Considering leaving the profession for good, could use advice

[Ian_J]

My shop and this forum aren't my only visibility into the industry. I have a lot of friends at other places to compare notes with, a bunch of whom are formerly from here. There's a distinct tonal difference between being contacted to check in and being contacted in a way where your "union" is involved.

But yes.



Yeah, I'm at 9, I think. All legit.

It is super weird that they track it by days instead of occurrences.

I would have to look up the “reliability policy” or whatever they call it here for accuracy, but it’s something like 4 to 6 occurrences with a rolling 12 month period. And all that gets you is a check-in call. An occurrence would be calling out for a trip or a block of reserve days. And if you continue to be sick through multiple trips, that can be rolled into one single occurrence if it’s the same sickness.

Anecdotally, only the really really obvious half percent of people get contact in a negative way.

It continues to baffle me why your pilot group is against unionizing.

 

[N826AW]

The CFI draft is gonna start soon. Stay tuned. I wonder who's jersey I'll be wearing on selection stage. CAE, ATP, AeroGuard, or maybe a local outfit. Bills almost all paid off/down DTI is much lower now as a result. Hubby exited BK, two months ago, has a 750 FICO, can you say co-signer? Hard work's paid off for both of us. Finally. The long waits almost over. Now let's go back into debt and get these three instructor ratings.

If you can find an airplane to rent that allows me to instruct you in, then I can do your initial and CFII. Can do all the ground via Zoom and the flying over a weekend or so.

 

[CoffeeIcePapers]

The CFI draft is gonna start soon. Stay tuned. I wonder whose jersey I'll be wearing on selection stage. CAE, ATP, AeroGuard, or maybe a local outfit. Bills almost all paid off/down DTI is much lower now as a result. Hubby exited BK, two months ago, has a 750 FICO, can you say co-signer? Hard work's paid off for both of us. Finally. The long waits almost over. Now let's go back into debt and get these three instructor ratings.

Awesome

Disciplinary meetings with the CP, consequences unspecified.

Our unio . . . no wait, labor or . . . no, that's not right either. Well, our (whatever the legal fiction of the day is) has reminded us that we owe all of our time to the company, and that we're expected to be able to justify any absences.

Pilots who are over the company average (6 days) are being contacted.

How much sick time do you accrue in a year? Where are you based? When I was based in New York, this violated state law.

 

[Baronman]

At my Blue shop… I could have 200+ hours of banked PTO… not call out for the prior 12 months but call out July 8 for a day trip and then again July 30 for a day trip and trigger a reliability review with the CP.

Some could call it disciplinary I suppose… Some wouldn’t…

 

[word302]

It is super weird that they track it by days instead of occurrences.

I would have to look up the “reliability policy” or whatever they call it here for accuracy, but it’s something like 4 to 6 occurrences with a rolling 12 month period. And all that gets you is a check-in call. An occurrence would be calling out for a trip or a block of reserve days. And if you continue to be sick through multiple trips, that can be rolled into one single occurrence if it’s the same sickness.

Anecdotally, only the really really obvious half percent of people get contact in a negative way.

It continues to baffle me why your pilot group is against unionizing.

I'm not so sure the pilot group is against unionizing anymore. I think a vote would pass easily for the last 7 or 8 years at least. The problem is ALPA won't allow another failed drive so they are requiring 80% of the group's emails and phone numbers before initiating a card drive. With the constant churn of pilots in the group (and several iterations of organizing committees) it's a pretty futile task. I was leading the drive for over 5 years. We just couldn't get the volunteers to collect contact information (think 10-20 pilots in each base, so 200-400 volunteers. I think we struggled to ever get above 30). I got 100s of people asking when we could vote, but very few willing to lift a finger to make it happen.

