ACA Pilots Vote for the right reasons...

[Diesel]

How are they going to cut more pilots? They don't even have enough pilots to cover the trips right now. Check out the reserve buckets.

Why should we keep cutting and then saying hey at least we aren't mesa. Why not just say no and prove we aren't mesa.

Just vote NO

 

[Old Crow]

Very difficult situation you guys are facing. I would like you all to consider why the "commuters", "Regionals" or whatever, are paid and treated poorly.
Up until Sept. 11, 2003 a Regional airline was losing approximately 13 pilots per month to the majors. Training cost, and lack of pilots to grow efficiently became quite expensive. Pay for training was begun, disregard to all aspects of a general wage description was a standard because the market would support it. They were pilots with low experence breaking into the industry.
THIS NO LONGER HOLDS TRUE.
Management of any company must adapt to the current economic position. The Regional industry has grown tremendously in the past two years.

Good luck guys.

 

[Patriot328]

How are they going to cut more pilots? They don't even have enough pilots to cover the trips right now. Check out the reserve buckets.

Just vote NO

You aren't serious, are you? Look at ALL the reserve buckets! We are incredibly overstaffed right now, just not in the correct places. We might be low on FOs, but we are VERY fat on captains.

 

[StaySeated]

I have no right to tell another pilot how to vote, but two things stated above concerned me enough to reply.

"In particular, the one thing that is making me think is that all of our MEC reps are good guys, they have the most info, and they recommended this TA - unamiously. "

Unfortunately, the MEC reps HAVE to support the TA. They can't recommend a contract for a vote while at the same time recommend that the membership vote "no". This is a huge legal no no. Your MEC is on board because they have to be, not because they want to be.

I noticed a mention of scope, and quickly closed my eyes and scrolled down to avoid reading any more. Please don't eat any more of the "scope sh1t sandwich" that ALPA has been cramming down regional carrier's throats. Scope is absolutley useless. Period.

Good luck ACA, for my own selfish reasons I hope you guys vote no and stop the domino effect. We are in a simliar, but much worse situation here at Skyway. One additional thing to consider is whatever the duration of your TA, you will probably still be there at the amendable date, so what are you willing to accept as pay in 6 or 8 years? With NO movement in the industry, your next contract should seem more important than ever.

 

[Diesel]

Riiight I'll just add the overstaffed remark in the section that BOS crews have longer blocks than CVG crews. It's all how you twist the numbers.

 

[neflyguy]

Went to the road show in Boston yesterday, as one of the ones
who will get furloughed possibly in the future,
my vote before the road show was "hell N0", after the road show,
"HELL Underscore NO!!"

DO NOT LET THEM SCARE YOU!!!!

 

[sideshow]

I'll state this as someone who has attended a roadshow, for what that's worth. If anyone learned anything different from attending a roadshow then you haven't paid much attention to what is going on. If the facts were stated succintly, the roadshow would take 30 minutes to an hour.

The fact that these things were negotiated, the company wanted more etc. Is that a surprise?

You mean the company wanted a 15% wage reduction and we wanted none so we agreed to 7.5%.

You mean the company wanted a 10 year deal and we wanted a 0 year deal so we agreed on a 5 year deal.

What a bargain for the company. I guess I should vote YES and be happy the company didn't want a 20 year deal and 30 percent wage reductions. That would have assured we get ALL of the express flying and Skywest and Air Wisconsin would have been shown the door.

Even with the unions and your current logic Skywest will not be continuing as an United Express partner.

I would lose respect for the company for not trying to get us to take the biggest and lengthiest concessions possible. That is their job. Whatever they get contributes directly to the bottom line. Period.

Imagine the company trying to decide where to get 7.5% (at a minimum, guaranteed) contributed to the bottom line. Don't forget 7.5% is even greater for the company when it comes to any matching in the 401k, payroll taxes etc. They have historically allowed the operation to run inefficiently.

