XJT Rejects SKW's Takeover Bid

[Gonzo]

This is not accurate. I don't feel anyone's boot on my neck, and I can hold the company to what's in the manual. My benefits cover my wife and me, I just asked for a golden day and it was granted, and I was even able to bid my vacation for NJC. Nearly everyone at SkyWest is happy, I feel like I wrote a lottery ticket to work here. Recently, I essentially told CS that I was going to have a driver take me and my crew from IYK to FAT (a 3 hour drive one way) and never heard peep from anyone.
I don't get why you would say the last quote above, it isn't very nice, and will not advance your argument.

Let's try to maintain civility in the face of the rough seas ahead.

It is based on things he has posted in the past.
By the way it was not a knock only on skywest but almost all regional airlines. Look at the airline I work at, do you know how the pilots were rewarded for a profitable year. 1.7% Raise:banghead:

 

[Bumblebee]

It is based on things he has posted in the past.
By the way it was not a knock only on skywest but almost all regional airlines. Look at the airline I work at, do you know how the pilots were rewarded for a profitable year. 1.7% Raise:banghead:

Where do you work? . . . it's not in your profile

 

[Nick]

Continental Airlines is not going to shoot themselves in the foot.

The people that run that company have their act together and they will NOT let a regional airline take advantage of them. They haven't in the past and they won't in the future.

The first example of this is their 100% bulletproof contract with ExpressJet. Granted ExpressJet was spun off at the time and may not have had much say in the CPA but CAL covered all of their bases and XJT's current situation demonstrates that.

 

[kellwolf]

Here we go again.

Yep. You have to remember, not all carriers treat their employees the way they should. I realize Skywest does so NOW, but with oil going through the roof, they might suddenly decide that pay rates or work rules need to change. The only thing stopping them is a gentleman's agreement and a handshake. Good luck holding that up in court if/when the time comes. If it's a choice between pissing off the pilots by lowering wages/altering work rules or losing money for the shareholders, what do YOU think management's going to pick?

I simply think it's better to have a contract. That way you at least have legal recourse. As it is now, you just get to take it if they change things.

 

[zmiller4]

My opinions have changed substantially since actually walking through the doors at ASA.

I wish I could take back the many things I've said against Skywest Inc, and some select pilots. But overall, I like what I am seeing on this side of the fence.

Holy Crap! I totally missed this. Is this a way late april fool's prank?

Seriously, it's good to hear that you guys don't totally hate us. I would be very interested to hear what your ALPA leadership thinks of the differences between pre-and post- acquisition managements.

 

[SoCalAprch]

SKW is a good place to work right now, I have lots of friends who are over there and even though they don't drink the kool-aid as much as some on here, they are happy with the way things are right now.

Just realize that in this industry things can get ###### real quick. Thats why you guys need a union over there. When things are good the company is gonna treat you good, but what do you think would be happening right now if the roles were switched and XJT was the one doing the buying? You guys would be up a creek with no paddle. Keep on drinking the kool-aid but as soon as one of your mainline operators goes Tango Uniform or someone comes in and undercuts you everyone will be singing a different song. Everyone, even the mighty SKW is vulnerable and don't think that you won't be the first ones that your friendly management throws under the bus when something doesn't go according to plan. Enjoy it while it is good but its arrogant to think that there will never be tough times for SKW and that you couldn't be in this same position in a year.

As for the XJT deal, don't cave. If anything they have 5 months to figure their stuff out and if they have anyone with a brain over there they would restructure and get rid of a bunch of middle management and undercut Skywest back. How come Skywest can do it for so much cheaper than you guys at XJT? If your not competitive then it may be your time to get out. And by doing it as cheap as SkyWest I don't mean that the pilots should give anything up. Management at XJT needs to do their frigen jobs and run the company in a way to make them competitive.

 

[Clocks]

If what we need to do in order to secure a new long term deal with CAL is just promise a price that will guarantee a crappy product to CAL's customers, that's fine with me. If we have good maintenance and a solid contract, I'll sit in the crew room watching TV while every flight is canceled and passengers are rioting upstairs. It really doesn't bother me at all (maybe it should). CAL is willing to accept a level of crappyness to save a few bucks, and they seem to be balancing it well enough with CHQ to avoid losing too many customers.

