ABX Mega Proffer

[ABXbooger]

Pretty defensive Penguin, you must really have an ulcer over knowing that the OPF you pick up is hurting one of your "brother teamsters".

Tell yourself all you want, convince yourself that less OPF won't help anyone, sounds like a drug addict saying "it only affects myself, no one else".

Point is there is no way to prove that it won't help.

Point is there is proof that it will help. Have you ever heard of UPS's attempt to furlough 100 back in 93-94 or so? The pilots stepped up and not one, I say again not one was fuloughed.

The union is not for all pilots, just those that matter, huh?

 

[ABXbooger]

As far as the senior guys doing their hi 5, let 'em at it. They earned it, let them build it up.

Don't you realize that this is not just about the most junior guys getting or staying furloughed? You are telling the company that you will allow them to run the airline as shortstaffed as the open flying will allow. You are also prohibiting people from career advancement. All the guys who would like to upgrade to captain or from DC-9 FO to 767 FO or just hold a better line,etc. By flying all the OPF, you are letting the company run those seats shorter.

Fact is, you sit from your perspective justifying your OPF, I sit looking up just wanting to feed my kids and stick around awhile.

It is hard to stomach collecting unemployment when you got guys making your entire salary plus every month.

 

[ABXbooger]

Article 12 section I paragraph 5 states that after failing two Proficiency checks, an additional proficiency check may be requested.

I think the question here is that the PFE's get three complete chances at groundschool, sim etc.

Second Officers who fail to upgrade after their second chance are terminated as per Article 11 section M paragraph 2.

 

[erichartmann]

As far as the senior guys doing their hi 5, let 'em at it. They earned it, let them build it up.

Don't you realize that this is not just about the most junior guys getting or staying furloughed? You are telling the company that you will allow them to run the airline as shortstaffed as the open flying will allow. You are also prohibiting people from career advancement. All the guys who would like to upgrade to captain or from DC-9 FO to 767 FO or just hold a better line,etc. By flying all the OPF, you are letting the company run those seats shorter.

Fact is, you sit from your perspective justifying your OPF, I sit looking up just wanting to feed my kids and stick around awhile.

It is hard to stomach collecting unemployment when you got guys making your entire salary plus every month.

Ok booger, let's look at the open time. Let's say there is enough OT for an additional 20 lines in the DC-9. That means 20 people get Captain's seats, and 20 more get the right seat somewhere. Now what do we have. Instead of the senior people or whoever else can hold it making extra money we have benifited a select few i.e. the 40 who moved to new seats. Additionally we have incurred additional payroll added costs which do not apply for OT, so the total cost of manning the airline has gone up. Joe will undoubtly seek pay cuts if this scenario comes to pass contractually. If it came to pass because as a group the pilot's declined to bid OT the union would wind up in court. If the company failed to crew any flights the court would impose sanctions and fines against the union. This would be true even if the E-board declined to support and actively discouraged the move. The precedent has been set by the courts with APA and AA.

The real problem here is the airline has stagnated for several years, and is now shrinking. I won't insult you by saying I feel your pain, because I don't. I think your solutions are very self serving, selfish, and in a word, stupid. You chose employment in very cyclical industry, albiet one that did not appear so for a while. Anyone who looked at the airline industry as a whole should have been able to recognize that when the freight segment of the industry reached maturity it would become just a subject to the economy as the pax side. Get used to it or go somewhere else.

 

[ABXbooger]

Hey eric, this isn't about me, it's about the 10 or so pilots that we either have furloughed now or soon will. Do you think we could pony up for 10 people? your arguements don't hold water when you are putting people on the street.

 

[ABXbooger]

eric, your post once again proves that this pilot group only cares about one thing.

 

[erichartmann]

eric, your post once again proves that this pilot group only cares about one thing.

I suggest you reread my previous post, & if you are capable of it, think about it some.

 

[ABXbooger]

Wow, that's so, like, seventh grade, ya know?

good post, you admit that getting rid of OPF will creat jobs, thanks. Also everything you say might happen is simply guessing. You have no proof how the company will react. 10 pilots worth of salary is a lot less than what the company pays in OT. How much in OT did you make last year? How many pilots could you have kept working? Who said the union had to make any policy? It's the right thing to do when guys are losing their jobs. Period.

