Frontier

giddy said:
There you go upup I didn’t want to put words into his mouth. Pretty disgraceful! I pray Frontier has enough people with more self respect (a shred would be all that it would take), not to mention respect for others, than this know it all to send this garbage back.

Cherokee the rest of your statement is a contradiction you have been arguing that we have to follow the ordained patterns and decisions by the NMB and arbitrators and then you give us an example of how they were broken, do you not see that it’s like you wrote a response for me?

As far as legacy rates I’ve never said what I’m expecting just what I won’t accept.
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I meant the history in terms of seniority and what pilots expect. They see in the past this happened and that happened, so for us in the future, this is what's going to most likely happen. And when it doesn't, they are disappointed. A guy above posted post 9/11 BK era wages but that is a one off thing. It's not accurate for a long term comparison. Pay and contracts are the same thing and think they are "of equals." The reality is the airlines are not equals. Too many pilots only think equipment and that's the end of their logic line. "I fly an A320, so I should get what a Delta A320 pilot gets." They completely ignore that Delta is a 40 billion entity while Frontier is a fraction of that. The business model, the airline's revenue, operating costs, everything, is different. Your comments on "send this garbage back" is somewhat ironic, because if this proposal is defined as "garbage" I don't know what you would call your current pay/contract. Based on your current package, this is significantly higher than what you have now. It isn't perfect, isn't legacy mainline, but a close enough to Spirit and within the same tier of airline Frontier is. How much more do you expect? And say you turn this down and then get your ask in 1.5 yrs with no change to the 75 million retro. Would that be "worth it?" Of course that's assuming the industry doesn't tank in the next year or two.
 
@jtrain609 will probably like this. There's currently a pilot senior to me here who bypassed upgrade and lives near PHL. He's already got an interview at Frontier and says if he gets hired, he's gonna go for the PHL base.
 
Cherokee_Cruiser said:
As someone who went through Age 65, the great recession, and my company's growth deferral of 2013, I've seen my career stall/standstill 3 different times in 11 years.
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Still have so many questions but just one I just have to ask. The Great Recession is that kind of like....... The Great Depression?
 
Cherokee_Cruiser said:
Seriously? You answered your own question. Because post 9/11 was a huge anomaly in the legacy/major airlines. They were all almost all in bankruptcy with wage cuts. It directly led to a huge boom in the regional industry and the LCC industry. Yes Spirit was around before 9/11 but nothing like it is today. jetBlue started 2000 and really expanded afterwards. VX wasn't around. Frontier was but much smaller. Sun Country and Allegiant were small jokes back then.

The problem was too many airlines, over capacity, too little market held by any one airline. Half of the airlines in that list are gone either outright or through mergers. The new tiers going forward are Delta/American/United, then Southwest/Alaska/Hawaiian/jetBlue, and then Spirit/Frontier/Allegiant/Sun Country. Historically with the exception of 9/11 and bankruptcies and post 2008 recession and bankruptcies, the legacy carriers have always paid more.
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You asserted that profitability (money made, in your words) was irrelevant to "tiers" despite the fact that 12 years ago the top five (top tier, I guess) were all airlines that had not declared bankruptcy and at least two were LCCs (I don't know what to call Frontier in 2006). The bottom five included three bankrupt legacies. If money made doesn't matter, how did United move from the bottom "tier" in 2006 to the top "tier" today?
 
Box hauler said:
Right lol, no one on earth could want to live in philly bad enough to drop all of that seniority Unless it was for DAL, UA or AA.
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Even then.

Giving up being 50% on a seniority list, where you're a topped out captain making $260 an hour and basically furlough proof? Anyone that left for Delta, United or American with that kind of seniority and pay needs to have their head examined.
 
jtrain609 said:
Even then.

Giving up being 50% on a seniority list, where you're a topped out captain making $260 an hour and basically furlough proof? Anyone that left for Delta, United or American with that kind of seniority and pay needs to have their head examined.
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Not topped out yet, but next year would be 244/hr for 8th yr pay and 53% on the list. That guy in question is single, no wife, kids, owns 2 airplanes (one is a Stearman!) on a grass field he flies on his personal time for fun. Honestly if I put myself in his shoes, with no interest to give up his planes, his grass strip, his home (downtown Philly I think), I can see why he would make a jump. On the other hand, can you imagine making 250k as a single CA with no expenses for wife/kids. Holy cow. If I didn't have 2 kids, I'd be riiiiiiiiccccchhhhhhhhhhhhhh.
 
