Comair Vote Results ???

[Berry McCockner]

Surplus, I can respect your decision to save your capt slot and a 9% paycut instead of being displaced to an FO. In the end everyone is looking out for themselves. But what is it worth to you? What happens when Freddo comes back and says that he needs more. If conex, mesaba, asa, and all the others lower their costs then cmr will be at the high end again. Will you then take another cut? When does it end? What is your job worth to you? How low are you willing to go? To the bottom? You are a sellout to yourself. Stand up for what you are worth.

 

[surplus1]

I am proud of anyone who voted yes, thus condeming the FO group to four years of poverty. You are happy now, paying your mortgage and feeding your family. But FOs cannot... We will not make $35k-$40k a year for the next four years. FOs will make less than CHQ and barely above Mesa...

In 1992 I voted against a TA that did not provide 60% of captains pay to FO's. In 1994 we achieved 60% for FO's (among other things) and I voted YES. So did the majority. I'm sure you were not here at that time. Nevertheless, I must tell you that the 60% was a first on the regional side and it came at the expense of significantly lower pay for every Captain.

In 1996 when the company was not honoring our 1994 contract, we fought tooth and nail and I along with many others help to achieve major improvements mid-contract. Those changes got your premium pay, your displacement pay, your filling of vacancies protections, improvements in reserve duty and reserve reassignments, etc. In most cases the imporvements benefited First Officers more than captains.

In 2001 we all paid a heavy price to keep the FO percentage and improve the pay rates of new hires, FO's and Captains and a host of other improvements for all of us. We had to strike for 89 days and vote down 2 "last and best offers" to do it. We did.

My point is that I don't think you were here then either. That's not your fault. But, you do need to consider the fact that the $35-40K that you have been enjoying, the pay that I have been enjoying and the benefits that we all had before this POS, were bought and paid for by those of us who came before you. They were not handed to us on a silver platter. We paid for them with years of sweat and tears so that you and others like you could come along and share them with those of us who earned them.

Things beyond our control have now taken a different turn and we are once more called upon to make sacrifices, very big ones, in an effort to survive. None of us is exempt from that call.

If you don't know, then you should know that your negotiating committee did NOT make a decision to "sacrifice First Officers" for the benefit of Captains. They didn't propose this crap and they didn't accept this crap because they thought it was a good idea. Neither did any of the rests of us. We all know that this is a lousy deal!

NO, it isn't something to be proud of. It is something that we had to do today if we are going to be able to do anything tomorrow.

YES, First Officer pay is now bad. But guess what? You will still be paid MORE than REP, PSA, TSA, MDA, MSA, PCL and MES. Those are the people you need to be upset with.

Is that the kind of quality you want in your right seat? You get what you pay for.

The quality of the person in my right seat was not determined by the pay rate before this and it won't be determined by the pay rate after this. I was getting more than we pay for before and that won't change. I realize you are angry and you have a right to be. I am angry too. I didn't vote for this because I like it. I voted becuse in my opinion I didn't have a choice.

Captains didn't walk away from this with a good deal my friend. I was able to list above 7 airlines that you will still be paid more than. You know what, I can only list 2 airlines that captains will be paid more than. They are ASA and MES. Don't think that captains came out ahead with this deal, we didn't. It sucks for everyone.

The company did propose a common rate for both Captains and FO's I don't know why it wound up the way it did, I wasn't at the table. My guess is the reason it came out that way is because that is what the overwhelming majority of regional airlines do. In fact I can only find 3 airlines that pay a type differential for Jet FO and they are AWAC, PSA and ASA. AWAC pays a differential in the BAE146, not the CRJ. PSA still pays less in both types. I'm sure the company just copied the others and rammed it down our throats. Comiar captains didn't make that decision, it was made for us by other airlines.

You need to understand that others have been undercutting us for years. Don't blame Comair captains for that. This captain has sympathy for ALL of us. There is nothing good about this deal.

