Delta-Northwest Deal at Risk

[Voice Of Reason]

Don't believe what you read in the press. This is posturing and pressuring to "get er' done" The un-named source in the articles is OTL.
The time pressure is purely artificial and self imposed to force the deal. This can and probably will drag out several more weeks.

Exactly. The media are pawns of greedy execs
http://forums.flightinfo.com/showthread.php?t=109308

 

[General Lee]

Don't believe what you read in the press. This is posturing and pressuring to "get er' done" The un-named source in the articles is OTL.

The time pressure is purely artificial and self imposed to force the deal. This can and probably will drag out several more weeks.

In the end I think the DAL and NWA MEC's will reach as fair a deal as possible.

That's good, and we all want something that is fair. I agree that some of the senior 744 pilots at NWA should be at the top of a combined list, since they fly the big whale and have been around longer. The rest of the list should be closely looked at and put together in a fair manner.


I think a lot of NWA guys think the Delta guys gained a lot thanks to the early retirement of our senior guys before BK. I think it was more like we kept a lot of people going to furlough thanks to those retirements. While pilots were leaving, we were parking planes for good at the same time. We parked all of our 737-200s (maybe 30 of them?), all of the 737-300s (maybe 15 of them), 14 767-200s, and the MD11s. Yes, some guys got to upgrade, but most moved from one plane to the next, and still had that 47% paycut. The whole time we have still had the 8 777s (now getting more), and the 21 767-400s--the two planes that pay the most. (we had those too when we also had the MD11s and L1011s, 727s, etc)

So, we had a bunch of pilots leave, along with a lot of planes. You at NWA are in the same boat sort of--with guys that were going to leave (before age 65), and planes that are ready to go. (742s and DC9s) You just haven't hit the stage that we did, yet. We have finished parking planes for now, and have redistributed planes from DOM to INTL, necessitating newhires along with new planes coming on line. None of that has happened recently for NWA, except some INTL expansion with your 757s.


Again, I hope for a FAIR integration.

Bye Bye--General Lee

 

[michael707767]

You were supposed to get a pay raise this year. Just because it comes out of your management's mouth doesn't make it true.

we did get a pay raise this year, per the terms of our contract. And I never heard anything about it from management, it came from the union folks.

 

[Tanker Clown]

we did get a pay raise this year, per the terms of our contract. And I never heard anything about it from management, it came from the union folks.

Micheal, a 1.5% raise in the face of 4.4% inflation is not really a raise. It's actually a loss of your purchasing power. Technically, yes, you got a raise. The problem is, you can afford less stuff today than you could one year ago.

 

[JohnyChimpO77]

NWA/DAL ALPA Fighting? I don't think so. I would bet money to say they are stalling on the new contract agreement because they can. I think the new contract is already agreed on between the two groups. The pilots are finally in the drivers seat and I think they are enjoying it. They should. Management and investors want a happy combined pilot group. I am sure they are willing to throw more money at the pilots and better work rules to get a peaceful resolution because in the end it makes them more money. If the two pilot groups settled everything before or by the deadline, you could never squeeze management for more money.
Meeting the deadline is like taking the first offer, you just don't do it!

Or they could just be fighting. But what do I know???

 

[michael707767]

Micheal, a 1.5% raise in the face of 4.4% inflation is not really a raise. It's actually a loss of your purchasing power. Technically, yes, you got a raise. The problem is, you can afford less stuff today than you could one year ago.

you are correct. But don't try to spin it like management promised a pay raise and then renigged. Our contract has very specific targets that have to be met, and then based on that spells out the raise we get.

 

[Tanker Clown]

you are correct. But don't try to spin it like management promised a pay raise and then renigged. Our contract has very specific targets that have to be met, and then based on that spells out the raise we get.

The Delta guys I work with made it sound like they were going to make the numbers say what they need to say to hose you guys. They were anticipating this happening this time last year. Maybe I just tend to be around the Delta Reservists that are Kool-Aid free.

 

[michael707767]

The Delta guys I work with made it sound like they were going to make the numbers say what they need to say to hose you guys.

