Attn. United Haters

[Dennis Miller]

UAL must be very proud of you Captain WatchYourElbows.

She's not a Captain, unless they are currently handing out type ratings on the soda cart. She is indeed one of the esteemed corps 'de la galley hags, a long forgotten stewardess that sold her soul to UAL for cheap airfare to Barbados. Now thirty odd years later she hasn't met Mr. Right, she’s a waitress at a bad restaurant at 37000 feet, and she's looking for that next pilot to blame her whole derisory life on. CHAOS my a$$, you broads didn't even have the decorousness to go through with the threat like the Mechanics at NWA did, so go find another copy of Cosmo stuffed in the back pocket of another 737, and rethink how your life may have turned out different, if only you had not quit the drive thru job at Del Taco.

 

[Russ]

"Oh yeah, just wait till you're on the jumpseat and the JetBlue guys are lecturing you on dragging down the industry"

There's plenty of time for it with the out and back to LGB.

 

[Metro752]

Tee Hee Hee, Nice way to treat your 744s with the purdy white paint...........

http://www.airliners.net/open.file/907988/L/

 

[Sonny Crockett]

Wow!

Seems like the good old UAL bashing is alive and well....

I haven't flown one stinking -400 out to VCV this year, so if you all want to jumpseat let me know I am LAX based.

To bad we are not going out of Business like some of you were dreaming about.

 

[G4G5]

Mugs]So liquidating UAL would have saved the . Further growth by LCC's (current and future upstarts) would not have affected the future viability of those plans at the remaining legacy carriers. Is that your opinion?

I never said it would have saved the defined benefit pension plans in the U.S. airline industry. Are you saying what UAL did was good for the industry?

It cracks me up when people hide behind the LCC excuse. Take a close look at Airtran, they have a 10.5% B fund. How do you explain that?

Would it have helped, absolutly. Even the director of the PBGC acknowledges that this will only lead to more defaults. Next you are going to tell me that UAL's ability to dump all it's pensions has nothing to do with DAL and NWA rushing to beat the 10/17 deadline. The folks at DAL and NWA are about to lose their pensions, or do you think that they will actually come out of CH11 with them intact? Are you going to tell me that UAL dump had no effect on their mgt's decisions? I never want to see anyone lose their jobs, heck I watched my father go through this at Pan Am but the line had to be drawn somewhere? Instead you folks opened the barn door.



The ATSB, in denying UAL's final request for the ATSB loan, said that UAL had sufficient access to the capital markets for financing. Thus, there was no need for UAL to receive an ATSB loan. However, the ATSB knew that the captial markets were not willing to loan UAL anything with the pension obligation in place. It can be assumed that given the UAL situation and the apparent lack of enthusiasm in Washington to pass any meaningful pension reform (as far as the airline industry is concerned), the Government had already accepted the reality of the collapse of the defined benefit pension plan in the U.S. airline industry. Afterall, it was the Government that deregulated the airlines to begin with, while making no requirement that new entrants offer pensions and other traditional benefits to their workforces.

The PBGC does not have theability to differentiate between sectors. It can't come out and say it's ok for the airline to dump their pension but not the auto industry. Their lies the problem. UAL mgt has started something that none of ever wanted to see happen.
Plenty of companies like Time Warner and IBM have switched from defined benefit plans to 401k plans without screwing their employes or the public.


