AirTran in talks with Airbus

[Boeingman]

The people have to move and if you don't have the equipment you call a charter operator. Once your equipment is on line, or your training is done we disappear, this has nothing to do with scope.

Moving any revenue passenger of another carrier, for whatever reason or excuse, is a scope issue.

 

[TurboS7]

Sorry guy, free skies, free country, and everything is deregulated SCOPE in your context went out in the 70's.

 

[DougCorp-9]

Miami Air at Airtran

Our contract at Airtran allows management to contract out a certain amount of flying for 6 months in a 12 month period. This was allowed so that when a market opportunity arises that we can get in even if we don't have the crews or equipment available. The contracting is only used until we can get the new equipment and crews to operate the route ourselves. We make more cash when we operate them ourselves. If we did not allow this then opportunities would pass and be taken by other carriers. We have been doing alot of expanding in the BMI market and cannot train the crews fast enough. Miami Air has been contracted to to do some of our ATL-FLL routes. It just so happens that these routes are usually overbooked. With Miami Air using a 738 we will be able to sell more seats in that market and generate more revenue untill we can increase the frequency ourselves.

 

[TurboS7]

Thankyou. I did start a new thread with some issues that we are dealing with more than U.S. carrier to carrier scope. We should all be concerned about these issues as the world gets smaller and smaller. Check it out.

 

[Boeingman]

Sorry guy, free skies, free country, and everything is deregulated SCOPE in your context went out in the 70's.

Youre talking in circles here. It has nothing to do with deregulation.

Our contract still has Scope clauses in black and white terminology and it was negotiated in the 90's.

I would expect you to argue about it because it is a threat to your type of operation.

 

[Ty Webb]

Sorry, Guy, but your beef is not with Turbo, it's with your company and your union.

At AirTran, it is not a scope issue at all, as another person pointed out. We have protection against that, if we needed it, but we don't need it- the Company could operate our own equipment cheaper than we can ACMI it.

We simply don't have the crews to fly the airplanes we have parked at ATL right now. Crews are being hired and trained, but until they are on-line, Miami Air will fill that gap.

I don't want to see the Company pass on the $$$ or turn away business. When we have the manpower, we'll do it ourselves.

We have hired 120 since Nov. and will have hired 300+ by the end of the year. You can only train a certain amount of people with the limited sim and training facilities we have in place.

PS., For what it's worth, the rumor around the training center was that we were looking at -700, not -800.

 

[TurboS7]

700 has another 500nm of range over the 800 and for all pratical purposes carries the same amount of people.

 

[Boeingman]

Sorry, Guy, but your beef is not with Turbo, it's with your company and your union.

I don't have a beef with either of you guys. If you want to farm out your flying and cut your own throats...have at it. In the long run it will work against you.

All I am saying is a solid scope clause prevents this scenario from happening (and then some) and keeps OUR pilots flying OUR passengers on OUR aircraft.

My point to Turbo is no matter how he sugarcoats it, at an airline with scope protection, this would not happen.

 

[-9Capt]

Boeingman,

Believe me, I understand your point.

However, AirTran does have a scope clause covering sub-service by other carriers which puts limits on the ammount of flying and duration it can go on.

If the company (AirTran) was not hiring, not expanding, and not recieving new aircraft, I would agree with you 100%. The fact of the matter is the company is growing and hiring as fast as they can, some would argue faster than they can.

In this case I don't see a problem farming out some flying (up to the limits of the scope clause) while the company expands to eventually handle it themselves.

In the long run every pilot on the property will be better off beacuse of it.

Happy Flying.