We just recently lost about 8,000 hours of block time. Who did we lose it to? Mesa. Why do you think that happened? Becuse Mesa underbid us and literally "paid" Delta for the business. That's the cut-throat enviroment that we live in. Comair captains are NOT reponsible for that. You're taking your justified anger out on the wrong people.

As for Fred getting the captains vote, please smell the coffee. Fred didn't call these shots, Delta did. He's just the messenger. What he can do will remain limited as long as we are "owned" by Delta. If another airline should buy us, they may keep Fred or they may replace him. We could do worse. Don't blame Fred, he's a victim just like you and me.

I am proud to vote no, because there was no urgency to vote yes at this moment in time. Why have we allowed the company drag out our previous contract negotiations?

You are now talking about two different things. The first is a matter of opinion. I think there was great urgency now and you don't that's an honest difference of opinion. You could be right, so could I.

As for "allowing" the company to drag out our previous contract negotiations we have never done that. The National Mediation Board allows companies to drag out negotiations. Pilot groups do not control the NMB and have to comply with the law. If you would like a more favorable NMB, try electing a different President for starters and a different Congress as a follow up.

 

[172driver]

Maybe you posted before reading my response, but if not, you need to reread it.

YES, First Officer pay is now bad. But guess what? You will still be paid MORE than REP, PSA, TSA, MDA, MSA, PCL and MES. Those are the people you need to be upset with.

NOT TRUE!!! We are lower than all but Mesa, FO's and CA's. I wish people would've analyzed this a little more closely before voting ignorantly, or maybe where we fit in the industry wasn't an important factor?

I do not want to hear that we should be angry at CHQ or Mesa ever again. We did this all by ourselves, took the largest concession in years.

 

[surplus1]

Surplus,

I generally respect and agree with your opinion, but you are way off base on this one. You have no right to attack me on the basis of one sentence in a flightinfo post. You certainly seem to have made a lot of assumptions on why you think I voted the way I did. Because I said, in the end, my decision came down to my needs, you assume I took no one else into consideration?

First of all I apologize for coming on so strong against your statements. We’re all up tight about this and that includes me. Nevertheless, it is true that what you said pi_ssed me off big time. I apologize for letting you cause me to get angry but I don’t apologize for what I said in response to your statements, I meant every word of it. I think you meant it too for you haven’t taken back a single word.

I did not assume anything about why you voted the way you did. I simply read what you wrote and believed that you meant what you said. If you did NOT mean that you voted NO because you “had nothing to lose”, then you should not have said that. If you did NOT mean that you were “embarrassed to wear our uniform”, you should not have said so. If you did NOT mean that you “no longer wish to be associated with this group of pilots”, you should not have said that. All that I did was take you at your own word. You have said nothing to retract any of your statements.

I accept your right to be angry about this. I’m angry too. However, no matter how angry you may be I don’t expect you to say things that you do not mean and I cannot accept what you did say in silence. Once you have uttered or written those words it is virtually impossible to take them back. You haven’t made any effort to do so. Therefore I can only presume that I did not misunderstand you.

This is only Flightinfo, but it is a public forum. What you say here is read by every tom, dick and harry, not just Comair pilots. Whenever I read what I see as an attack on this pilot group I will respond to it. I’m a Comair pilot and I’m not embarrassed to wear my uniform or ashamed to be associated with this group; I’m proud of that association. I wish you were too.

I definitely weighed the needs of every employee in this company, my needs, my family, and the other pilots in the industry before I came to a decision. You assumed otherwise.

The only thing I assumed was that you meant what you said. If you did take all those things into consideration, then what did you mean by saying you had “nothing to lose”? It seems you have just as much to lose as any of us.

If you considered all those factors then you considered one thing that I did NOT consider. I did not spend even one second considering “other pilots in the industry.” Over the years I have come to learn (there have been more years than you can imagine) that other pilots in the industry never consider my pilot group when they make their decisions. The evidence of that is all around us for more than 30 years that I know about personally and a he!! of a lot longer that I’ve read about. Is that good? No, it isn’t but I can’t do anything about it. The only thing I can affect is what happens in my own group. So, I treat the others the same way that they treat us. Saving the profession is a nice idea but in order to do that you must first save yourself. You don’t save the profession by committing suicide. I can guarantee that a month after we go out of business 90% won’t remember our name. A year later none of them will. Sad maybe, but true.