adk said:
You asserted that profitability (money made, in your words) was irrelevant to "tiers" despite the fact that 12 years ago the top five (top tier, I guess) were all airlines that had not declared bankruptcy and at least two were LCCs (I don't know what to call Frontier in 2006). The bottom five included three bankrupt legacies. If money made doesn't matter, how did United move from the bottom "tier" in 2006 to the top "tier" today?
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It was the hurt in the post 9/11 world. The LCC expansion happened mostly in the 2000s and 2010s because the legacies were down, through BKcies, had given up many cities/markets, and left an opening for lower cost carriers. United was not a "bottom" tier in 2006 and top "tier" today. They were always in the "top tier" category (contract 2000 was pretty decent at the time). Post 9/11 and BK changed all that and pay came way down as it did for other legacies. 2008 recession hurt again. But they are profitable after a merger. Their profitability was affected but not the fact they are a large, long standing/existing legacy airline. Top tier doesn't mean how profitable one is in a given year. If an airline is unprofitable long term it would go out of business or be bought/acquired. Legacy airlines have always had their profitability years be up and down throughout history. It is the carriers history, status (legacy), length of existence, size of airline, size of operation, size of revenue, etc that ranks them in the tiers.


giddy said:
Still have so many questions but just one I just have to ask. The Great Recession is that kind of like....... The Great Depression?
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You do realize that's an official term, right? If you don't mind me asking, how long have you been at Frontier and when did you start at the airlines?
 
[QUOTE="Cherokee_Cruiser, post: 2836637, member: 183"You do realize that's an official term, right? If you don't mind me asking, how long have you been at Frontier and when did you start at the airlines?[/QUOTE]
No I did not, I just thought it was a term you made up to support your melodramatic post about how your airline career stalled out with two of the three events you mentioned happening in your first or second year of starting. Also didn’t realize that 11 years made you a wise old sage on the industry. That is also a new one to me. Thanks for the education. I’ve only got two more years till I reach your level. If you’d like to continue the member measuring contest just pm me....on second thought... just keep it to yourself.
 
Cherokee_Cruiser said:
It was the hurt in the post 9/11 world. The LCC expansion happened mostly in the 2000s and 2010s because the legacies were down, through BKcies, had given up many cities/markets, and left an opening for lower cost carriers. United was not a "bottom" tier in 2006 and top "tier" today. They were always in the "top tier" category (contract 2000 was pretty decent at the time). Post 9/11 and BK changed all that and pay came way down as it did for other legacies. 2008 recession hurt again. But they are profitable after a merger. Their profitability was affected but not the fact they are a large, long standing/existing legacy airline. Top tier doesn't mean how profitable one is in a given year. If an airline is unprofitable long term it would go out of business or be bought/acquired. Legacy airlines have always had their profitability years be up and down throughout history. It is the carriers history, status (legacy), length of existence, size of airline, size of operation, size of revenue, etc that ranks them in the tiers.
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So ... "money made" doesn't matter, but bankruptcy can negatively affect pay rates of a "top tier" airline?

If United has always been a "top tier" airline but their pay has been near both the top and bottom of the spectrum over the past decade, why can't Frontier (apparently bottom tier) go from near the bottom to near the top?
 
giddy said:
No I did not, I just thought it was a term you made up to support your melodramatic post about how your airline career stalled out with two of the three events you mentioned happening in your first or second year of starting. Also didn’t realize that 11 years made you a wise old sage on the industry. That is also a new one to me. Thanks for the education. I’ve only got two more years till I reach your level. If you’d like to continue the member measuring contest just pm me....on second thought... just keep it to yourself.
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Yeah the Great Recession is a term. If you started in 2009 then you too have gone through some of this crap so you know what's it like. Anyway it sounds like I hit a personal nerve when I didn't mean to. My total time in the industry isn't great, but I have gone through 2 mergers with 2 binding arbitration seniority awards, and 1 contractual binding award. The commentary by lawyers, judges, and arbitrators all suggest the same thing in terms of tiers of airline. They recognize the airlines for what they are.

Last point, say you get it your way and this thing is turned down. How long do you think before the next company AIP resulting in TA comes down your way? 3 mos? 6 mos? 1 yr? more? And if the 75 million retro amount isn't changed, are your gains in that new TA enough to offset what you lost from present time to the time TA2 is voted in?


adk said:
So ... "money made" doesn't matter, but bankruptcy can negatively affect pay rates of a "top tier" airline?

If United has always been a "top tier" airline but their pay has been near both the top and bottom of the spectrum over the past decade, why can't Frontier (apparently bottom tier) go from near the bottom to near the top?
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Because Frontier was never a legacy airline or pay at the top. The only reason pay came to 'top' is because the other carriers hit BK and wage cuts, which were then corrected once the economy got better. Call it an anomaly. They were already high and fell below and then went high again which is back to where they were. Frontier has never been that high to begin with. There's a difference.