Our union has full access to the numbers. Given what happend with oil prices at the end of the year, I don't question why we didn't get more than we did. Only a fool would think the oil prices would not affect our operating margin. Even if you are able to raise fares enough to cover the increased fuel cost (a big if) the margin still goes down.

 

[ExAF]

9s and 319s

But then you guys also need the bottom 1000 for the dc9 and 319s. JMHO.

Why do you keep lumping the 319s in with the DC9s. They are worlds apart in every respect. The 319 is a common type with the 320. They are much more efficient than a 9 or MD. I'd much rather fly a 319 than a MD88 (big DC9) and most passengers feel the same way about riding in the back. They are in no way similar to a DC-9.

 

[~~~^~~~]

Well they share one defining characteristic...

They are smaller than an MD88 in the same way that a 777 is smaller than a 747.

Cuts both ways.

 

[DTW320]

Well they share one defining characteristic...

They are smaller than an MD88 in the same way that a 777 is smaller than a 747.

Cuts both ways.

Who cares? They are the same bid category, flown interchangeably with, and pay the same as the 148 seat A320, which is not smaller than an MD88. So the 319's are smaller than the MD88 in the same way your 757's are smaller than your 767's. Same bid position, same pay on the 75 as the 76 (300's).

 

[Caveman]

Career expectations. That's a good one. This is the airline business. Anything past next year is a wild guess at best.

I can't believe some of you are trying to decide 'fair' on what might happen 10, 15 or 20 years down the road. That's why this deal will never happen if left up to the pilots. Everybody is way too greedy, way too unrealistic and way too myopic.

 

[FDJ2]

Who cares? They are the same bid category, flown interchangeably with, and pay the same as the 148 seat A320, which is not smaller than an MD88.

They also all pay less than the MD-88, definitely much less than the 737-800.

So the 319's are smaller than the MD88 in the same way your 757's are smaller than your 767's. Same bid position, same pay on the 75 as the 76 (300's).

So by your logic we can consider our 757s widebodied since they pay the same as the wide bodied 767-300er. That would mean that DAL brings 245 wide bodied paying aircraft to the party and NWA would be bringing 63. Interesting. I like how you think.

 

[~~~^~~~]

Probably the only one celebrating tonight is Doug Steenland. Thanks to the NWA pilots he now has a pretty good shot at keeping his job.

The NWA pilots should continue to insist on the top spots, then DOH, a staple and the ability to take all the bases and all the jets. The crazier the better - lets kill this thing

Yep 747's and A330's at the top. The 757-300 is bigger too, so stick it at the top and the A320 seats 6 more than an 88 so put all those at the top, and the pay is less, so the folks who need to recover industry standard, put them at the top. Pinnacle and Compass are growing like kudzu, so to preserve their expectations, put them at the top. And just about every pilot is retiring before their next rotation - so lets make it easy - staple Delta below Big Sky. Our 777's CA's can green slip one leg flights to Arizona in your DC-9's.

Man, you guys had me going, but now I see the plan. Bravo Rizutto :nuts: :smash: :beer:

 

[Noserider76]

This needs to either go away or do it based on Career expectations. Career expectations is the only fair way to do it.

Relative seniority with fences. What your seniority holds now is what it should hold after the merger. Nobody is bumped from their equipment or base. No categories are rebid. Everyone's life remains the same with the NW pilots getting bigger payraises, better work rules, and both groups sharing the equity. Anything else is a windfall for one group and a sheet sandwich for the other.

 

[jetflier]

Merging companies will not lower the cost of fuel. I think we have a pretty good thing going at Delta, as do the NW guys at NW. I don't see any benefit for the Delta pilots in this merger. The only thing to offer Delta pilots would be a favorable SLI....without it most Delta pilots would favor going it on our own.

"One of the chief assets Northwest brings to the merger is its dominance of U.S. routes to Asia, something that Delta and many other airlines lack.

