April Roster

I’ve had a couple of requests to post my monthly roster – so here’s April for you!

I think I’ve explained before about the bidding system we have. There are 7 groups that all the crew are divided up into (randomly, as far as I can tell) and the bidding system goes by group seniority. So my group (group 5) is at “top bid”, where you supposedly have the highest chances of getting what you bid for, in April.

Even after nearly two and a half years I still haven’t got the bidding system completely sussed out, and I only got 2 of the things I asked for – you can bid for up to 5 (this includes layovers and days off).

  • Barcelona (one of the destinations I bid for!)
  • Munich (didn’t bid for this, but I seem to get it every month regardless!)
  • Los Angeles (trying to swap for our new 42 hour JFK layover)
  • 5 days off (which I bid for)
  • Kuwait turnaround
  • Munich
  • Barcelona

So as you can see – no new destinations again. 🙁

At least I got a couple of Barcelona trips in there, which will be fun as I’m hoping it’ll have warmed up nicely!

As for the lovely string of 5 days off, mum and dad have very kindly invited me to join them in Athens for a little holiday! Unfortunately it’s not quite enough time to visit any of the beautiful Greek islands, so I’ll try and see if I can do that sometime later this year. Any tips for Athens are very welcome! 🙂

P.s. Follow me on Instagram & Twitter for day-to-day updates of where I am in the world and what’s going on! 

15 Comments

  1. Eley
    April 2, 2015 / 6:21 pm

    How many hours you are payed of for this kind of roster?

    • April 6, 2015 / 1:43 am

      Well we have a basic salary regardless of how much we fly – then we also get paid per hour. So you can work out the length of each flight and then you’ll see how many hours it is.

  2. K
    April 1, 2015 / 3:59 pm

    HI Rachel. I love your blog and have been reading since the beginning so keep it up 🙂

    I attended an interview last month and am patiently waiting to hear if I have the job!

    I have one question about the different aircrafts you get trained on. Does everyone train on all aircrafts ie B777 and A380 or do Emirates only train certain people on certain ones? The reason I ask is because I read somewhere that some aircrafts mainly do turnarounds and if a person is solely trained on these they would not get to do many layovers?

    I hope this question makes sense 🙂 Looking forward to hearing from you..

    • April 6, 2015 / 1:42 am

      Thanks so much for reading 🙂 I’ll keep my fingers crossed for you! So we have the “crosstrained” crew (A380 and B777) and the “mainfleet” crew (B777 and A330 / A340). As for which you’ll be trained on – it completely depends on where the most crew are needed at that time. It’s true that the A330/A340 have a lot of turnaround destinations, however when I was working in economy some months I had just as many turnarounds as mainfleet crew. So it’s all a matter of luck and hoping you get some good flights 🙂

      • K
        April 13, 2015 / 2:51 pm

        Thank you so much for coming back to me. I am still waiting to hear so keep those fingers crossed 🙂

        I think I will be happy working on any aircraft as long as I actually get the job! Looking forward to many more blog posts from you and hopefully flying with you some day 🙂

  3. Anonymous
    March 31, 2015 / 4:54 pm

    Hey, just with regards to extra languages other than english….I know they ask you if you’re fluent in other languages but do they give you a test (like the one if you weren’t a native engish speaker) ? I’ve been living in France for the past year for my year abroad for my degree… In european standards I’d be a level C1 so I don’t know if that would be accepted as a second fluent language or not ?
    Any advice would be greatly appreciated. Thanks !

    • April 6, 2015 / 1:38 am

      Well I didn’t have to do any other tests, however it may have changed now. Best to contact the recruitment team and double check just to be sure. I’m not sure if they go by the levels, however they say you need to be able to read, write and speak the language fluently. Imagine there was a medical situation onboard and you were the only language speaker, would you feel comfortable dealing with it/translating by yourself?

  4. March 26, 2015 / 4:51 am

    i love barcelona! and you get to go twice. how exciting 🙂 enjoy

    • April 6, 2015 / 1:36 am

      I know right, lucky me 🙂 Super busy flight though, we didn’t stop for 7 hours!

  5. March 25, 2015 / 6:36 pm

    Hi Rachel!
    How are you? I found your blog a few days ago, and I’m delighted reading all the information you’ve shared here, mostly your first impressions about joining the company.
    I’ve been successful during the recruitment process in my city (Lisbon, Portugal) and I’ll be joining on the 1st of May, this year, as cabin crew.
    I would like to talk to you, because I have some concerns about the joining process, feel free to add me on Facebook (just click on my name here) or e-mail me:
    tavares.g.diogo@gmail.com
    Thank you so much for this helpful blog, I’ve been enjoying it since day one.
    I hope you’re loving this life changing experience, and I can’t wait to hear from you.
    Best Regards, Diogo Tavares

    • April 6, 2015 / 1:36 am

      Hi Diogo! Glad you found my blog 🙂
      Congrats on getting the job! You can send me a private message on Twitter or Instagram or ask me any questions on here 🙂
      Hopefully I’ll get to visit Lisbon one day – it looks beautiful!

  6. Ravi
    March 24, 2015 / 6:50 pm

    I wanted to ask u abt the turn around flights.suppose if u want to visit Kuwait on a personal/tourist trip can u end the trip there and take leave to visit the place?

    • April 6, 2015 / 1:32 am

      No it doesn’t really work like that – they need us to work the return trip as well. Usually we just stay on the plane once the passengers have disembarked and hang around while the cleaners are on, then the new lot of pax come on ready to fly back!

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