Probably the biggest factor in my process, as I said earlier, was that these new rates do not pay fair market value for a CRJ FO, nor for a pilot with my level of experience.

I agree that these new rates do not pay fair value for anyone, not just FO’s. Unfortunately there is nothing “fair” about business it all operates by the golden rule, which means that the man with the gold makes the rules. In this case the man with the gold is flat broke but he still has the power to make the rules.

In the piloting profession your pay is never determined by your “level of experience”. It is determined by your seniority in your airline and the type of equipment that your airline operates. When I was first hired here my pay was $12.67 per hr. and all the BS I could stand. The airplane that I flew, if you took its wings off and laid them next to the fuselage, was literally small enough to be carried in the cargo compartment of the airplane that I flew previously. I had more time in the traffic pattern than the kid in the left seat had total time. He had the number I had the experience, and that experience didn’t amount to a single digit on my W2. I assure you, pay has nothing to do with experience when you’re an airline pilot. When you get hired by a new company they pay you whatever happens to be their new-hire pay and not one penny more. By definition, experience is the exchange of the errors of youth for those of age.

The only time experience counts for anything is when you’re trying to get some entry level job and meet some arbitrary standard so they’ll talk to you. Once you’ve past that hurdle you can’t by a cup of coffee at Starbucks with ten thousand hours. Those are the rules of this game. Try to learn them (and I’m not saying that with sarcasm. We all have to start somewhere and we all have to learn). This will be my last job but it certainly wasn’t my first or my best. That does not make me smarter than you it just makes me older than you. I know that too.

The FO's got thrown under the bus here...by the company, by the union, and by their peers, i.e. you.

I wasn’t at the bargaining table so I don’t know what exactly happened there and what didn’t. However, I do know all of the people from our side who were there on our behalf, personally. Whatever you may think of them, I know for a fact that not one of them would intentionally throw away the rights of our First Officers on behalf of the captains. I’ve worked with those people for many years and they just would not do that intentionally. You seem to ignore the fact that our negotiators did not agree with the terms of this contract.

I do not know why our MEC decided to put this up for a vote by the membership. That’s a question you have to ask them. All I know is what you know; they decided to remain “neutral” and they put it up for us to decide. We did and now we have to move on.

As for how the “captains” voted as opposed to how the first officers voted, you are making an assumption that I don’t care to make. The truth is you do not know and I do not know who voted what way. The vote is a secret ballot. You say you voted NO and I said I voted YES. I believe you. Maybe you believe me, maybe you don’t. When a tough contract passes there are always a lot of people who claim they voted NO when they actually voted YES. The point is neither one of us actually knows how the other voted.

It is not fair (and more importantly not logical) for you to make the presumption that all captains voted for this and all FO’s voted against it. I happen to know a lot of captains who say they voted NO and every one of them has more than 10 years with this company. I think you’re assuming too much about who got thrown under the bus. Don’t let your emotions govern your thinking.

We went from mid $40K, 60% of CA pay, to low $30K, 55% of CA pay. That is a huge difference when you are at the low end of the earning scale, but I'm sure you remember that, right?

Yes, I do remember that. People like me lost 16% of their base pay, plus a 10% company contribution to our retirement fund, plus all of the same things that you lost. Yes, it’s harder to make it on the lower end of the scale, I know that. Personally I would have preferred to take a 20 – 25% book rate pay cut to keep the 60% FO ratio but I wasn’t given that option. The only option available was yes or no.

Would other captains have been willing to take a bigger hit for the 60%? I don’t know the answer. However I do know that in the past captains did do that. How do you think we got FO pay to be 60% of CA pay? Do you think the company just gave us that? Well, if you do think that let me be the first to tell you that they didn’t. We paid for that 60% ratio by accepting lower CA pay rates across the board. I’m not guessing about that, I was here and I know. You weren’t here and you don’t know.

