Mesa furlough?

I wish everyone best luck.

A total • thing to say

Don't blame Jace. He would like make his "commuting life" a little easier. :p On the opposite side, PDT might hire ex-Mesa Dash guys and gals for staffing.
 
Hey, JaceTheAce... I like you but that was kind of an • thing to say. Well, not kind of. A total • thing to say.

I'm not saying it will replace Mesa's operations, I would just like to see our airline have presence out there to make my commute a bit better.

PHX is US Airways property, we'll see what happens.

:yeahthat:

Don't blame Jace. He would like make his "commuting life" a little easier. :p On the opposite side, PDT might hire ex-Mesa Dash guys and gals for staffing.
That would be great if we could hire them - pull them out of a bad operation and have them come to a better one.
 
I'm not saying it will replace Mesa's operations, I would just like to see our airline have presence out there to make my commute a bit better.
And you thought the perfect place to make this desire of yours known is a thread about 49 furloughed pilots from a competing regional airline who happens to have a major PHX base? That is BS.
 
This is a negotiating tactic, friends. Strong word on the street is that the 3Q financials will be late (as usual) and will show a loss (ooh, shocker).

The loss I can see as reality. OJ has been wasting money in Hawaii and China and he's never going to see it back. The airline NEEDS those 50 newhires and they're only getting furloughed because management wants the soon-to-be-released TA to pass.

Do the right thing for those who are furloughed. VOTE NO! OJ's first offer will be crud. Always has been, always will be. That's how negotiations are. Shoot it down in a huge way. If the FAs can negotiate for 2+ years, so can the pilots.

This is not like Contract 2003. There is no Freedom. The MEC is not playing games with the pilot group. Just say no. Do the right thing for the guys and gals that management is screwing.
 
IMO, if the pilots got a TA that early it's either really good or REALLY, REALLY bad. If it's the later, the negotiating committee either needs to be sacked or put in a room with pilots for a good talking to.
 
When you're reading it, remember:

Southwest pilots told the company that they did not want PBS. Generally speaking, PBS will only work well IF you, the pilots, have 110% control over the system and the language. PBS means $$$ to MAG management, and nothing at all to the pilots. Really read up on that before you accept it.

If the TA says "to the extent possible" or "at the company's discretion" or anything like that anywhere in it ... vote NO. You don't need it and it costs the company NOTHING to eliminate it.

If the TA allows for junior assignments, vote NO. It is the responsibility of any corporation in any industry to properly staff itself. Make the company recall the pawns, I mean furloughs, and hire enough people for the job at hand.

Now, when it comes to payrates, that will be a tough one. Like it or not, the reality is that MAG is teetering on the brink of extinction, thanks in part to the somewhat legal dealings and bad investment choices of OJ. You probably won't get top dollar, but that doesn't mean you can't ask for it. No matter what, the FOs need a pay differential for the CR7 and CR9. Don't pass a TA without it.

There are some who argue "Oh, it's only for 2 years. Let's take what we can get now and we'll fight for better in 2010." Nope. That's what OJ wants you to think. IF there is a MAG in 2010, it'll take 5 years to negotiate a good contract. That means 7 years under this thing, so make it the best in the business.

Best of luck to you all. It's not an easy time. Your MEC is a much better group than what we had in 2003, and you have much more access on the 'net to discuss things. If you're not already, get over to MesaHub or LAMAland to discuss this thing once it's in your hands.

-Bog
 
Southwest pilots told the company that they did not want PBS. Generally speaking, PBS will only work well IF you, the pilots, have 110% control over the system and the language. PBS means $$$ to MAG management, and nothing at all to the pilots. Really read up on that before you accept it.


I'll relate what happened at PCL when we had PBS rammed down our throat. There was an LOA from our 99 agreement (aka the current contract) that allowed for PBS. One of the stipulations was it needed a 6 month successful parallel bidding period with the paper bidding process. Well, of the "6 months" the company decided to go with, maybe ONE of them could have been deemed "successful" by the pilot group as the rest of them weren't even contractually compliant. Well, the company put it in, and there's a standing grievance on it right now (to my knowledge, it's still in the grievance process).

As a result, the powers that be decided that the scheduling section of our contract was null and void, being replaced by PBS.....unless THEY needed something from that section. PBS has triggered more grievances than I thought possible. Vacations are ALL screwed up. The way it used to work is you bid, you got your line, and any trips scheduled during the time your vacation fell were removed. When PBS started, vacation was added in first, so the system bid around your vacation. Which means you might get the last 16 days of the month off, but you would fly close to the limit the first half of the month with VERY few days off. Training events used to work similar to vacation. If you were awarded a trip per your bid that fell on a training event, you got bought off that. Now, PBS builds training in first, so you don't get more than 3.75 hours a day for training, whereas before we had the opportunity to bid a high credit 2-3 day and get the credit for that. Same problems with days off and front/back loading of the schedule occur with training as with vacation.

Another issue that has just crept up is military leave. The only way the company can seem to get it to work is if you turn in your orders for leave BEFORE bidding. Guess what? PBS bids around that now, too, so you get the same thing -- work your butt off before leave....then work your butt off for the military while on military leave. I'll let blee relate his little horror story of fighting to get paid correctly, too.

We MIGHT have even had a new contract a few months ago if the company was willing to give on some PBS issues. Instead, we actually went FURTHER apart thanks to their stance on PBS. It basically takes a lot of things the pilots have control over QoL wise with paper bidding out of their hands and puts it in the company's hands.
 
Thanks for the post kell. I'd love to hear more constructive opinions on PBS. I don't really know much about it, and I'd like to make an educated decision when it comes to voting for or against it. As I understand it, PBS would make the scheduling more efficient, but if the company has the majority of the say in things, then it will also be used to abuse the crew. Is that a fair over generalization?
 
If there is no contractually set default value for each of the parameters used in the PBS then it just make them able to screw you over, but more efficiently.
 
Thanks for the post kell. I'd love to hear more constructive opinions on PBS. I don't really know much about it, and I'd like to make an educated decision when it comes to voting for or against it. As I understand it, PBS would make the scheduling more efficient, but if the company has the majority of the say in things, then it will also be used to abuse the crew. Is that a fair over generalization?

It's more efficient, sure. But if you've got no control over your QoL, it's all one sided advantages for management. They may (and ours does) be able to change programming parameters month-to-month to the point you don't even get the same thing on a standing bid. I've seen my bid go from 95 credit line with 17 days off to a 87 credit line with 12 days off....and I didn't change a thing. If you've got pilot access to the pairing generator, you can see what they're doing. We don't, and the company doesn't wanna give it to us b/c they're afraid we'll catch some stuff they're doing. Probably would.

Now, under the right circumstances and an airline that's properly staffed, PBS can be a good thing. I just have no experience in that. Right now, management is "punishing" us for winning a grievance on vacation by requiring over 30 reserves per base for time they'll have to get covered. Now, if they were smart and did it our way, they'd be able to just schedule that stuff ahead of time when the lines come out and vacation slides are awarded. Instead, they'd rather hold 60 people per base hostage on a day-to-day basis "just in case." If we had access to the pairings, we could see what needed to be covered and generate lines out of that. Viola. More line holders, fewer reserves. But the company likes flexibility, so they get reserves with 10 days off a month rather than line holders that can tell scheduling "no."
 
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