AND PLEASE, NOBODY SAY THERE IS ANY SCOPE PROTECTION IN THIS TA.

 

[MarriedToIt]

edit

 

[g159av8tor]

I'm so scared, if I vote yes then everyone will just shut-up and it'll all go away...

Wake up!!! Vote this bastard down. Want to know why? Because the industry is on the way up. The Iraqi war is over, it's summer time, people are traveling. Things are on the upswing:

http://www.usatoday.com/money/biztravel/2003-06-03-air_x.htm
http://news.ft.com/servlet/ContentS...StoryFT/FullStory&c=StoryFT&cid=1054416422132
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,87491,00.html

You want to enter into a 5 year concessionary package after we've hit rock bottom? Five years is too long regardless of who wanted what.

Eight-teen months is a long enough period is get a clearer picture of the future and short enough that it's not that hard of a kick in the pants. SKW's deal is grrreat!!! They'll be flying 70 seaters at their current rate while we're flying them for less than our current 50 seat rate, if you look at the numbers. SKW's MGT will not renege because of the threat of ALPA being voted in. Our MEC's line of BS concerning why they weren't slick enough to get that is aggravating.

Vote no because the next TA, if any, will be a pill more easily swollowed.

Tailwinds...

 

[tarp]

DoJetJock,

I am voting "no" for the right reasons. Unlike an FRJ FO who will only gets his pay frozen, I will be taking a 7.5% pay cut if this TA goes through - notice how the company and the MEC agreed and accept a TA that even divides the pilot's reaction by seat!!!

So you sit in BOS or CVG doing 6, 7, 8 leg days in the mighty Do-jet. You think that you are overcompensated by ACA to do that? You are going to give concessions like going back to a $1.50 per diem when a $1.60 doesn't even cover road expenses! You are going to give up your carry-in, carry-out monthly transition conflict so that you get paid even less to be beaten up by Scheduling. You are going to smile and say "yes, may I please have another" when you are told that you are working till midnight on the day before your vacation and that your report time is 0600 on your first day back from vacation? You agree that ACA is such a well-oiled machine that there is no other avenue for them to save 9 million dollars from the bottom line except by taking it out of your salary?

Maybe I shouldn't have left the Dork - CVG looked like a prison to me - maybe I was wrong and you guys have discovered country club living?

My salary has no effect on ACA's negotiations with United or Bain. They could have bid any number they wanted without concessions. Do you have any idea how paltry a sum $9 million is in a company the size of ACA? But taking somewhere between 7.5% and 20% (I'm counting all the workrule changes that removes about 5 weeks of soft money from my pay!) hurts me a great deal.

I don't know how CVG traffic is moving, but I've just flown the past two weeks on the CRJ (United side). Here are my statistics:

Total flight legs: 26
Legs w/ full aircraft (50 pax): 22
Legs with 48 pax: 2
Legs with 47 pax: 1
Legs with 36 pax: 1

Get the picture. How can I be flying 98% full loads and anyone in our food chain is losing money? If I'm flying full loads and management is doing their job (i.e. not giving away the seats), then how can they not pay me and make a profit?

Were you here for the Charter Flying TA? What a crock! Company asked us to give them everything - MEC highly endorsed it so that we could assure many jobs in the Charter department. Well we voted it down. The company still ran Charters and why did the company fail at attracting Charter business - not because pilots couldn't work 16 hour days - because they had no planes allocated and too many breakdowns (maintenance problems). Why do we continually have MX problems at ACA - because it is a low-budget operation that doesn't have enough qualified people or the equipment to do it right. Have you looked at our airplanes and our competitors? Why do we have speed tape and unpainted parts on a plane that is being rolled out into revenue service? Are we that pressed that we can't even wait for a coat of blue paint to be applied to an engine cowl or a fairing?

I'm not falling for this stuff. My reasoning is firmly based in what I see every day not words spoken by my management or the MEC. I vote NO!