Continued

 

[surplus1]

Part 2 of 2

The difference, for me, is owning my own house versus an apartment with roommates. How much weight did you give my needs when you voted to put my job at a subsistence wage? Yeah, I'm sure you thought about the FO's, but it really didn't sway you, did it? In the end, it was about saving YOUR job.

You’re wrong my friend. I took all of that into consideration. I thought it would be better for you to have a job with a base rate of $34 than to have no job at all. I also thought it would be better for me to have my new compensation than to be unemployed. I thought it would be better for our mechanics, our CSR, our rampies, our dispatchers and our flight attendants to all have some job, than to be unemployed. I know that the low pay may force many of us to seek employment elsewhere. I thought it would be better to do that while still getting a pay check than from the unemployment line.

I thought that if the company survived and could escape the clutches of Delta we might have the chance to recover and even to grow, in which case, if we did grow you could upgrade sooner and recover more than you’ve lost. I can’t upgrade so I won’t have the chance to recover anything, but you will.

It also occurred to me that you are very young. If you have to it is possible for you to start over and still come out ahead. For a large number of our senior pilots that just isn’t possible, whether they want to or not. Did YOU think about that? Forgive me, but it doesn’t sound like you did. Everything you’ve said sounds like it’s all about YOU. I realize that you are your #1 and you make that pretty clear. You should not be too surprised if others think the same way.

Knowing how sharp you normally are, I have to say I am a little surprised at how badly you botched your analysis of our new rates. You seem to have missed the fact that we all lost a year of longevity with the Feb. LOA. Thus, in making any comparison, a 5 yr guy must look at the new 4 yr pay, 10 at 9, etc. If you do that, you will see that, in every category, we are lower than everybody but Mesa. In fact, the 70 scale is equal to Mesa.

I thought about it but I did not consider it and I do not think it should be considered. The ’05 LOA and this agreement are very different. The LOA was a risk that the pilots chose to take for the prospect of new growth. The benefits of that growth would have gone almost exclusively to FO’s in the form of upgrades. When you are already a senior CA you don’t benefit any from the company buying more airplanes just like the one you already fly. The LOA passed. Do you think that was because all the captains voted against it and all the FO’s voted for it? If that was so then how come it wasn’t voted down? After all it didn’t benefit the captains by a whole lot. Sure some would move from the little RJ to the bigger RJ and make a few more bucks, but the real benefit was upgrades for First Officers. Did you vote NO on that one too? I bet you didn’t.

Did you expect Delta to go Chapter 11 when that was on the table? Was your policy them “full pay to the last day” as you say it should be now now? I wonder.

We voluntarily went from the very top to the very bottom, in the blink of an eye.

In that one sentence is the real difference between you and I. You think this was voluntary. I think it was blackmail under the guise of bankruptcy. There was nothing voluntary about it. And no, I don’t blame Fred for this, I blame Delta Air Lines.

Do you think for a moment that I would vote for anything resembling this POS on a voluntary basis, as in Section 6? If you do you’re way out in left field.

Young man I voted for this for one reason only. Delta Air Lines has a loaded gun and it is pointed at our collective heads. If they have to they WILL pull the trigger. Even though we voted YES, they will still pull the trigger if that is in the best interest of Delta Air Lines. That’s the way the cookie crumbles. It’s not pretty, it’s reality.

We came to this gun fight without the proverbial knife. We came unarmed and we lost. If the gods favor us we will live to fight another day. If they don’t we’re history.
Apparently you prefer to decide to be history and make it happen. I prefer to gamble in hopes I can live to fight another day, when I have a chance of winning. I know that day may never come but I wasn’t ready to guarantee that it wouldn’t.

Fate is the Hunter.

 

[kmox29]

...And this is why the regionals will always race for the bottom or pay to play. Comair got a beautiful contract after a gutsy 90 day walkout. Nowadays, if someone threatens to pull the plug on your airline, we start choking. Comair was one of the first, and they lost. Air Willy was also one of the first and they lost (I believe the promise to them was they HAD the United flying if they took concessions).

