Pinnacle guys - is it almost finally time?

I am convinced now that there is a driving force to wrapping up these negotiations. I feel the company wants dual qulification really bad for some reason for delta or some other carrier. I have no problem with dual qualification as long as there is pay protection and good work rules that come from it. I am going to throw this out there not as my belief but from a couple junior pilots i was talking too. Is there any chance some senior pilots don't want to fly the 200 anymore and that is why they are holding on this?
 
The only way as a -900 qualified crewmember I will accept dual qual is if EVERYTHING they ask me to do is paid at the -900 rate (200 flying/reserve, 900 flying/reserve, sick, etc.). That way they won't want to use 900 guys too much in the 200 system. And, for the 200 folks, they should get 900 pay for every minute they spend qualified in the 900.

Or.... the only -200 rate is when I'm sitting in a -200 but there needs to be a monthly cap on hours, because I don't want them to take my reserve time off and start paying me the lower rate to do -200 high speeds.

STFD, or bust. No blended rates.
 
I'm still sticking with what I said before on the guarantee that FOs won't be furloughed and CAs won't be downgraded. What good is getting paid at the -900 rate for all the flying I do if it boots me back to the right seat and kicks 50+ guys to the street?
 
pilotlight said:
I am convinced now that there is a driving force to wrapping up these negotiations. I feel the company wants dual qulification really bad for some reason for delta or some other carrier. I have no problem with dual qualification as long as there is pay protection and good work rules that come from it. I am going to throw this out there not as my belief but from a couple junior pilots i was talking too. Is there any chance some senior pilots don't want to fly the 200 anymore and that is why they are holding on this?
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We took the separate pay category position way back when I was a newbie MEC member years ago at the beginning of contract negotiations. It was for one big reason: seniority.

Seniority should have its privileges. A senior pilot should not have to jump back and forth between two different planes and only make the higher rate when he's lucky enough to get flying on the -900. He should be able to fly the -900 all the time and get the higher rate all the time. Seniority is supposed to count for something.

I hope they don't back down on this issue. STFD!
 
So why not set it up like ExpressJet had it? The bidding categories for captain were long jet and short jet (145 vs. 135). The number of short jets in the fleet determined the number of short jet captain vacancies there were. If you could only hold short jet in your base, you were paid short jet pay regardless of what aircraft you fly. So you bid with everybody, you fly both aircraft, blah blah blah, the only difference in pay is based on seniority.

If you're senior you get paid more, if you're junior you get paid less. It's not an issue now that the short jets are gone, but that's how the contract is setup.
 
That's an interesting idea, and it might be a good compromise. Personally, I would still fight to the end on keeping them completely separate, but that's just me.
 
thats not a bad idea. Isnt that how Horzons pay scale is as well? Senior guys got the -700 pay while the junior pilot got Dash-8 pay, no matter what equipment they were on.
 
kellwolf said:
Actually, I think they ARE talking to Delta. They tried to sneak this one by us and hoped everyone would say "Oh well, there at goes." Then they realized that if they go through with this, they're gonna be short of FAs, rampers and gate agents during the busy summer months while they bring new people up to speed. Oops. All it did was not only unite the pilot group (mostly), but put ALL of the employee groups firmly in management's collective faces.

On the "Delta is pushing PCL to get a contract," I don't know if I buy into that. If we drop out, Delta can just either let the flying go or shift it to another carrier. I'm sure they could downgrade ATL-RIC from a -900 to a -700 while ASA does ATL-Belize City in a -900. From what I've gotten from Scott (and he talks to Lee Moak over at Delta a lot), there's not much pressure coming from Delta on this one. I'm more inclined to think there's another RFP out there we're not hearing about that might hinge on a pilot contract.
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Hate to say I told you so, but i knew the company's meeting with delta wouldnt provide any results. I am not too sad about losing the buddy passes and RTC. I mean having them were fine, but if thats all i lost I wouldnt be too sad about it. But losing travel bennies for my mom, that really sucks. She was hoping to travel internationally next year. Now i have to tell her "sorry, Delta screwed us". ALso the 3 int'l travel days is ridiculous. I was never a fan of this merger. but now i really hate it.

As for the contract. maybe its not delta. but its something pushing Phil. Which is good for us. The company isnt all of a sudden wanting to sign a contract just to make us happy. Why would they? we were the cheapest operators providing the BEST performance numbers. If i was CEO, i wouldn't sign a contract either. there is no incentive too, unless there is something else in the works.
 
blee256 said:
Hate to say I told you so, but i knew the company's meeting with delta wouldnt provide any results. I am not too sad about losing the buddy passes and RTC. I mean having them were fine, but if thats all i lost I wouldnt be too sad about it. But losing travel bennies for my mom, that really sucks. She was hoping to travel internationally next year. Now i have to tell her "sorry, Delta screwed us". ALso the 3 int'l travel days is ridiculous. I was never a fan of this merger. but now i really hate it.
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Eh, no reason to say "I told ya so," I honestly never really thought they'd make any headway. I'm actually not even sure they talked about the pass benefits. I'd like to hear recordings or see transcripts of what goes on in the Pinnacle/Delta meetings. Might make for some SERIOUS interesting reading. It would at least give us some semblance of truth that god knows we don't get from our own management. My biggest beef is still the international travel days. Why even have pass benefits if I can fly more international on American and United, two carriers our company doesn't even fly for?

