LaydeeSarah

I am a software consultant and spend a portion of each week travelling around to clients. My company only allow travel in Y but with the addition of my own personal travel and some upgrades out of my own pocket I get to maintain airline and hotel status.

Bear in mind, as thegoderic says, that it isnt all fun. Much of your week is spent away from home in hotels or sat on a plane, and made worse when you have to be ready to work when you get to your destination. I have had a number of 4am starts for a 6.30am flight, a whole day of work and then home on the 7pm flight, bed by 10pm -- only to start again the next day.

I think my ideal job would be a travel writer, one of those people who writes the reviews in Business Traveller and the like, getting paid to fly in J and F cabins and write about it.

Pandor

Many people write reviews for free: www.airlinequality.com

gms

I would urge you to firstly think about a career you are interested in and think you would enjoy.

Secondly, as many have posted, business travel ain't much fun these days. I rarely get any time to see beyond the inside of an airport, taxis, hotel and office. Traveling the world in economy is fine if you're off on your hols for a couple of weeks, but as a GC holder who travels mainly in ET or WT+ I can tell you it can be quite a painful experience.

So if you think you'll find a job straight out of school or college that will let you travel business class to exotic destinations and have loads of time to sight see when you arrive, dream on!

gaz68

Oh for god's sake, lighten up will ya

Phil the Flyer

Forgive me if my 54 year old memory is failing me, but weren't you under some sort of self-imposed FT BAEC exile until after 9 June (or thereabouts)?

To the OP - British Civil Engineers are still widely respected and very much in demand worldwide. If you have a full-time overseas contract of employment, and observe no. of days visiting rules, you can achieve non-resident for (UK) tax purposes status into the bargain.

Prospero

Warning: excessive work related travel can kill one's passion for flying

Rambuster

My job will get you all sorts of FF cards.
Yawn!

sunrisegirl

Exactly ^

I know a fair number of GCH's and all work extremely hard whilst travelling on business. I've know some fly a 4-5 hour flight in CE, sign some documents in the departure lounge, and then return on another 4-5 hour flight having been in the country they travelled to for barely an hour.

Cabin crew and flight deck crew do not earn any status whatsoever from doing their work. However a few, as well as some ground staff, are silver and gold card holders from their own private travel - using full commercial tickets in the same way as regular passengers.

If you're looking for a career choice, then surely it's best to choose something which you both enjoy and are qualified at. Little point in taking a job requiring lots of travel if you hate it.

Pandor

(Mr) Phil the Flyer, I remember a fellow FT'er suggested that it would help to visit FT daily for a limited time... I've actually been doing about 7 hours of revision daily (seriously ) except Sundays. I'm currently doing well and am only on FT during short breaks. As long as I follow my timetable and do sufficient revision daily, there is time to browse FT.

Back on topic...

Swanhunter

Quite.

To the OP - as others have said find a sector you are interested in and pursue that first, then think about how you can leverage your skills and experience to find a travelling job.

I enjoyed the first 5-6 years of business travel (mostly). I was able to go to places I was unlikely to otherwise visit (Saudi Arabia), see a different side of those I had been to (nothing quite like negotiating with Thai or Cambodian civil servants to give a clear insight into a society) and earn miles to support holidays in new places I wanted to go to (hello Tonga and Samoa).

Then my job became the same 3-4 places on repeat with increased frequency. Over 3 weeks last summer I did LHR-BLR-CMB-MAA-BOM-LHR-MAN-LHR-HKG-SIN-HKG-PVG-LHR-IST-LHR-HKG-LHR including lots of days on the ground working. Utterly horrific. The holidays are still there for me, the GGL benefits smooth the path but it is tiring and stressful and doesn't just impact you. I've lost touch with friends through never being around and most painful of all was being somewhere over Russia on a CX plane (and thus uncontactable) when my father died. Finding out by baggage carousel 7 of T3, 6 hours after he passed away was not cool at all.

HIDDY

My younger brother is a CA.....great job,very healthy salary,fancy car,gorgeous house and a stunning wife......he works extremely hard and his position comes with a hell of a lot of responsibility. When he travels to Cape Town on business they send him in VS Premium Economy and in Europe he flies in economy class.

I on the other hand potter about, have a decent house,normal car,loving wife,two dogs three cats and a tortoise. I pay for my own travel and I have not only seen more of the world than my brother but I have flown First Class five times more than him. ^

Gaz

As a few others have said succinctly, there are numerous downsides to seriously heavy business travel. Your life ceases to be your own, and instead is dictated by where you're off to next, with other essential life stuff having to be crammed into the small amount of time you have at home. It's tough on relationships, and you invariably miss important things like weddings and christenings, as well as losing touch with numerous friends because you're never there. There have been quite a few occasions when I've been about to head off to somewhere I really didn't want to go to (despite nice lounges and a great hotel the other end), because my friends were all doing something far more fun like going down the pub for the bank holiday!

That said, I still wouldn't change - but I'm quite lucky. Although I pull some fairly ridiculously hectic schedules, I don't have to work too hard when I'm actually away (unlike most) and I have a reasonable degree of choice about whether I want to go somewhere or not.

Embuexpat

^^^ except no tortoise, though there may well be one somewhere in the garden, but I do have a MUCCI.

KenJohn

You could have added chauffeured driven car, even it is is Mrs Hiddy who is the chauffeur.

antichef

But you do get to spend a lot of time at really good music festivals in good locations and as tax deductible too, when the rest of us are hitting the sack in some far off and remote airport hotel!

One mans meat ..... etc