I'm not being selfish, I don't bid open time and won't, I enjoy my time away from work. Unlike you I work so I can go home, not continue to work.

How about this. We make it contractual that whenever there are any pilots on furlough, the open time is reduced enough to allow those pilots to remain working. Hi 5 guys still will be able to max it out. When all pilots are working, the open time goes back to however much the company wants to publish. That way you senior guys get the OPF you richly deserve and the junior guys get to continue to do the job they were hired for.

Thought about it...

 

[penguin22]

Pretty defensive Penguin, you must really have an ulcer over knowing that the OPF you pick up is hurting one of your "brother teamsters".

You give me way too much credit. I don't feel the least bit guilty. But I am doing my high 5, so at least you give me that.

The key is, for it to work here, it would take contractural change as you suggest. As I've said, the way it is now opf would just be replaced with junior manning. And, as I've said, junior manning is very difficult to avoid. We can't just simply say no. So your UPS example falls short. You need to get it in the contract that we can turn down a junior man assignment. Good luck with that, by the way.

 

[DC-9er]

Can anybody confirm a rumor I heard last night about all the SOs being given class dates after all?

 

[356emain]

It is true DC-9er. The last SO was called yesterday by one of our cheif pilots to confirm he wanted the class. They are all in.

 

[abxaviator]

Obviously a great deal of forethought and consideration went into the initial furlough decision.

 

[GoABX]

Obviously a great deal of forethought and consideration went into the initial furlough decision.

I don't like the idea of going through the motions, especially when it is screwing with peoples lives, BUT to get to the PFEs they had to also take out the SOs. They've rang the warning bell for the PFEs and those who can control their own destinies have chosen not to, as evidenced by many having a lackadaisical attitude toward upgrading. A straight 9F proffer wouldn't have worked, because it would have triggered recall rather than getting PFEs off the panel.


On OPF bans

The argument that money merely flows from the senior to the junior and it is ineffective is just selfish rationalization. If we claim to be members of a union, it is immorale for one man to work extra if it puts another man out of work. Forget about brotherhood, but imagine that the other man was literally your blood brother or father. Would you work two jobs and put your real brother out of work? Yes, I know that furloughee is not really your blood brother, but do you have several sets of morales and ethics you apply differently to different people to suit your purposes??

Can the company work around an open time ban....yes. Does it make things more difficult on them? ...Yes. When we are in negotiations or going head to head with the company we stop doing the favors we that do for them every night.

The OPF rationale is sort of like requesting an interesection takeoff (during negotiations) and then saying well we were going to takeoff some time anyway....I might as well just get out early. No Favors = No Favors....(even if that favor might help yourself too.)

Everyone that sqwawks about lawsuits knows the answer they want and then tries to find the evidence to support it. The lawsuits everyone refers to have 2 things in common: #1) those unions were in 'status quo' and #2) they were taken to court, told to stop, and then it continued.

People, who tout the ineffectivesness of OPF bans, always quote the failure of the ban 10 years ago. That action wore on the company and on the crewmembers. But in the end the only reason it failed was because some senior guys were going to fall out of ranks and no one on the EBoard or SPC had the stones to say "the hell you are" and it was lifted before it collapsed. Poor leadership, not poor strategy.

The solution does lie in a contract amendment that says no OPF with furlough and also protects the hi-5ers. But don't be surprised if it dies on the table.


Extra seats at the schoolhouse

If in fact the company did decide to slide the SOs into class, then they did "the right thing". The union better not say a peep about proffer protocol or seniority.

 

[LarryinTN]

It was the union that convinced the company to publish all of the 767 proffers, to run the DC9 class and to put all four of the F/Os into it. The company was going to just furlough everybody and worry each 767 class one at a time.

 

[GoABX]

LJ

I understand that. It would have been nice if the SOs had just gone direct to class via proffer. But when it didn't shake out that way, the argument could have been made that another proffer had to be posted, rather than telling them when to show up for school.