The industry is simply evolving as the Government intended. Thanks to the internet, it is finally happening. The pension defaults are viewed as a relatively small cost for a longer term benefit. Nothing to be proud of, but the economics of it all are unstoppable with or without UAL in the picture

http://news.morningstar.com/news/PR/M07/D20/1121862660469.html
Arpey pointed out that in addition to earning a modest profit, AMR was able to contribute $75 million to its various defined benefit pension plans in the second quarter, bringing its total contributions to the plans this year to $213 million. AMR also was able to grow its cash balance, ending the period with $3.9 billion in cash and short-term investments, including a restricted balance of $492 million.

http://news.morningstar.com/news/PR/M07/D20/1121857267003.html
During the quarter, Continental made pension contributions of $50 million of cash and 6.1 million shares of ExpressJet stock. The contribution of ExpressJet stock resulted in a $47 million gain recognized during the quarter. The company also made pension contributions of an additional $40 million of cash to the pension plans in July of 2005, bringing the total year-to-date contributions to the plans to $220 million. [font=Times New Roman, Times, serif]Continental expects to make $84 million in additional contributions to its pension plans this year, fulfilling its required funding obligations. [/font]

No it's pretty clear that you are hiding behind the, "it would have happened anyway" excuse. If that's the case then how do you explain AMR and CAL making their pension payments? It has nothing to do with, it would have happened any and everything to do with poor mgt.

 

[WatchYourElbows]

AGAIN.......who was the first to dump their pensions?

 

[WatchYourElbows]

Must be sad to live your LCC lives wishing that UAL would go under so that MAYBE someday you could fly the REAL jets. Too bad, so sad.

 

[G4G5]

AGAIN.......who was the first to dump their pensions?

delete

 

[G4G5]

Must be sad to live your LCC lives wishing that UAL would go under so that MAYBE someday you could fly the REAL jets. Too bad, so sad.

delete

 

[Sonny Crockett]

Must be sad to live your LCC lives wishing that UAL would go under so that MAYBE someday you could fly the REAL jets. Too bad, so sad.

I agree with that 100%

HA! HA! HA! HA!

UNITED WILL STAND................

Read it, learn it, LIVE IT !!!!!

 

[Mugs]

Mugs]
It cracks me up when people hide behind the LCC excuse. Take a close look at Airtran, they have a 10.5% B fund. How do you explain that?

No it's pretty clear that you are hiding behind the, "it would have happened anyway" excuse. If that's the case then how do you explain AMR and CAL making their pension payments? It has nothing to do with, it would have happened any and everything to do with poor mgt.

Airtran has a good "B"-fund, but of course there is no A-plan at all. Even UAL still has 9% going to the B, which is supposed to go to 15% post-CH11. When you consider the enormous debt levels at both AMR and CAL and what they will be competeing against with or without UAL, do you really believe the pensions at both companies will be viable for the long run? Speaking of Airtran, they have torn apart Delta in their own backyard. Is UAL to blame for that too?

Maybe that is why AMR is so spooked by talk of the repeal of the Wright Amendment. Losing the revenue premium in Dallas, as Delta did in Atlanta, could have dire consequences for yet another debt laiden legacy carrier. If you find it more conveinent to blame having to compete with UAL and its new cost structure, fine. Just keep in mind that it is just the thing you would have wound up competeing against eventually even if UAL had shut down back in 2002.

 

[AA717driver]

Must be sad to live your LCC lives wishing that UAL would go under so that MAYBE someday you could fly the REAL jets. Too bad, so sad.

Excuse me, but when you actually have ratings on the aircraft you have listed in your profile, THEN you can lecture us.

Until that time, you can give me the whole can!

BTW, UAL pays the same as most LCC's and less than some. You are now a LCC with all the accompanying pay and bene's... (And, no, I don't take any joy in that. All our union dues have gone for nothing other than bigger paychecks for the national "leaders". We've gotten hosed.)

B6Driver--You know me so you should know I didn't mean that comment that way. For years you and I endured the "dragging down the industry comments". I was pointing out the irony that JB and others pay better and are more stable than UAL and the other legacies and it will be their turn to get the snide comments.TC

 

[Mugs]

Excuse me, but when you actually have ratings on the aircraft you have listed in your profile, THEN you can lecture us.

Until that time, you can give me the whole can!

BTW, UAL pays the same as most LCC's and less than some. You are now a LCC with all the accompanying pay and bene's... (And, no, I don't take any joy in that. All our union dues have gone for nothing other than bigger paychecks for the national "leaders". We've gotten hosed.)

