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Silver State Helicopters


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sounds like that guy could piss in a bottle and sell it as apple juice. If an instructor there was fortunate enough to get 25 hours a week of paid instructing time, he/she would be earning $40 per hour. I think not. Run away from this company, before you become one of those brainwashed cfi's that was blatently lieing to you.
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TTF, Siver State won't talk with you unless you started with them, bad buisness! The owner Jerry, himself emailed me, and asked if I really did talk with his staff, and I told him about it, but he never did follow up on anything. I'm sure Silver State is good enough to train new pilots, as long as bring along $50,000 up front, and have 2 years to comeplete your training. There are alot of good schools out there that would be more then happy to train you. Good luck. ::rotorhead::
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"When he got to the part about financing, he told us it would be about $55,000.  To pay this back, if you made it thru the program and were (most likely, because they pretty much hire 94% of the students) offered a job as a CFI you'd be making....well, $52,000.  The lowest paid CFI they had.  Again, this gave me the impression they start you at $52,000 a year SALARY."

 

Most flight schools will offer the same program as SSH's for around $40,000.  Do the math:  SSH students are overpaying by at least $15,000.  That times about 70 students is over a million dollars!  That's how they can afford to pay their CFI's $52K/year.  The extra $20K/yr. for each instructor is a drop in the bucket compared to the profit they're making by overcharging the students.  All in all, a pretty clever scheme.

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  • 2 weeks later...
I have flown with two instructors that went to SSH in Utah and found they were getting paid for about 6 hours a day at 25.00 per hour, on site 10-12 hours a day. So at 5 days a week, 52 weeks a year gets you $39,000.00 no where near 52,000.00 they claim. If they instructed a ground class they had 30 students for two hours and got paid 300.00, what a bargan.  Both left within a couple of months of starting there. They are good for the CFI who is looking for that first break, and who really will fly for food. Yes they have hired non students...
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Currently I am working on my Commercial IFR Rotorcraft Helicopter with SSH Mesa AZ and I am beginning to see the politics at work with in the coorporate structure.  I feel this is a good school and I like most of the operation but the time it is currently taking to finish my schooling is a drawback to my life's schedule and the total money involved per student is insane.  I can see how they have expanded so much in the last year alone but I hope it doesn't kill the already tight market for rotorcraft pilots.
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  • 8 months later...

After reading this entire thread it occurred to me that with its very rapid growth SSH is becoming the Walmart of the helicopter industry. As such they are going to be hated by the rest of the helicopter industry in the same way Walmart is hated by the rest of the retailing industry.

 

Is SSH a pyramid scheme? If one assumes that pilots with CFI rating are only good for instructing students, then SSH surely does look like one.

 

However if you look at their web site you will see SSH employs helicopter pilots for a whole lot more than flight instruction (tours, external load, law enforcement support, etc). Who is doing those other jobs? Well, it is CFIs who have accumulated enough flying time within the company, of course. So, a CFI who is instructing at SSH today will likely be doing something else within the company as soon as that person has accumulated enough total flying time.

 

From what I have read in the press and in the SSH website, it appears the main reason SSH trains students is so it can fill jobs within the company. Since the company is growing very rapidly, it makes perfect sense for them to have an agressive student recruiting program, because they need many new employees to fill the openings at all the new SSH locations that keep opening up.

 

So to me SSH does look like a viable business and not a pyramid scheme.

 

Disclaimer: All of the above is just my opinion and as such it could be completely wrong. I have no relationshhip whatsoever with SSH nor am I planing to join their employee, I mean, student training program at this time.

 

 

 

 

 

 

I

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