As for the contract. maybe its not delta. but its something pushing Phil. Which is good for us. The company isnt all of a sudden wanting to sign a contract just to make us happy. Why would they? we were the cheapest operators providing the BEST performance numbers. If i was CEO, i wouldn't sign a contract either. there is no incentive too, unless there is something else in the works.
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I think they may have accidentally tipped us all off pushing for dual qual all of a sudden. Sure, we're overstaffed in ATL and understaffed every where else, but why not just do a re-alignment bid?
 
kellwolf said:
Eh, no reason to say "I told ya so," I honestly never really thought they'd make any headway. I'm actually not even sure they talked about the pass benefits. I'd like to hear recordings or see transcripts of what goes on in the Pinnacle/Delta meetings. Might make for some SERIOUS interesting reading. It would at least give us some semblance of truth that god knows we don't get from our own management.
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What i picture is, you know in those tv shows, when someone goes into buy a car and they are haggling with the salesman. And the salesman says "hold on a sec. let me check with my manager" so he runs to the back office. And all he does is grap some water and ask his buddies, so where we going for lunch today. Then he comes back out and tells the customer, sorry my boss said we cant do that deal. But i really tried. Thats exactly how it went.

kellwolf said:
My biggest beef is still the international travel days. Why even have pass benefits if I can fly more international on American and United, two carriers our company doesn't even fly for?
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Exactly!!


kellwolf said:
I think they may have accidentally tipped us all off pushing for dual qual all of a sudden. Sure, we're overstaffed in ATL and understaffed every where else, but why not just do a re-alignment bid?
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Why dont they do a lot of things here! haha...so we displaced captains to ATL, and now we are overstaffed there, is that whats going on? and we displaced people to the right seat and CA are getting JMed and extended constantly, is that right? haha....simply the best


BTW, kell, do you have rgt this month?
 
blee256 said:
What i picture is, you know in those tv shows, when someone goes into buy a car and they are haggling with the salesman. And the salesman says "hold on a sec. let me check with my manager" so he runs to the back office. And all he does is grap some water and ask his buddies, so where we going for lunch today. Then he comes back out and tells the customer, sorry my boss said we cant do that deal. But i really tried. Thats exactly how it went.
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That's how I picture it, too. Nevermind the fact that when management came out to "sell" the new pass benefits in the crew rooms they had no clue how they worked. Yeah, THAT'S who I want fighting for my pass benefits.

BTW, kell, do you have rgt this month?
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Nah. I had it back in April.
 
Another week of complete silence. Anyone know if they are actually meeting this week? I am curious to see if this Dual Qualification issue is another stall tatic.
 
The nmb now has their hand in the matter. The company wants dual qual to only have to pay -900 rates when in the 900. Our dfault solution is to keep it seperate. The company was given a proposal much like expressjet's to have seniority bidding for the pay; but it also protects current -900 pilots. That is very expensive for the company. If they want the flexibility it will cost them, or they can drop the dual qual and we would have a TA. Unfortunately I don't think the TA (current and assuming no dual qual) would pass an MEC vote, and not a pilot vote if it made it to the group. Pass travel and certain other areas are currently unchanged from the current contract language. Why this is the case is unknown to me. Leading performance doesn't help.
 
After talking to Ken about a couple of things in DTW the other day, I tend to agree with him. Being on the retirement and insurance committee, he's in the know on a certain sections of the TA, and they're WELL short of what they should be on a new deal. If it manages to eek past the MEC, I'm willing to read the whole thing cover to cover multiple times to see it as a whole. However, if they pretty much left what we discussed unchanged, I shudder to think how scope was TA'ed so quickly last week.
 
The lastest i am hearing and i am sure higney will get the official news when it comes out is that this round of mediated negotiations is going to produce nothing. We are never going to get released. Seriously, lets pick a day and just shut this place down. The world will be a better place.
 
pilotlight said:
The lastest i am hearing and i am sure higney will get the official news when it comes out is that this round of mediated negotiations is going to produce nothing. We are never going to get released. Seriously, lets pick a day and just shut this place down. The world will be a better place.
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I have been told the negotiating committee is currently in DC doing mediated sessions with the NMB. I do not know if any progress has been made- they just started sometime yesterday. If you wanna know what's going on show up at the LEC meeting tomorrow. It would be nice to put some names with real names and faces. :dunno: Saucer afterwards?
 
higney85 said:
I have been told the negotiating committee is currently in DC doing mediated sessions with the NMB. I do not know if any progress has been made- they just started sometime yesterday. If you wanna know what's going on show up at the LEC meeting tomorrow. It would be nice to put some names with real names and faces. :dunno: Saucer afterwards?
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Why haven't we had a meeting in the newly established 127 yet? If I had won that would have been high on my priority list.

BTW what time is this meeting in MEM?
 
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