Everyone obviously has their opinion. Mine is, I'd rather be out of a job than give in to the threat of "Better fly cheap, or else". I know it won't make a difference if my company (Mesaba) goes under. At least I won't have to work for crap wages in a dead end career anymore.

 

[BluDevAv8r]

Only if you work for a commuter or a 121 legacy carrier.

Well that is sort of implied isn't it? I was referring to the 121 world since this is in a 121 forum (regionals).

-Neal

 

[BluDevAv8r]

MEC chairman J.C. Lawson is also to blame, he couldn't keep Comair mgmt at the table and got the take it or lose it option. Did you know he pulls down 160K a year, never flys, and is out with his ALPA buddies drinking beer on your dime. He buys trips for his Reps that in turn keep him in office. Throw this bum out, he is part of your problem. Oh ya take his side kick Bill "I'll tell you what you want to hear" Baker with him. What has he been doing for the past 3 years besides collecting a paycheck.?

Can you please explain (with facts and evidence) how JC Lawson earns $160,000 per year?

-Neal

 

[N2264J]

Re: Comair Vote Results???

As I said, some may say it is "a day late and a dollar short" but National is making this "pay to play" small jet issue a very important priority.

If you had any compassion for your fellow man, you'd give me some of the drugs you're smoking.

So how's that Brand Scope working out for ya?

 

[BluDevAv8r]

If you had any compassion for your fellow man, you'd give me some of the drugs you're smoking.

So how's that Brand Scope working out for ya?

I suppose I like to look forward rather than look backward...

 

[737 Pylt]

If you had any compassion for your fellow man, you'd give me some of the drugs you're smoking.

So how's that Brand Scope working out for ya?

How's the rjdc lawsuit working for you??
737

 

[Sucka]

Here is sneak peak into the future of the regional airlines:

http://www.dauntless-soft.com/PRODUCTS/Freebies/USAirParkingBrake/

The end result of the pay to play game...

 

[N2264J]

How's the rjdc lawsuit working for you??

Ahhh...thanks for caring.

http://www.rjdefense.com/2006/litup_012006.pdf

By the way, how's that Brand Scope workin' out for ya?

 

[N2264J]

I suppose I like to look forward rather than look backward...

ALPA has unveiled a new initiative in its long fight to protect the wages and work rules of express pilots--a Fee-For-Departure Task Force.

Fee-for-Departure Task Force!

I've got tears in my eyes. We're saved!

By the way, how's that Brand Scope workin' out for ya?

 

[737 Pylt]

Ahhh...thanks for caring.

http://www.rjdefense.com/2006/litup_012006.pdf

By the way, how's that Brand Scope workin' out for ya?

Better than your pathetic lawsuit! You better keep sending your pal Haber more $$, I hear his pool needs retiling on his home out in the Hamptons plus his porsche lease just came up for renewal!
How many claims were thrown out by the judge???:laugh: :laugh: :laugh:
737

 

[172driver]

You’re wrong my friend. I took all of that into consideration. I thought it would be better for you to have a job with a base rate of $34 than to have no job at all.

My base rate would be $31.50 after almost three years with CMR. Again, I'm not sure you grasp the fact that we lost a year of longevity and must look one year lower on the scale. I am currently making $37.18, and would be making $41 with no concessions. Is it better for me to have this job after an $11,000/yr pay cut, which will not pay my bills, or to take a chance at keeping my wage while risking the job? You know what I decided, so please don't act altruistic, as if you did it for me and others in my seat.

I thought it would be better for our mechanics, our CSR, our rampies, our dispatchers and our flight attendants to all have some job, than to be unemployed.

I did too, but I figured most of them would still have a job, whether it be servicing our aircraft or others. The flight attendants now have the full heat turned up on them because we were unable to hold the line. Looks to me like they are willing to hold the line at the risk of losing their jobs.

I thought that if the company survived and could escape the clutches of Delta we might have the chance to recover and even to grow, in which case, if we did grow you could upgrade sooner and recover more than you’ve lost. I can’t upgrade so I won’t have the chance to recover anything, but you will.