"The crown jewel of any of these mergers is Northwest's access to Asia," said George Hoffer, an industry analyst and a professor of economics at Virginia Commonwealth University. "Northwest is the smallest of the carriers that is up for sale, yet it has the greatest bottom line potential because of its access to Asia. That is the real benefit to Delta."

I think we have a pretty good thing going at Northwest, as do the DAL guys at DAL. I don't see any benefit for the Northwest pilots in this merger. The only thing to offer Northwest pilots would be a favorable SLI....without it most Northwest pilots would favor going it on our own.[/quote]

 

[jetflier]

Newhires were told that we will have a total of 20 777s (12 more than we have now) within 2 years (we have 3 firm orders this year, along with 6 firm coming Dec 31st to March 31st of next year). They were told we were going to get a few more from another leasing source. As far as the MD90s go, we were scheduled to get 9 this year (we even trained all of the CVG MD88 pilots on the MD90 already), and that there were over 100 available. In fact Saudia just put 28 up for sale. The others we have looked at in person are from these airlines-- JAS (Japan Air System), China Northern, and China Eastern. Anderson was "one signature" away from signing for a bunch of those, when this merger stuff supposedly popped up. We had guys looking at them as I said before in person. We have MD90 FTDs and SIMs, and we have mechanics who can fix them. We also just finished getting 17 AA 757-200ERs with winglets, and will get 7 737-700s this year, with a total of 25 with options.

Here is an post from our WEB board concerning the incorrect info from the DAL side. This corrects the incorrect assumptions made about freighters and DC9 aircraft.


"A buddy of mine at DAL let slip out that DAL not only has access to our web board, but their merger comm. is using our own postings against us. This is a public forum and I believe if there was anytime for us to stop shooting at each other, now is the time. I'm not calling for a peace treaty, just a truce until the merger is complete.
DAL has thrown our sitting of the DC-9 in our merger comm. faces. Some people have said, on this board, that all freighters will be sold and all DC-9's parked. DAL is using this info as fact in their negotiations. Now we all know that there is no plan to park any of our freighters. In fact a recent article in one of the freight mags quoted our mgt as actively searching for additional freighters.The article exists because I read it.I believe it was posted on this board. There is no plan to sit all our DC -9's. In fact, we may even retrofit them with GPS until Boeing comes up with the next-gen narrowbody. I heard that from the training dept in January.
Our merger comm is holding the line against a very stubborn DAL group."

 

[Diesel-9]

Talked with a couple people recently about the -9 GPS. Probably going to happen. Nothing available to replace the -9 that goes into so many wet, slippery 6000' runways carrying a belly full of cargo. Hope the B-717 talk is serious. My guess is about 10/10 new frieghters. 744F and A-330F.

 

[Diesel-9]

Delta is not buying NWA or anyone. If it goes will be a stock swap. DAL has $4.0 Billion debt due now through 2011, NWA $1.9. DAL has $1.0 Billion LESS cash on hand than NWA. DAL CASM is 10% higher than NWA. NWA Cash/Monthly Expense ratio over twice as good as DAL, 3.2 to 1.5 and NWA operating margin is almost 60% higher than DAL. NWA pretax margin is 139% higher than DAL. NWA had the highest operating margins in the industry in 2007. NWA gets 12% revenue from RJ's while DAL is 25%/expensive. DAL needs a merger/help before end of 2009 or gets tight on cash again. Over the next 20 years the Pacific Region will have over twice the growth rate of any other region. DAL Pacific operation is 0.2% of their overall ops. NWA has 10% of their operations in Asia. Who really needs who? CAL would be a much better deal with NWA.

These numbers appear to be out of the National ALPA NWA/DAL Merger Analysis. Appears DAL needs a dance partner's cash and cash flow to pay her bills the next few years. Did you use the UAL playbook for CH-11? Great! Another 'Black Hole'. As Sam Kinison would say, "THAAAANKS! AAAAHHHHHHHHHH!"

 

[clippyrip]

So by your logic we can consider our 757s widebodied since they pay the same as the wide bodied 767-300er. That would mean that DAL brings 245 wide bodied paying aircraft to the party and NWA would be bringing 63. Interesting. I like how you think.

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