 

[kellwolf]

If what we need to do in order to secure a new long term deal with CAL is just promise a price that will guarantee a crappy product to CAL's customers, that's fine with me. If we have good maintenance and a solid contract, I'll sit in the crew room watching TV while every flight is canceled and passengers are rioting upstairs. It really doesn't bother me at all (maybe it should). CAL is willing to accept a level of crappyness to save a few bucks, and they seem to be balancing it well enough with CHQ to avoid losing too many customers.

Bringing it down to NWA's level, huh?

If anyone can pull of a re-structuring deal that'll save XJT, it's the current management team. If they can't, well, then maybe it IS time to throw in the towel. I think the reason Skywest can undercut them in a bidding war is b/c of the number of contracts they have. They can take a gamble and maybe subsidize some CAL flying b/c they're making extra $$$ on the UAL flying. Someone else mentioned that it's a good bet all the regional flying stuff for Delta was decided pre-merger, and Skywest might be trying to grab what they can now as far as more mainline partners go. They were already getting block hours reduced by Delta. If Delta were to cut them loose altogether, it might be good to have a backup plan when it comes to CAL.

 

[SoCalAprch]

If what we need to do in order to secure a new long term deal with CAL is just promise a price that will guarantee a crappy product to CAL's customers, that's fine with me. If we have good maintenance and a solid contract, I'll sit in the crew room watching TV while every flight is canceled and passengers are rioting upstairs. It really doesn't bother me at all (maybe it should). CAL is willing to accept a level of crappyness to save a few bucks, and they seem to be balancing it well enough with CHQ to avoid losing too many customers.

I haven't heard that SkyWest has bad maintenance or cancels a bunch of flights. The issue here is that SkyWest can do more with less and XJT hasn't figured out how to do it yet. XJT is in a crappy contract with CAL and that hurts them, I will give that to them. However if you can't figure out a way to offer the same services as your competitors at a similar price you are gonna get washed out or absorbed by a company that can. It sucks but all this "so and so undercut us" whining is BS and it happens in every industry. Figure out how to offer a product that costs the same as your competitors and you should be alright. And to reiterate my stance, this has nothing to do with pilots taking any pay cuts or giving any concessions.

 

[Clocks]

I just accept that the operational factors that are out of my hands are...out of my hands

But the people in charge at XJT know way more than I do. Hopefully they can come up with a beneficial solution without sacrificing XJT's product to the level CAL wants. But if they have to, that's fine with me too (with my before mentioned requirements).

 

[kellwolf]

I can tell ya, XJT ground agents DO know how to do more with less. Nothing like having three people to turn an airplane in 20 minutes. And that's counting rampers, gate agents and ops agents.

That's going off how it was the end of 2004-beginning of 2005 when I was there.

 

[Clocks]

I can tell ya, XJT ground agents DO know how to do more with less. Nothing like having three people to turn an airplane in 20 minutes. And that's counting rampers, gate agents and ops agents.

That's going off how it was the end of 2004-beginning of 2005 when I was there.

All of our quick turns were under 20 minutes my last 2 day, the rampers and gate agents were amazing! 17 minutes was our quickest, and probably the fastest I've seen in the short time I've been here.

 

[SoCalAprch]

17 minutes is good. That screams efficiency. So maybe Im wrong but still no one can answer why Skywest can offer a similar product for alot less. I don't think it has anything to do with SKW having 2 codeshare partners either. They just have United and Delta (i think), XJET has Continental and Delta.

And CHQ has a 98.9% completion factor on the Continental side so I don't understand what service they are losing by using Chautauqua. Iv never flown on an Express Jet flight but maybe Im missing something big that XJET offers that everyone else doesn't.

 

[surreal1221]

Holy Crap! I totally missed this. Is this a way late april fool's prank?

Seriously, it's good to hear that you guys don't totally hate us. I would be very interested to hear what your ALPA leadership thinks of the differences between pre-and post- acquisition managements.

No April Fools joke.

I've heard nothing but horrible things about the management we had at the top prior to the acquisition. They were an all out anti-labor management, and not just directed towards pilots. We still have one or two guys, I won't mention names or even positions right now, that I've heard a lot of grumbling over. This grumbling is majority sentiment that these one or two individuals should be gone soon due to their inability to foster a good working relationship with the pilots and management.

Brad Holt, President, appears to have the full support of ALPA in his short history here. I've heard nothing but wonderful things about what he has been able to do that the other management individuals failed to do in their 5+ years of being in the position. So, overall ALPA is happy with post-acquisition management changes.

