Dr_Pepper said:
Cool you actually work for them - I seriously looked into it at one point but was put off by the hours, also aside from the airports of course the centres are nowhere near me.
So what's SERCO then and where do you work? It sounds good.
I'm going to work at a little (as in it doesn't do commercial airliners, but not in terms of how many movements you do. Movements are how you measure air traffic) airfield called Cranfield Airport out between Milton Keynes and Bedford. The reason I'm going is it's part of Cranfield university and as such run an aeronautical engineering course which has its own I small jet which the students go up in as its got computers built into the back of the seats to record data and such when doing manoeuvres. It also has about 5 or 6 flying schools and has the 2nd most helicopter movements in the UK after Aberdeen with the off shore stuff. They have no radar so its all done by using procedures which makes it challenging which is why I want to do it. As they are paying £25K for me to gain another license that I don't have, and giving me a relocation package I'll be bound to them for 3 years unless I decide to go back to someone like NATS who could buy the bond out.
As for hours, well for me Cranfield is only open 830 till 7 and you don;t work that many, there are so many laws surrounding working hours its untrue, I've never worked more than 1 hour at a time before getting a half hour break although the law states you can work 1 1/2 hours before a break. there are also restrictions as to how many hours you work per month etc. You also get a lot more time off than you do in an average job, dependent on unit you get about 5 two week holidays a year.
NATS is a great company and the training is good, especially as you consider it costs something like £200,000 pounds to train an ATCO from off the street to a working controller. I will probably go back to them in 5 or so years time when I want to consider pensions again as the pension scheme is unbelievable where you effectively get 75% of your best months salary from the last 18months you worked, until you die! retirment age is 60.
SERCO are a facilities management company who somehow came about air traffic and don't really know what to do with it, consequently they are losing contracts at airports who have got wise to the costs of having SERCO run it, so why go I here you say, well Cranfields contract is up for renewal next April which means they will probably bring air traffic in-house which means big wage rises for the ATCO's there
Or i could stay with them and work in places like Gibraltar or earn some tax free money in Saudi and others countries out that way.
When you get a ATCO license you can work anywhere in Europe as it's a European license you get, or Canada who accept it with no problems or anywhere else with a bit of training (for instance in the US ATCO's get about $180,000 or Australia $120,000AUS) as all pilots and air traffic controllers in the world have a requirement to speak English and work on GMT.
Now how did this thread end up here
Aaron.