 

[Ian_J]

I'm not so sure the pilot group is against unionizing anymore. I think a vote would pass easily for the last 7 or 8 years at least. The problem is ALPA won't allow another failed drive so they are requiring 80% of the group's emails and phone numbers before initiating a card drive. With the constant churn of pilots in the group (and several iterations of organizing committees) it's a pretty futile task. I was leading the drive for over 5 years. We just couldn't get the volunteers to collect contact information (think 10-20 pilots in each base, so 200-400 volunteers. I think we struggled to ever get above 30). I got 100s of people asking when we could vote, but very few willing to lift a finger to make it happen.

Geez. Well that sucks.

 

[Maximilian_Jenius]

I'm not so sure the pilot group is against unionizing anymore. I think a vote would pass easily for the last 7 or 8 years at least. The problem is ALPA won't allow another failed drive so they are requiring 80% of the group's emails and phone numbers before initiating a card drive. With the constant churn of pilots in the group (and several iterations of organizing committees) it's a pretty futile task. I was leading the drive for over 5 years. We just couldn't get the volunteers to collect contact information (think 10-20 pilots in each base, so 200-400 volunteers. I think we struggled to ever get above 30). I got 100s of people asking when we could vote, but very few willing to lift a finger to make it happen.

A lot of pilots were very worried about the real possibility of retribution. Granted that I was just a Skywest cadet and I guess that I still technically am. But we had a pilot representative come in and speak to our school twice a month. During the last active ALPA drive circa 2018/2019 I think, one came in full propaganda and was like, "so I'm sure that we heard that there's an ALPA drive going on. We don't need ALPA on property, we're a family." But talking to younger FO's that would come and talk to the school one on one, if asked and not in front of the entire class, they would say that they wanted ALPA and a lot of others do as well. But again retribution.

 

[🦈💜]

I'm not so sure the pilot group is against unionizing anymore. I think a vote would pass easily for the last 7 or 8 years at least. The problem is ALPA won't allow another failed drive so they are requiring 80% of the group's emails and phone numbers before initiating a card drive. With the constant churn of pilots in the group (and several iterations of organizing committees) it's a pretty futile task. I was leading the drive for over 5 years. We just couldn't get the volunteers to collect contact information (think 10-20 pilots in each base, so 200-400 volunteers. I think we struggled to ever get above 30). I got 100s of people asking when we could vote, but very few willing to lift a finger to make it happen.

Ok, we've gotta know each other.

Yeah, what he says. Same with my experience. Not sure if we overlapped on the OC, but yeah.

Even the domain is gone now.

 

[Ian_J]

A lot of pilots were very worried about the real possibility of retribution. Granted that I was just a Skywest cadet and I guess that I still technically am. But we had a pilot representative come in and speak to our school twice a month. During the last active ALPA drive circa 2018/2019 I think, one came in full propaganda and was like, "so I'm sure that we heard that there's an ALPA drive going on. We don't need ALPA on property, we're a family." But talking to younger FO's that would come and talk to the school one on one, if asked and not in front of the entire class, they would say that they wanted ALPA and a lot of others do as well. But again retribution.

Had a 20+ year OO former base chief in my new hire class. Even though he moved on to an ALPA legacy he still was drunk on OO koolaid talking about how they never needed a union because they were family.

5 years later the dude volunteers in his new airline’s chief pilot office. Not special assignment. Not union. He just comes in and “helps” for free.

 

[word302]

Had a 20+ year OO former base chief in my new hire class. Even though he moved on to an ALPA legacy he still was drunk on OO koolaid talking about how they never needed a union because they were family.

5 years later the dude volunteers in his new airline’s chief pilot office. Not special assignment. Not union. He just comes in and “helps” for free.

Even a lot of those guys have figured out it's not the same, family-run operation that hired them. Most of them are so out of touch with what it's like to be a junior pilot though. They have the seniority to circumvent the lack of QOL so they think everything is unicorns and rainbows. They're definitely in the minority now though and have been for quite some time.

