Thanks PBS!
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kellwolf
Piece of Trash
Like that goo that flowed in the sewer in "Ghostbusters II"?
Great. Now I'm gonna start called PT "Vigo!"
GaTechKid
Well-Known Member
Wow, my head hurts after trying to follow you on the point system. I had no idea that PBS software varied so much between companies! So are you saying that you don't have access to the pairings and therefore can't bid for specific pairings?
Chris_Ford
Well-Known Member
Why don't you want to go to Aruba? Too windy for you?
kellwolf
Piece of Trash
Bingo. We can bid for trip length, specific overnights, length of overnights, etc, but we can't bid for, say, pairing M2231. The points system is, IMO, the best way to get what you want. You CAN do a simple LOW, MED, HI option, but you're even more blinded by what you're rating things then. Honestly, my standing big is for credit over 85 hours a month, high credit lines and max days off. Anything else just kinda gums up the works. For the past several months, my PBS line has actually been better than what I got on paper bids. The trouble is, not everyone above me in seniority is participating, so it's not an accurate representation of what I'd be getting if it were live. There's no way to "test" to see what your preferences do, either. Once it's out there, what you see for the month is what you get. There's no way to know anything like "Well, if I lowered the points on "days off" and increased the points on "Desire Jun 7th off" would I get that day off?" You either get it or you don't.
According to the LOA, we're supposed to get training from the company sufficient for pilots to be proficient in using the system. That hasn't happened yet. It's been a "here it is, play with it for a few months cause it's going live." What happens to the new hires that get tossed to the fire? They get burned. The union plans on grieving it, but with the Colgan scope clause, contract negotiations and now -900 pay rates taking priority, it looks like the company is gonna slide this one by. Last I heard, it goes live in Aug.
zmiller4
Well-Known Member
On top of it all I managed only 2 day "weekends" all month for a whopping total of 10 days off in June.
Worst line I've ever had, anywhere.:crazy:anic:
Ouch!!
I was going to bitch about how I got pwned by PBS for next month, but compared to 10 days off, my 13 off is not bad (but I've been pulling 15 off for the last 6 months). And at least I've got no less than 3 off at a time. I'm surprised it wasn't worse for me, since our base has only 29 lineholders for 32 lines and I had figured they'd pile the flying on those of us left. Oh well, hopefully it will get better next month.
Hootie
Old Skool
April 10 off, May 11 off.
June I have 14 off, 89 hours credit, only two landings in ATL, four mostly commutable 4 day trips, and only two days where I have to wake up before noon (I hate 5am east coast shows). Im pretty stoked finally!
Im 80th percentile SLC. Since IOE I have yet to have a single weekend day off. I also just finished an uncommutable 5 day (WOAH!!) and starting today I will enjoy my first three days off in a row in the past 6 weeks.
June I have 14 off, 89 hours credit, only two landings in ATL, four mostly commutable 4 day trips, and only two days where I have to wake up before noon (I hate 5am east coast shows). Im pretty stoked finally!
Im 80th percentile SLC. Since IOE I have yet to have a single weekend day off. I also just finished an uncommutable 5 day (WOAH!!) and starting today I will enjoy my first three days off in a row in the past 6 weeks.
zmiller4
Well-Known Member
Smoooooth!
I just noticed, by the way, that a guy *1* number senior to me who was in my class was just awarded EMB CA. It's really scary to think that I'd most likely get a captain slot in the next class. I'm headed up to ORD in a month or two, though, as the commute from BNA will be pretty easy. I hope.
zmiller4
Well-Known Member
I'll just say that I've learned some important life lessons in the past few months that precipitated the move (I grew up in Nashville, so it's pretty much moving home).
Your seniority would be holding decent 4-day trips in Tucson now, I think. I bet you could start getting late shows, too. I'm already bidding 20 of 30 here now, and that should be like 17 of 35 next month. For some reason they awarded me ORD last month...effective in September. I'm going to be pissed when all these guys fresh out of class get it before me.
Hootie
Old Skool
Did you like TUS as a base or would you recommend commuting somewhere else? I'm scheduled to be based there starting in Oct. If I would have known it was going to be a six month wait from award to actually starting there I would have bid it earlier, oh well. When are you packing up and moving?
zmiller4
Well-Known Member
6 months? WTF? That's worse than the 4 months I'll have to wait for ORD.
I *loved* TUS as a base. Aside from some ORD flying this month, it's been almost all CA flying with a little SLC. I don't know how much of the LAX/SFO stuff you've done, but it's pretty much cake compared to dealing with the weather up out of SLC. CA overnights are pretty good, too--we do a lot of LAX and SFO, which are both usually long with a lot of stuff to do. The captains are almost all really cool (couple big-time exceptions, though) and the flight attendants are generally older and smarter (good or bad depending on how you look at it).
With your seniority, it looks like you'll be bidding in the mid-20's out of 33 or so when you get there, which should give you some control over the trips you get. Some months there won't be many late shows/early releases at all, but your commute probably won't be that bad--there's a $39 deal at the comfort suites by the airport if you don't feel like doing the drive (a couple phoenix captains do that regularly).
kellwolf
Piece of Trash
If he got lowered from the min days off b/c of training, it's because of some parameters the company has set. The way ours is gonna work is all of your training gets scheduled on off days. If you've only got 10 off days, guess what? The really crappy thing is the program counts vacation days the same as a normal day off. So, you could technically get a 10 day off line with 5 days of vacation, and they could drop the 3 days of recurrent in on you, reducing it to 12 days off total. Under the current system, you'd have 15, and they'd have to remove flying to get the recurrent training in.
GaTechKid
Well-Known Member
If I was in your shoes ATL would be a no brainer. You can drive if you have to, you'll be pretty senior there, it's all 700/900 flying, and there's a lot less short legs like ORD-MKE, ORD-AZO, etc..
Of course I say this with no intention of preventing you from bumping me down a number!
zmiller4
Well-Known Member
Of course I say this with no intention of preventing you from bumping me down a number!
Oh, it's going to happen. I've been watching the 700 pairings out of ORD for a while now, and they are niiiiice!
Actually, I think Mr. Taylor would take a baseball bat to my head if I bid for ATL. I just don't feel right doing it.
kellwolf
Piece of Trash
Okay, I think I got the PBS thing here figured out. I decided to "test" bid for a weekend off with an early release time on Fri and a late show on Monday, if not getting Monday off altogether. I didn't get Fri off totally b/c I have a "carry over" trip already on my schedule from this month, but I probably would have without that. I did manage to get a 7:50 am release time on that Fri, and not only Sat-Mon off, but Tues as well. Booyah. How did I do it? Combined the "avoid" selection with the "desire" selections. For example, "desire weekend X off" at 500 points along with "avoid work on weekend x" at 500 points. Toss in an additonal selection for each individual day, and it scored my line at over 3000 total pts. Oh yeah, and it was still 13 total days off with 92 hours of credit.