So how do you guys bid?

A

Atooraya

New Member
I'm currently number 42 on the seniority list and there's 47 hard lines.

A LOT of the lines i like are in the 40's because they have chicago overnights on the weekends, and i'm from chicago and based in richmond, so it works out.

What else do you guys look for? I was hoping there was some sort of program to use that helps
 
I've always looked at a blend between time at home and quality of flying, since it all pays the same. Of all the crazy things, that recently led me to a reserve line which gives me two or three days a month less at home. The payoff is working three days out of my last 15 on and it's worth it because I don't mind spending a lot of time in LA in the winter. Most guys will bid whatever kinda crappy line gives them the most time at home, no matter what. I guess that's the price you pay for being married.
 
DE727UPS said:
I've always looked at a blend between time at home and quality of flying, since it all pays the same. Of all the crazy things, that recently led me to a reserve line which gives me two or three days a month less at home. The payoff is working three days out of my last 15 on and it's worth it because I don't mind spending a lot of time in LA in the winter. Most guys will bid whatever kinda crappy line gives them the most time at home, no matter what. I guess that's the price you pay for being married.
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I just have a gf, so that doesn't worry me TOO much. I just need certain days off, and i like the idea of spending weekends at home to go out with friends and gf and then going to work the next day.
 
We do an "open" bid...just put down ten days you want off.

or put down weekends, or mon and tues...etc.

it works pretty good...especially if you're senior.
 
We have PBS, and I really don't know much about it. I live in base, so I bid the shortest trips I can get. Bidding 29 of 37, that would be 4-days. My base doesn't have a large variety of trips--they're mostly slight variations of the same, so the specific trip doesn't matter much to me.

As for days off, I go for the most weekend days off first (scored 6 off next month), followed by most days off period, then most days off in between work blocks. I don't care too much about credit, because at first-year pay there's not a huge difference between 85 and 90 hours. I'd rather have the time off.
 
Just got my first awarded line in PBS. Thank goodness for federal regulations because without them I'd be working 9 days straight.

I commute so I go for the 4 day trips with 3 days off in between.
 
We use a program called Ad-Opt which lets you list preferences and it (supposedly) sorts the lines and creates a bid for you.

Unless you want to spend a lot of spare time pouring over the bid packet, you pretty much have to use this program....I think there are about 600 lines for each seat in my base right now (although that number will be coming down).

Personally, as an FO I requested 3 or 4 day trips with good productivity (credit hours > 23), weeeknds off, max days off per month, and overnights in certain stations that i liked. This usually worked out pretty well.

Now that I'm 5th from the bottom out of about 900 captains in my base, I take whatever they give me.
 
I just go for max credit and max days off. Generally, with my seniority, I wind up with around 90-95 hours a month with 10-12 days off.
 
When I was JFK based (only 1 trip to go this month) I use to bid for max hours. If I was going to be away from home, I would like to make some of that great 1st year FO cash. JFK is a very junior base for us that I could get what I wanted 60% of the time. I'll be MCO based now and pretty low on the list. For March I just bid what days I would like off. I think I got 4 of them. Not the best, but the overall thing for me is that I'll based at home and won't have to commute to get to work.

P.S. we use a system called SBS.
 
I bid for lines that give me max days off and the specific days off I want... that's it. Everything else (commutability, nice overnights, high value trips, deadheads, etc...) comes during the Initial and Secondary Line (schedule) improvement windows. It is there that I can trade every one of my trips for something better for me (one man's trash is another man's treasure.)

Basically it allows me to totally re-vamp my entire schedule exactly how I like it... and at the very least... I have the time I need off.

Oh yeah... and then there's trip drops and advertisements... I do that a lot too... ;) I've dropped and advertised away my entire month before, effectively allowing me to build my month as I go out of "open" time and "Advertisements". That's real nice too.

Bob
 
I try to bid to maximize days off, maximize weekends off, and get commutable multi-day trips. Not always possible, but I try. Spending a few nights in the lovely commuter hotels of IAH in March, but made out pretty well. Once the training rush lets up, I'll be top third on the IAH CA list, and should be able to hold good commuter trips. Of course, IAH is commuter-heavy, so it'll depend on how crappy the trips are that crew planning dreams up each month.

In April, I'm expecting LBB overnights by the bagful!
 
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