 

[SlumTodd_Millionaire]

How about longevity instead of seniority? That way you don't take a paycut, but you have to start at the bottom. Seems like a fair compromise to me versus the alternative of starting over completely from the bottom.

Why!?! Why on Earth would you even consider giving up anything!?! Your contract already guarantees you protections. You need to hold on to them and not start thinking about how much less you would settle for.

You have no real works rules. You have no real benefits.
People like you never get it.:banghead::banghead::banghead:

:yeahthat:

and I can hold the company to what's in the manual

No you can't. There is no legal recourse for you whatsoever. If management decides that they don't like the manual, they'll simply ignore it or change it. You have no protections and can't hold anyone to anything.

 

[Bumblebee]

Why!?! Why on Earth would you even consider giving up anything!?! Your contract already guarantees you protections. You need to hold on to them and not start thinking about how much less you would settle for.



:yeahthat:



No you can't. There is no legal recourse for you whatsoever. If management decides that they don't like the manual, they'll simply ignore it or change it. You have no protections and can't hold anyone to anything.

Actually, we can. Our policy manual is signed by all parties. It is a contract. The problem is in enforcement should they breech the contract. We (SAPA) do not have a legal department, so I would have to get my own counsel in order to enforce the terms of our contract. Additionally, we do not have the job action remedies that a union house would.

 

[kellwolf]

No you can't. There is no legal recourse for you whatsoever. If management decides that they don't like the manual, they'll simply ignore it or change it. You have no protections and can't hold anyone to anything.

Sorta like "Oh, wait. You mean the CA can't get food for the FO on a quick turn b/c the manual says they can't eat the same thing. Hold on." <insert FOM revision allowing said policy> "There ya go. Oh, and we changed the FA manual so they can eat in the galley now, too. Please try not to have all three crew members stopping to get food when changing planes now."

 

[Bumblebee]

Sorta like "Oh, wait. You mean the CA can't get food for the FO on a quick turn b/c the manual says they can't eat the same thing. Hold on." <insert FOM revision allowing said policy> "There ya go. Oh, and we changed the FA manual so they can eat in the galley now, too. Please try not to have all three crew members stopping to get food when changing planes now."

I had a FA who still wouldn't eat in the cabin with passengers onboard, so we delayed boarding for a few minutes to allow her to eat some lunch. No one asked me a thing about it.
Generally whenever Mgmt wants to change something, they come to SAPA/SIA and negotiate the change. We just don't have to wait for the contract to expire; we amend the current contract. It gives us a lot of flexibility to fix things we don't like, and it gives them a chance to make adjustments when necessary more expiditiously. One part of the way we do things is that every change we make has to be a win win overall or we don't agree, and then it is not signed and does not become part of the contract.

 

[SlumTodd_Millionaire]

Actually, we can. Our policy manual is signed by all parties. It is a contract. The problem is in enforcement should they breech the contract. We (SAPA) do not have a legal department, so I would have to get my own counsel in order to enforce the terms of our contract. Additionally, we do not have the job action remedies that a union house would.

I don't know who told you all of that, but from a legal stand point, it is completely inaccurate. What you have is not a legal contract, because one party, SAPA, has no legal authority to enter into any contract with the company. A contract that is invalid is void. You could get an attorney all you want and try to fight it, but you'll get nowhere. In fact, you'll have a hard time finding any attorney to take the case, because they all know the law isn't on your side.

Sorta like "Oh, wait. You mean the CA can't get food for the FO on a quick turn b/c the manual says they can't eat the same thing. Hold on." <insert FOM revision allowing said policy> "There ya go. Oh, and we changed the FA manual so they can eat in the galley now, too. Please try not to have all three crew members stopping to get food when changing planes now."

Huh? I must have missed something. Is this something that happened at Skywest?

 

[Bumblebee]

I don't know who told you all of that, but from a legal stand point, it is completely inaccurate. What you have is not a legal contract, because one party, SAPA, has no legal authority to enter into any contract with the company. A contract that is invalid is void. You could get an attorney all you want and try to fight it, but you'll get nowhere. In fact, you'll have a hard time finding any attorney to take the case, because they all know the law isn't on your side.



Huh? I must have missed something. Is this something that happened at Skywest?

No but we do allow our FA's to eat in the cabin now. (It just was reasonable.)
as far as PCL I'll get back to you after I check some things out