'm not going to discuss what current or future pay rates might be while negotiations with the company are going on. Hopefully that answers a few of your questions.

 

[TOGA]

What he/she said. Bases are CLE, EWR and IAH. Of course there are always rumors of new bases, but that's it for now. Not surprisingly, morale is at an all-time low due to the 9/11 flow-back situation described above. Nonetheless, this has been a great place to work. Nice equipment, great people, excellent training dep't, good relationship with Flight Ops Mgmt, etc. We will be getting a great contract (dammit!), probably within the next six months. We are no longer owned by CAL, as of . . . April, I think it was. We have a Capacity Purchase Agreement with CAL that basically keeps everything the same in our relationship into '07 . . . then it's anyone's guess what'll happen. As for upgrade time, what a freakin' mess! I was a jet Captain 18 months after I was hired . . . for 2.5 months. Now, I've been back in the right seat for almost two years. As soon as CAL calls back their pilots out of our a/c, I'll be a CA again. If your crystal ball has anything to say about that, my wife would love to hear it! Good luck. Maybe we'll fly together someday . . .

 

[Saluki Dawg]

TOGA:
You and I must be in the same exact seniority range. Our stories are identical. Hopefully we will both be back in the saddle by next summer. At least all we'll need is a 2 + 1 in the sim and we're good to go again.

 

[TOGA]

01/10/00, you?

 

[Saluki Dawg]

02/07/00.

 

[rogerroger]

pay

what do you mean in terms of a substantial pay raise. were in negotiations too ao i was just wondering what you guys are aiming for???

 

[FSB99]

nice bait... hopefully nobody who actually works at coex will answer this with specific numbers. nice try, though!

by substantial, he means, take a look at our current payrates.. when this is said and done, we're going to look back at those old payrates and think to ourselves, how did we ever live that long on those?!