B6Driver--You know me so you should know I didn't mean that comment that way. For years you and I endured the "dragging down the industry comments". I was pointing out the irony that JB and others pay better and are more stable than UAL and the other legacies and it will be their turn to get the snide comments.TC

Can I expect that lecture on board both the A320 and the EMB-190?

 

[canyonblue]

Must be sad to live your LCC lives wishing that UAL would go under so that MAYBE someday you could fly the REAL jets. Too bad, so sad.

Yea, but you have to work at United. Too bad, so sad. It is the United employee that has to wish for the good old days that will never return. It's like those child stars that show up on reality shows and at Tractor Pulls, you feel more sad for them than anything else.

 

[fifty30retard]

She's not a Captain, unless they are currently handing out type ratings on the soda cart. She is indeed one of the esteemed corps 'de la galley hags, a long forgotten stewardess that sold her soul to UAL for cheap airfare to Barbados. Now thirty odd years later she hasn't met Mr. Right, she’s a waitress at a bad restaurant at 37000 feet, and she's looking for that next pilot to blame her whole derisory life on. CHAOS my a$$, you broads didn't even have the decorousness to go through with the threat like the Mechanics at NWA did, so go find another copy of Cosmo stuffed in the back pocket of another 737, and rethink how your life may have turned out different, if only you had not quit the drive thru job at Del Taco.

Excellant! Bravo! So true it must hurt.

 

[B6Driver]

AA717Driver / Tim,

I sort of figured that but thanks any way. We're good.

 

[WatchYourElbows]

Sorry, would love to sit and chat. But I have to pack for my Munich trip. You know Munich, it's in Europe. Ta Ta for now!! Have fun in Des Moines.

 

[canyonblue]

Here is some German to help you in Munich:

Ich bin ein fetter Flugbegleiter, der nicht gelegt erhält, helfe mir bitte!

 

[F9 Driver]

Am I wrong in assuming that F9 is "selling their product" right now for less than it will cost in the near future? Your Airbus leases are heavily back-loaded as I understand it. It seems to me that as the true Airbus lease costs begin to kick in, F9 will see further erosion in cost advantages over the UAL competition. I am not trying to spar with you, just wondering if their is any validity to this line of reasoning.

Well. Here’s the program as I, just a line pilot mind you, see it.

UAL’s CASM ex-fuel is higher than F9’s. Even with all of the gnashing of teeth and wailing – A LOT higher. About two cents I believe. Right now I think UAL’s profitable international flying is subsidizing its domestic CASM > RASM, and chapter 11 protection makes the book keeping more important than the flying.

I don’t think UAL’s CASM is going to drop once CH11 protection ends. F9’s is probably going to continue to drop as the aircraft are deployed more efficiently, but may be negatively impacted by changing lease rates in the future. Our RASM should continue to increase as we enter better earning markets.

Leases aren’t my specialty. But it would seem that GCAS et al have been softened up by the recent spate of bankruptcy filings/threat of bankruptcy filings, and may want to renegotiate lease terms. Kind of like the pension domino effect.

Even if F9’s CASM does rise I don’t see it reaching UAL’s level. With that as my premise: I’d like to see UAL raise their fares to where their RASM > CASM. We’d both make money.

I know this is a bit simplistic, but it is basic economics, and is why I think this line of reasoning is precisely where the solution lies – at least part of it.

 

[enigma]

I’d like to see UAL raise their fares to where their RASM > CASM. We’d both make money.

I know this is a bit simplistic, but it is basic economics, and is why I think this line of reasoning is precisely where the solution lies – at least part of it.

It is also basic that you can't raise fares above the level that customers are willing to pay. At some point, raising fares reaches a point of diminishing returns, and for as much as I question management some times, I don't think that they are stupid enought to price too low, or to price too high. Quite frankly, I'll bet that all managers are charging every penny that the market will bear.

enigma