 

[Maximilian_Jenius]

Had a 20+ year OO former base chief in my new hire class. Even though he moved on to an ALPA legacy he still was drunk on OO koolaid talking about how they never needed a union because they were family.

5 years later the dude volunteers in his new airline’s chief pilot office. Not special assignment. Not union. He just comes in and “helps” for free.

Even a lot of those guys have figured out it's not the same, family-run operation that hired them. Most of them are so out of touch with what it's like to be a junior pilot though. They have the seniority to circumvent the lack of QOL so they think everything is unicorns and rainbows. They're definitely in the minority now though and have been for quite some time.

We had another very senior SLC ERJ captain come into our class. He said something to this point. "Sure with my time and experience, I could leave SKYW and go to the likes of DL or UA, no problem (he must not have liked AA). But why would I do that? I'd just be a number there. But at SKYW I'm a person. I'm family. We all know each other here in SLC.

I text @derg during dudes talk. Doug's reply back was, "sure." With a laughing emoji.

 

[Ian_J]

We had another very senior SLC ERJ captain come into our class. He said something to this point. "Sure with my time and experience, I could leave SKYW and go to the likes of DL or UA, no problem (he must not have liked AA). But why would I do that? I'd just be a number there. But at SKYW I'm a person. I'm family. We all know each other here in SLC.

I text @derg during dudes talk. Doug's reply back was, "sure." With a laughing emoji.

Yeah, they know each other as family so well they’ll pounce on your 6th sick day.

 

[Maximilian_Jenius]

Yeah, they know each other as family so well they’ll pounce on your 6th sick day.

Another thing that he said was. "I already make really good money for my family. I'm not greedy. I don't need to make $300-400k."

Folks... if you either haven't been, or haven't lived in UT. The indoctrination is quite thick there. Church rules all and SKYW, like all all other big SLC/UT. corporate companies. Is an extension of the church.

 

[derg]

Another thing that he said was. "I already make really good money for my family. I'm not greedy. I don't need to make $300-400k."

Folks... if you either haven't been, or haven't lived in UT. The indoctrination is quite thick there. Church rules all and SKYW, like all all other big SLC/UT. corporate companies. Is an extension of the church.

“Gold, Jerry, this is GOLD!”

 

[derg]

Even counting on one hand the amount of hotels I get in a year, NYC is redonkulous. Still better than ATL flying.

NYC 330 is the best flying, but we’d fly the sh— out of that 350 tho!

 

[Maximilian_Jenius]

NYC 330 is the best flying.

LIES! SLC ERJ is the best flying, ever! I don't need to fly to ATH. When I can fly to ATL. Then to AHN. Next best thing!

 

[derg]

LIES! SLC ERJ is the best flying, ever! I don't need to fly to ATH. When I can fly to ATL. Then to AHN. Next best thing!

There ARE people that think that way, then retire only to complain about not being able to get to ATH because the loads are full.

 

[Maximilian_Jenius]

There ARE people that think that way, then retire only to complain about not being able to get to ATH because the loads are full.

Bro, the parade of propaganda pilots, trying to indoctrinate up at the cadet level was comical and alarming. Being an outsider I wasn't swayed. But the local Mormons, they all drank the Guyana juice and even came back for seconds.

 

[word302]

Bro, the parade of propaganda pilots, trying to indoctrinate up at the cadet level was comical and alarming. Being an outsider I wasn't swayed. But the local Mormons, they all drank the Guyana juice and even came back for seconds.

Amazingly most of the pilots in that base aren’t members of the cloth.

 

[ERfly]

Had a 20+ year OO former base chief in my new hire class. Even though he moved on to an ALPA legacy he still was drunk on OO koolaid talking about how they never needed a union because they were family.

5 years later the dude volunteers in his new airline’s chief pilot office. Not special assignment. Not union. He just comes in and “helps” for free.

XJT had one of those!

We called him Dwight, Assistant to the Chief Pilot. Finally weaseled his way into the big chair. It went about as well as you'd expect.