Hey bud, my heart goes out to you! I truely hope that you are able to find a better opportunity in the near future. We have Captains selfishly flying in the right seat because we are short First officers! But we just furloughed 169 pilots? I have no respect for these individuals. They will try to justify to the world why they are doing what they are doing, but it is plain wrong!
Yes you can blame AirTran management. AirTran management played around and was trying to be cheap. AirTran could have completed the deal with ATA long before ATA went into bankruptcy, but their arrogance and being cheap allowed them to be outplayed. They didn't think Southwest would jump in the game. But that goes to show you how arrogant these people are. They let their deal go to the courts and they lost there. Go back and do a search and you will find that the ATA deal was inked long before bankruptcy. Why did they let it go into bankruptcy, because they were hoping to get something on the cheap! That's the way things work at AirTran. As far Northwest, you are wrong again. Airtran was willing to pay over $400 million dollars on their last offer for Midwest. Well if they had not been arrogant, they would have tried to close the Midwest deal prior to Northwest coming out of bankruptcy. If Midwest and a MKE hub was so vital to their business plan, they would have not nickel and dimed the deal and gone in and made a better offer before Northwest came out of bankruptcy and trumped them again! (Keep in mind Northwest could not play in the game while in bankruptcy, I saw this coming why couldn't these guys who earn all their bonus' see it coming) Again this managements arrogance has caused them to FAIL and short of selling airplanes to raise cash, they have no business plan. That is why this company is where it is today. Bottom line, sometimes you have to PAY TO PLAY if you want to be a real player in this industry! NO CONCESSIONS PERIOD!
Understood.... Agreed! BUT if AT mgmt countered the offer, don't you think SWA(who wanted to expand MDW service) would have made a better deal? I believe that AT tried to get the cheapest deal possible BUT once SWA got involved it was over. AT doesn't have deep pockets...hence the cheapness....
I personally will never accept concessions! Southwest only entered the picture because ATA went into bankruptcy and were accepting potential better offers than AirTran's in bankruptcy. America West almost succeeded at buying all of ATA in Bankruptcy and ATA management was all for it, but America West could not workout a deal with all of ATA's lessors and walked away. The key is AirTran had reach an agreement with ATA prior to bankruptcy. This is significant because they could have just closed the deal prior to ATA going into bankruptcy therefore eliminating any chance of a bidding war. That means Southwest would of had no card to play. The end result would of been ATA would have liquidated earlier, and AirTran would of had 14 gates in MDW and more landing slots in LGA and DCA.