Arbitrator Javits and Bloch. Lawyers, SLI work, contractual settlement work. Direct quote:

"It is true that Alaska earns record pretax margins relative to the industry average, but that metric alone does not suggest that pilot pay should be the equivalent of the industry leaders."

That says Alaska, but you can replace that with any profitable airline like Spirit or Frontier. Keep in mind they are saying about Alaska when it comes to the big 3 airlines. Bottom line, you can have the best pretax margins and make lots of profit, but that doesn't mean pilot pay should be equivalent to Delta/United/American. That's what the industry lawyers, judges, and arbitrators think. Most pilots don't.
 
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Cherokee_Cruiser said:
Because Frontier was never a legacy airline or pay at the top. The only reason pay came to 'top' is because the other carriers hit BK and wage cuts, which were then corrected once the economy got better. Call it an anomaly. They were already high and fell below and then went high again which is back to where they were. Frontier has never been that high to begin with. There's a difference.
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So, let's extrapolate this. If, in 30 years, Frontier grows into an airline the same size as Southwest, their pilots still deserve to make less than SWA because they're in the lowest caste?

Or, if, in 30 years, Frontier has been consistently profitable and United has been through bankruptcy four more times, Frontier pilots still deserve to make less than UA?
 
adk said:
So, let's extrapolate this. If, in 30 years, Frontier grows into an airline the same size as Southwest, their pilots still deserve to make less than SWA because they're in the lowest caste?
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Then, no. Frontier would then have the history, the fleet size, the fleet numbers, the revenue numbers, etc, to go to a higher tier carrier.

These are quotes from industry lawyers, judges, and arbitrators in a recent ruling....


" In awarding these [wage] increases, we are satisfied that Alaska pilots will be properly ranked just behind the four leading industry carriers. There is reason for such relative juxtaposition, but it is also true that Alaska is not properly considered fully comparable to American, Delta, United or Southwest. Those carriers, unlike Alaska, all have large networks, in some cases global, and substantially different operating models. They are between 3 to 5 times larger than Alaska and, due to their larger size and scale, they maintain strong networks with large numbers of corporate accounts and high revenue customers who demand frequency and breadth of service that can only be provided by carriers of that size and scale. "

" A fifth place ranking also recognizes the fact that Alaska occupies a similar position in virtually every business metric - operating revenue, net income, number of departures, available seats, and number of destinations served. It is true that Alaska earns record pretax margins relative to the industry average, but that metric alone does not suggest that pilot pay should be the equivalent of the industry leaders. "


If your contract process ever goes beyond the company and pilots, that's what you will face with judges, lawyers, and arbitrators.
 
Cherokee_Cruiser said:
Yeah the Great Recession is a term. If you started in 2009 then you too have gone through some of this crap so you know what's it like. Anyway it sounds like I hit a personal nerve when I didn't mean to.



Last point, say you get it your way and this thing is turned down. How long do you think before the next company AIP resulting in TA comes down your way? 3 mos? 6 mos? 1 yr? more? And if the 75 million retro amount isn't changed, are your gains in that new TA enough to offset what you lost from present time to the time TA2 is voted in?
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That sounds like kind of an apology, so thank you. But what would really do it for me is you admitting you don’t have all the information you need to be making the assertions you have about our situation and it has shown in your “i said but meant” posts. The current line bid, vacation, and training conflict rules would all be given up in this contract (which allows for huge amounts of soft time resulting in almost full months off or huge pay credit hours in a certain month) for pay in the new contract that when you factor in overrides, is actually lower than Spirits for the majority of our pilot group. And there are other parts of the AIP that are sub Spirit, reserve rules, incentivized pay, on and on. Also, would it have made any difference if I had been in the Airlines for 2 years? It was a cheap shot. Nonetheless, thanks and I apologize if I got too personal as well.

I don’t know how long just like you don’t. Like you said there is some risk involved it also is just such a clear choice of them taking advantage of us or actually not being afraid to use our rare position of advantage to our full benefit. Most importantly, the point of my earlier post may not have been clear, if we vote this in we solidify our position as a third class group of pilots willing to take the scraps that our owners are willing to throw us off their overflowing platters and this will be used against us in subsequent negotiations, that the NMB and others (ahem) will throw in our face the next time around. Your business model over money available rule is just nuts. Negotiations don’t happen unless there is money available. How much money is available determines the potential success of your negotiations. United pilots don’t get to say but our reputation “I’m a 5 star man” if god forbid the next time around Spirit is larger and more profitable, to take it to the extreme.
 
jtrain609 said:
I ran this idea by my wife last night, and she confirmed she'd leave me if I ever did anything this stupid.
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The things I did that would result in my wife leaving me has grown since ...I got a wife....also I'm glad I didn't do such things because of aforementioned wife leaving...
 
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