ACA Negotiating Update

[walkthasky]

not sure...

The latest "rumor" i hear is that they will start in sept. @ 25 a month, which should mean we go in Dec. 03 sometime. But thats just rumor.
Are you back home ?? When do you think you'll finish up training ?? You're missing all this reserve fun Anyways, just trying to stay positive here. There are alot of pessimistic people out there, watch out!

c-ya

 

[Mayday911]

What is the "official" number of furloughs at ACA vs. the rumored amount?

I have heard in the neighborhood of 300-350...I hope that info is false!!

Mayday

 

[walkthasky]

officially...

Their are 96 on furlough and 101 on deck waiting to hear when. That 101 can change drastically in the next few months for the good or better, and hopefully our 96 will come back soon.

 

[C-5 MEM]

Walk,

I am home for a little bit. We are being told that we will be flying the rebuilding Iraq. That will be until Nov 03 and then in 04 we tranistion into the C-5. Where are you on reserve?

Terry

 

[surplus1]

So, don't say we lowered the bar for everyone else.

I assume that ACA is in the same sinking boat that AWAC is in and I bet the outcome is the same. I could be wrong.

flyer

Don't worry, I'm not going to say you lowered the bar for everyone else. You have only lowered it for yourselves.

With all due respect, I though it was UAL that was in the "sinking boat". I'm just not smart enough to guess how lowering rates at AWAC or ACA could possibly plug the leaks in UAL's boat.

If that boat is going to sink, it will do so no matter if AWAC and ACA fly for free. In my opinion, whether you lower your rates to the basement or not makes no difference. If UAL wants to contract with Mesa, they will do so regardless of your rates. If they put all their eggs in the Mesa basket that won't make UAL survive either. It will just muckup their feed.

Sorry, I just don't understand the logic of the whole thing. Guess I'm stupid. My bad.

 

[Mayday911]

The reason the current UAX carriers had to rebid was because United spent millions of dollars on an outside consulting group to help them maximize profits, thats right profits, from the Express network. So this consulting group came up with a scheme to help us all (use sarcastic tone). United was the first network carrier to pay their regionals a fee per departure, that is now history. The new bid is based on block hour. Within in this bid per block hour are 7 line item bids. They are: Pilot costs, F/A costs, mx costs, a/c operating costs, profit margin, duration, and something else I forgot. United is going to take the whole package and asses who will make the most money for them.

With pilot costs a direct item in the bid, there is no way that any of the current carriers could compete w/ the newcomers to the party. The consulting group specifically invited lower paid carriers to the party in order to get the current carriers to "get in line" with what United is willing to pay.

TSA, Chatauqua, Mesa, and one other (nobody knows for sure who that is) are all lower paid across the board, not just the pilots. From what I understand the CHQ pilots are in negotiations right now, and TSA's pilot contract is up in a couple of years.

AWAC is at an advantage to most of the other regionals bidding on the contract. Since they are privately owned they can bid on a lower profit margin than the publically held companies. From what the ALPA attorney says that is a very significant number. While times were good AWAC was making a 4.8% profit, while Skywest and ACA were in the neighborhood of 15%. This is why the new AWAC pilot contract LOA did not have to come down to the level of Mesa. 12 days off, scheduled trip and duty rigs (not look back), 75 hour guarantee for all pilots, plus pay rates still 5 dollars higher and hour, etc.

Just passing on the info...good luck to everyone in negotiations right now, I hope you are not hurt too bad by the new AWAC agreement. Think of it this way...Mesa set the new industry standard and then AWAC raised it a little, now its your turn (Okay maybe that doesn't help at all).

Mayday.

 

[avrodriver]

I'd like to agree with you.........

I've been trying to stay out of all this but I wouldn't call us hero's by a long shot. While Mesa may have set the standard for current contracts, we just set the standard that it is acceptable for our hardly earned contracts to be picked apart for the good of "the man". Sorry ACA....I wish you guys the best, hopefully you can show all the guys over here what a little backbone can get ya. I'm not bashing my fellow pilot group, I know why people voted yes, but nevertheless I'm a little disappointed. Oh well time to face the music and start our 8 year (plus two) sentence. Regionals su.ck!

 

[rightrudder]

Mayday 911, that was a great overview of the situation facing ACA, AWAC and Skywest. I think a lot of folks (Surplus) on the outside don't understand the whole picture here.

 

[walkthasky]

other carrier...

I believe the other carrier was BigSky, but not sure.

 

[KingAirKiddo]

Like walkthasky said in another post...blah, blah, blah.