Commuting
Living somewhere other than your base city and flying in on staff travel before each trip, common at US and European carriers.
Definition
Commuting is living away from your base and travelling to it — usually on standby staff travel — before each trip or block of duties, then home again after. It is widespread wherever crew have free or cheap staff travel and base cities are expensive: US majors, Lufthansa, British Airways. Most US contracts have a commuter policy that protects you if you list on two flights and both fail, but the travel itself is unpaid and outside your duty time.
What it means for you
Commuting lets you keep a cheaper home or a partner's job while flying from an expensive hub, and it is the reason crash pads exist. The cost is hidden time: a commute the day before an early report is an unpaid night away, and a missed standby seat is a missed trip on your record. Gulf carriers do not allow it — everyone lives at the base.
In practice
United crew commute widely on staff travel, and crash pads near Newark, SFO and Chicago are an established sublet economy; a Lufthansa crew member may live in Leipzig and fly to Frankfurt on standby travel the evening before a long-haul report.
Go deeper
Related terms
4 terms- Crash padCrew lifeA shared apartment near a US crew base, rented by the bunk, where commuting crew sleep between trips instead of paying for a hotel.
- Staff travelPay & benefitsHeavily discounted, usually standby, flights for airline employees and their families on their own airline and partner carriers.
- BaseCrew lifeThe airport where your duties start and end and where you must live within reach — the single fact that most shapes a cabin crew life.
- JumpseatPay & benefitsThe fold-down crew seat at each door or on the flight deck; as a benefit, the right to ride it free when commuting or travelling.