The hiring freeze that was not announced: how to tell when an airline has quietly stopped, and the signs from the crew side
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#1 BA purser, and Paul's autumn hiring thread asked for the quiet ones, and I want to write about how to tell when an airline has stopped hiring without saying so, because candidates waste months on open pages.
The signs from outside
The careers page is open but the assessment dates are not being published. The video interview invitations stop, and the applicants' forums (this one) go quiet on that airline. The 'application received' status sits for months instead of weeks. The recruiter LinkedIn posts stop. The press releases talk about fleet and routes and not about crew.
The signs from inside
No new joiner batches on the crew lists for two months. The training academy is running recurrent courses only. The base is asking senior crew to cover the summer with overtime instead of hiring. The crew room hears 'we are consolidating'. And the standby blocks get longer because the base is short and not recruiting.
Why airlines do not announce it
Because an announced freeze is a news story about the airline's finances, and an unannounced one is just a slow careers page. Because the freeze may be a pause and the airline wants the pipeline warm. And because the recruitment team is still employed and still receiving applications, which is not the same as hiring.
What a candidate should do
Ask here. A crew member at the airline can say 'no batches since March' in a sentence and save you a season. Watch for assessment dates, not open pages. Apply anyway, because the pipeline that reopens hires from the existing applications first. And do not wait for one airline. Apply to five.
What a crew member should do
Say so, plainly, with the month, in Paul's thread or this one. Nico did it for ITA in the autumn thread and it was the most useful reply there. The airlines will not tell candidates. We can.
The current picture, from what I hear
I will not name airlines beyond what crew have already posted, but the pattern this year is: the low cost carriers and the Gulf are hiring hard, the US majors in waves, and two or three European legacy carriers are on quiet pauses that their careers pages do not show. The crew at those carriers know. Ask them.
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#2 ITA, and I said no course since spring in the autumn thread and I will say it here again: the page is open, the batches are not. Candidates for ITA should apply and should not wait. Gavin's signs are all present at my base.
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#3 Virgin, and the 'senior crew covering the summer with overtime instead of hiring' sign is the one that crew notice first and candidates cannot see. When the overtime emails start, the freeze is on. Watch for crew complaining about overtime on this forum. It is a hiring indicator.
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#4 Austrian, and we have been on exactly the kind of quiet pause Gavin describes for most of this year, with a page that says open and a training centre that says recurrent. Candidates for Austrian: apply, and apply elsewhere, and do not wait for us this season.
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#6 Applying, and I have been waiting on one European legacy carrier's 'application received' since February, and this thread has told me why, and I have applied to four others this week. The five applications rule.
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#7 Recruitment adjacent, and the 'recruitment team still employed and still receiving applications is not the same as hiring' line is the thing candidates most need to understand. The team is warm. The pipeline is cold. The crew know which.