Cabin crew training diplomas?

[Bri-namite]

Thinking about the whole cabin crew thing.

Are the learning diplomas worth it?

Like this. (http://www.cabincrewticket.co.uk/courseoverview.htm)

Don't really fancy shelling out 75 notes if it's just gonna be crap that's just common sense or that.

Is there a standard course that I can take? Like a more common one? Home learnings where it's at kids, as I work full time now.

What's the career like anyway?

[rachie004]

Waste of time IMHO! I know a guy who has done every qualification of this type and gets no where - its all down to interview technique! I did a thingy in Airline and Aiport ops before I went into the industry - sure it gave me a good insight but NOTHING will ever prepare you for the actual training you receive before you go online

The 'career', if you can call it that, varies depending on the type of airline you want to work for. I love it - there's a real buzz in the industry, however it can get quite tedious (think the tv ad for that first magazine - more tea?)

Is there anything you want to know specifically? Where abouts would you be looking at being based?

[Bri-namite]

Cheers :thumb:


Is there anything you want to know specifically? Where abouts would you be looking at being based?

I dunno really, I mean I used to be dead good at first aid at school and I'm used to serving customers and stuff. I'm quite easy to move wherever in the northern bit of England, or ideally Scotland.

It's something I've imagined myself doing for a while now, how much of the places you fly to do you actually see? I also quite like the idea of furthering myself up the ladder i.e start on some crappy budget airline then hopefully if I rock at my job then I can move on to something bigger and better.

It's a proper hard interview process though, eh?

[rachie004]

It can be a very hard interview process yes - lots of hoops to jump through

As for seeing destinations - it depends again on what sort of company your flying with, if you're going low cost then you'll see nothing, charter airlines - if you get long haul then you'll get trips etc. I work for a scheduled airline and at my particular base we get domestic night stops (they just stopped the eurpoean ones - boo!), but at other bases they get domestic and european night stops :)

You don't have to start off with some crappy budget airline! I started off in charter - got screwed and went onto scheduled!

I'm not all that familiar with which airlines are based in Scotland - the North East of England doesn't have all that many options (hence why I moved to Manchester).

TBH, its a bit late to be applying to airlines now, most of them have recruited for the summer season although some are still looking for people!

What type of job do you have now?

[JsT]

I'm not all that familiar with which airlines are based in Scotland - the North East of England doesn't have all that many options (hence why I moved to Manchester).


The only one I can think of are Eastern Airways which are Humberside and Teeside.

BA have a couple of Scottish crew bases, we get a lot of transfers at work for Pilots etc.

[rachie004]

The only one I can think of are Eastern Airways which are Humberside and Teeside.

BA have a couple of Scottish crew bases, we get a lot of transfers at work for Pilots etc.

BA Connect are based in EDI and INV, there should be Loganair (?) which is another subsidary of BA - I think they might be based in Aberdeen?

For Newcastle you have Jet2hell and Sleazyjet along with all the charter airlines. Teesside has BMI Baby and BMI, and Eastern airways yes.

Charter is fun but its seasonal and takes years to get a permanent contract! And I have too much self respect to work for a low cost outfit :p

[JsT]

Jet2hell and Sleazyjet

Haha, loving it!

[Bri-namite]

I work in car insurance at the moment, but I did two years for Mecca Bingo so I've got a lot of face to face customer experience and I'm the master at smiling to everyone who's horrible to me, especially in a closed environment.

Would be more than happy to work in Aberdeen as that's where I'm from, ideally I'd find something Glasgow-ish, but if things are right then I'd consider moving wherever.

Would deffo want something permanent in all honesty, suppose it's just a matter of waiting till the time is right? I'm not especially arsed about making the career change straight away, but it's something worth thinking about really.

I think working for someone like BA or a massive airline would be proper cool one day :yes:

[rachie004]

You definately need face to face customer service experience - most of the interview questions are service based!

You might be better going for somewhere like EDI/GLA with them being bigger? I think Excel airways might have a base up in Glasgow, I'm fairly sure MyTravel do too - like I said I'm really not familiar with the Scottish bases

Most airlines start recruiting in October through to around January or February, but like I said, some are still recruiting now - have a looksie at aviationjobsearch.com. No one ever takes you on a permanent contract straight away - thats the thing with this industry, you always get taken on as temporary first, if you get on well then there's a good chance of being kept on but I know when I was at mytravel, there were some girls still on seasonal contracts after being there for years! its a very fickle industry unfortunately!

[Char_Baby]

How about doing a customer service NVQ? I know you've got heaps of customer service experience but all those sorta things go well in your favour against other candidates, and tons of people will go for the job.

[rachie004]

TBH that probably wouldn't make any difference when applying to airline's either.. although if that was something you wanted to do to better yourself then why not?

As long as you have your GCSEs in English/Maths and you can flounce into the interview, look the part, give them what they want to here then you'll do fine :thumb: