Cal mec response to ual mec

[ualdriver]

Conspiracy? No. There are actually junior UAL guys/gals who are actually screwed.

Thank PW for us for the 70 seat jets showing up in CAL bases....

I didn't realize that PW was the guy in charge when 70 seat jets showed up at UAL? But let's not let facts get in the way of a good flightinfo debate!

Of course there are guys on UAL property who are screwed. It sucks to be junior. We all knew that when we took the job, no?

Refresh my memory....are you a UAL guy or a CAL guy? I forgot.

 

[EWR_FO]

Of course there are guys on UAL property who are screwed. It sucks to be junior. We all knew that when we took the job, no?

Why does it have to suck to be junior? I contend it sucks to be junior far, far, worse today than it ever did in the past. That is a DIRECT result of the senior contingent using the junior contingent like Chinese infantry, obviously you don't see anything wrong with that.

 

[Furloughed80]

ualdriver,

Can you or any other UAL guys/gals answer 1 question? Is the UAL side trying to 'unband' by cutting the hourly rate on the 777?

 

[ualdriver]

Why does it have to suck to be junior? I contend it sucks to be junior far, far, worse today than it ever did in the past. That is a DIRECT result of the senior contingent using the junior contingent like Chinese infantry, obviously you don't see anything wrong with that.

It has to suck to be junior because we choose a seniority based employment system. Because of that, if anything "goes wrong" the junior guy gets the boot. In a previous airline life, I was furloughed. I didn't lash out my fellow pilots because my employer ran into hard times. I did not have any expectations of anything from the guys senior to me nor did I feel that they screwed me over because they had their jobs and I didn't have mine.

As to your argument about it being "far far worse today" than it ever did in the past.......well, I don't know about that. Maybe from yours and my perspective, that is true simply because these are the worst economic times that we have ever seen in our adult working years. So yeah, I guess that's true in that regard. However, how about the stagflation and economic times of the late 70's early 80's? Is it "far" worse today? That's a matter of opinion I guess.

As a counterpoint, however, I would say that a furloughee gets taken care of a lot better than furloughees in the previous generation. For example, our furloughees have their health care taken care of along with travel benefits and a right to sit on the sidelines and bypass for many years with no jeopardy of losing their recall rights. Sucks to be furloughed, sure. But I'd rather be a UAL furloughee now than a furloughee when the "senior guys" themselves were furloughed from United, for example.

Your last comment I'll just ignore.

 

[ualdriver]

ualdriver,

Can you or any other UAL guys/gals answer 1 question? Is the UAL side trying to 'unband' by cutting the hourly rate on the 777?

I don't know, but that doesn't make much sense. Our standing direction to our MEC is to UNBAND our aircraft. We wanted to do this before our merger with CAL was announced because we viewed the banding of aircraft as a concession left over from our hard economic times during bankruptcy. It was part of the whole "industry leading contract" thing, among many other things obviously.

If anything, I'm sure they want to unband the 777/747-400 by giving the 777 industry leading rates then increasing the 747-400 rates by some amount over the new, hopefully higher 777 rates since the 747-400 is a more "productive" aircraft.

From what I am hearing from our reps, it sounds like we want to unband and CAL doesn't. So I suspect we're going to compromise somehow and end up with some sort of banding unfortunately. Hopefully we'll gain more in pay by pulling the smaller aircraft in the band "up" then we lose by pulling the larger aircraft "down" in the band. We'll see I guess.

 

[EWR_FO]

It has to suck to be junior because we choose a seniority based employment system. Because of that, if anything "goes wrong" the junior guy gets the boot. In a previous airline life, I was furloughed. I didn't lash out my fellow pilots because my employer ran into hard times. I did not have any expectations of anything from the guys senior to me nor did I feel that they screwed me over because they had their jobs and I didn't have mine.

As to your argument about it being "far far worse today" than it ever did in the past.......well, I don't know about that. Maybe from yours and my perspective, that is true simply because these are the worst economic times that we have ever seen in our adult working years. So yeah, I guess that's true in that regard. However, how about the stagflation and economic times of the late 70's early 80's? Is it "far" worse today? That's a matter of opinion I guess.

As a counterpoint, however, I would say that a furloughee gets taken care of a lot better than furloughees in the previous generation. For example, our furloughees have their health care taken care of along with travel benefits and a right to sit on the sidelines and bypass for many years with no jeopardy of losing their recall rights. Sucks to be furloughed, sure. But I'd rather be a UAL furloughee now than a furloughee when the "senior guys" themselves were furloughed from United, for example.

Your last comment I'll just ignore.

I'm not talking about being furloughed, that has always sucked. I'm talking about working under a subpar contract that is absolutely tilted toward cushioning those on top. I've watched it happen time and time again and I'm sick of it. I watched our NC committee agree to concessions to "save the A plan" (even though no one quite explained what they were saving it from) and screw a large percentage of the junior contingent on the last go around. I will not stand by and watch it happen again, regardless of the section or subject matter being discussed.

 

[Yuppyguppy]

To answer one of your questions...PW gave us the e170 which as you know is the guppy killer. I'll be back to you UALDRIVER when I get some of my questions answered from the reps.

 

[Homer Jay]

I am getting SO SICK of all this union He Said/She Said bs! This job sucks ball$ as it is and our elected reps are making it even worse. Hey Wendy and Jay, quite the bickering, settle your squabbles, and get us an industry leading contract before my job disappears to Skywest and Republic!!!!!

 

[ualdriver]

To answer one of your questions...PW gave us the e170 which as you know is the guppy killer. I'll be back to you UALDRIVER when I get some of my questions answered from the reps.

You'll likely get the same answers I did when I asked. I just figured you would want to hear them from someone who actually knows what's going on rather than some guy on a forum.

Yup, I agree with you about PW's role in the 70 seat RJ mess. He signed a side letter (foolishly) to allow the E170 in the mix. He did not allow the "concept" of 70 seat jets at UAL. We pilots did in the late 1990's. The pilots are to blame, as much as I'd like to blame PW because I don't think he was a good leader for that time.

 

[ualdriver]

I'm not talking about being furloughed, that has always sucked. I'm talking about working under a subpar contract that is absolutely tilted toward cushioning those on top. I've watched it happen time and time again and I'm sick of it. I watched our NC committee agree to concessions to "save the A plan" (even though no one quite explained what they were saving it from) and screw a large percentage of the junior contingent on the last go around. I will not stand by and watch it happen again, regardless of the section or subject matter being discussed.

Sounds good to me.