Asa Strike Vote!

[outtahere]

You know the first few posters on here are unbelieveable. I came from an airline that cared nothing for its employee's, maint. was terrible, schedules were attrocious, now I work for ASA and I love my job. However, I also believe ASA would be a better airline if the employees were treated fairly. One thing I can say about that "other" airline is the pilot group was incredibly unified, even though we had no union. ASA; its no wonder we are treated with no respect by management, we can't even treat each other with respect. For those of you on this board who claim to be SENIOR, what good does that do you at a company like ASA. You will be Junior Manned, you will be drafted to go fly as a first officer even though you haven't been in the right seat for over ten years, your pay will be audited every month, and they will take money away. You will be given airport reserve, even though we don't have airport reserve in our contract. Perhaps you have been here for twenty years, and you know what it is alot better now than when you were flying a Bandit, but that was then. OUR contract is over six years old, it is being reinterpreted at will, are you so afraid of management that you refuse to stand up for yourself. Our management is like the bully in middle school, until you stood up and kicked his a$$, he tormented you daily. Now I do not want lose my job, but I am not willing to stand by and be abused. We have a fifteen year agreement with Delta for fying, it is performance based, Skywest is paid fee per departure. If our cost goes up, all that happens is Skywest's profit margin shrinks a little. Delta is not going to dump us because our costs go up. However if we go on strike, Skywest is penalized for the lack of departures, costing them alot more than what we are asking for in a new contract. Who has more to lose, you making sh!ty wages on an even crappier schedule, or Skywest who just invested $425 million into us. Use the tools that you have. A strike vote is a tool that is used to tell management enough is enough. Coex took a strike vote after a year and a half of negotiations, we have been doing this for three years. How much longer do we stand around and do nothing?

 

[601Pilot]

Don't talk about it, do it! Don't lower the BAR you chest thumper!

I'm trying to do it, you jacka$$!

 

["GO AROUND"]

I agree With everyone else. I think ASA is Crazy for pickiting in this economy. Here people are losing jobs and ASA is asking for a pay raise you should just be happy you have a job. Some people are so greedy.

Whose asking for a pay raise? Profit sharing sounds good right now with major improvments in QOL. The company wants to take things back and little or no limitations on everything else. Not greedy, just not wiling to lower the bar from it's current location.

 

[asacap]

I expect a pay raise, retro pay, and QOL stuff. Otherwise I vote to strike. It's that simple. Just because the industry stinks right now we are supposed roll over? Forget that. Hopefully we can raise the bar and get others to do the same.

 

[~~~^~~~]

Yes - ASA pilots are not treated as well as they were under this contract when it was agreed to - examples:

• No picking up trips with higher block times if they result in any additional time off. If you want to trade a 6 hour 3 day for a 7 hour two day, they now will not let you do it. It is the Company's goal to have everyone as close to 10 days off a month as they can get them.
• Continued flying after 3 continuous duty overnights. After flying nights for three days, they can put you on a 3 day trip that starts 10, or 11, hours after your last nap. Duty out at o7oo, see you back at the airport at 17oo for a 3 day.

No only do we need a new contract, we need a contract as good as the one we thought we had in 1999. I'm not talking money, I'm talking QOL and I'll walk over QOL.

 

["GO AROUND"]

There's money to be made if you get the QOL stuff that is needed. Talked to a SKW guy the other day and his profit sharing checks amounted to about a $5 an hr pay raise if you worked it out. Don't know how true that is but that's a nice raise.

I'll be on the next train out if we don't get QOL improvements. As someone else said on this board, ASA is not a bad place to work, but it could be so much better.

My .02, I'm tired of guys bashing the MEC, union and CNC guy's. If you're not part of the solution you are part of the problem. All this has probably been said before, but if you think you can do better then take part in the election or support a change to someone who you think is better or S.T.F.U. Someone who is volunteering to try and make pilots lives better and giving up their time in the process. I'm not saying that you don't have the right to complain, but that's all you hear with noone stepping up with anything else.

There, I will get off my soap box.

Flame on..........

 

[atrdriver]

It's amazing that all the people who DON'T work at ASA at experts on what we want in our contract. We are not looking at making more money here. Most of the items that we have proposed would SAVE the company money in the long term because it would be MORE EFFICIENT. But the company won't even talk to us about those issues. WE HAVEN'T EVEN EXCHANED PROPOSALS ON COMPENSATION. Right before negotiations broke off the company was arguing over ALPA's proposal to have a pilot classified as a "reserve" pilot or a "lineholder", depending on what they were able to hold in the month in question. MANAGEMENT WOULDN'T ALLOW THOSE SIMPLE CLASSIFICATIONS. If you are not here, and don't know what we are dealing with, maybe you should either educate yourself before chiming in, or simply stay out of the discussion. I would be happy with our current payrates, given a better QOL. But I am NOT happy with the current situation, and a lot of other ASA pilots are starting to see the light.

 

[79%N1]

Yes - ASA pilots are not treated as well as they were under this contract when it was agreed to - examples:

• No picking up trips with higher block times if they result in any additional time off. If you want to trade a 6 hour 3 day for a 7 hour two day, they now will not let you do it. It is the Company's goal to have everyone as close to 10 days off a month as they can get them.
• Continued flying after 3 continuous duty overnights. After flying nights for three days, they can put you on a 3 day trip that starts 10, or 11, hours after your last nap. Duty out at o7oo, see you back at the airport at 17oo for a 3 day.

No only do we need a new contract, we need a contract as good as the one we thought we had in 1999. I'm not talking money, I'm talking QOL and I'll walk over QOL.

Thats exactly what Im saying.......and I'm with you. I think the group at ASA knows were not upping our hourly rates much, but many are ready to walk over these QOL issues! This company is full of control freak managers who dont realize that letting up a little control over stupid stuff will add up to a happier pilot group, which will then work with them to save $$ other ways.

 

[sweptback]

• Continued flying after 3 continuous duty overnights. After flying nights for three days, they can put you on a 3 day trip that starts 10, or 11, hours after your last nap. Duty out at o7oo, see you back at the airport at 17oo for a 3 day.

Actually you need 11 hours in domicile for a scheduled assignment, but between two CDOs you only need 9. Still, that extra hour in your example is not going to make any difference, and yes it sucks. I've had to do it before... one of those "legal but not necessarily the safest" ideas.

It's funny how the Company makes a big deal about how you should be coming to work expecting to work 14 hours straight for a CDO, yet pulls stuff like this without any regard to sleep cycles. It's just whatever works in their favor, I guess.

 

[dash8driver64]

Given the crap market out there, its not likely that we're gonna get much of a pay raise. not that we are asking for it. Those of us that want retro pay may also be dissapointed. SKW has only owned this hornets nest for a short while and i fear that they are thinking "well that was your old owners problem not ours"i'd be happy with the QOL stuff, pay bump and trip and duty rigs. The way scheduling runs things now we would get 50% pay raise with rigs. At least they would have to think about how they build lines and divey out assignments.
if we had rigs, i would have made 112 hrs of pay in Sept.