That would be nice but I would be so buried in debt by then that I would never recover. The difference between CA and FO wage reductions, as you know, is that you may have to change your lifestyle or sell some toys, while I will have to take food off the table or file BK.

It also occurred to me that you are very young. If you have to it is possible for you to start over and still come out ahead. For a large number of our senior pilots that just isn’t possible, whether they want to or not. Did YOU think about that? Forgive me, but it doesn’t sound like you did. Everything you’ve said sounds like it’s all about YOU. I realize that you are your #1 and you make that pretty clear. You should not be too surprised if others think the same way.

I agree wholeheartedly. I do plan on starting over, if all goes well.

I also realize, and have stated many times publicly, the position the more senior guys are in. I feel much more badly for them being put in this predicament than I do for myself. I don't blame anyone for the way they voted or for thinking of themselves first. You are the one who launched that attack.

What I said was that I am embarrassed to work for a company that pays me not only less than the average RJ pilot, but less than all RJ pilots except Mesa. I'm surprised that you don't share that feeling to some degree. There has to be some shame in putting on the uniform of the lowest paid carrier in the business.

I came to CMR because I respected and admired the way you all had fought to raise the bar. I wanted the guaranteed good pay and QOL over the quick upgrade time at other companies. I also wanted to be a part of a group that had each other's back and showed unity when times got tough. Well, it hasn't worked out that way. Had I gone to CHQ, or even Mesa, I would be making more money, have better QOL, and have at least equivalent unity, as there is none here.

I thought about it but I did not consider it and I do not think it should be considered. The ’05 LOA and this agreement are very different. The LOA was a risk that the pilots chose to take for the prospect of new growth. The benefits of that growth would have gone almost exclusively to FO’s in the form of upgrades. When you are already a senior CA you don’t benefit any from the company buying more airplanes just like the one you already fly. The LOA passed. Do you think that was because all the captains voted against it and all the FO’s voted for it? If that was so then how come it wasn’t voted down? After all it didn’t benefit the captains by a whole lot. Sure some would move from the little RJ to the bigger RJ and make a few more bucks, but the real benefit was upgrades for First Officers. Did you vote NO on that one too? I bet you didn’t.

One last time, surplus, the '05 LOA lost us a year of longevity which remains lost when we sign the new LOA. I do not want to argue about the '05 LOA, but want you to understand that when looking at the new pay scales, you must compare your 12th year CA wages against Mesa's 13th year. This makes you, if you fly the 50, the second lowest paid RJ captain in the industry.

I do think most senior captains voted against the 05 LOA, as would I. Those who voted yes bought Fred's line about viability of the company. They didn't vote for it to help out the FO's. Growth does help junior captains and all FO's, thus the 60-40 vote.

Did you expect Delta to go Chapter 11 when that was on the table? Was your policy them “full pay to the last day” as you say it should be now now? I wonder.

That is not my policy at all. I knew pay cuts were coming. I knew they would be steep. I was willing to accept them if they were reasonable. In my opinion, they were not. Delta did not bargain in good faith, nor did they offer us anything reasonable, fair, or average.

Every other DCI carrier has guaranteed growth coming, for one reason or another. Growth to most of the pilot group means quality of life, more money, and job security. Growth is also why they have thus far been willing to work for a lower wage than us. We are not growing and there is no provision in the LOA for growth, thus the wage I can accept in the right seat must be higher than average.

This LOA gives me Mesa plus pennies. Unacceptable. Career earnings for a Mesa pilot are now way beyond those of a Comair pilot. I agree with you that we have nothing to prove, no bar to hold up, but that's not what this was about in my mind. It's about my pride and what I can survive on.

You are right about experience meaning little in this business when it comes to pay. However, a pilot with a certain level of experience can command a certain wage in the open market. For me, with no PIC turbine, that wage is around $35-40K. That is what I will be paid to fly airplanes, my bottom line. If no one wants to pay it, I will leave the industry.

In that one sentence is the real difference between you and I. You think this was voluntary. I think it was blackmail under the guise of bankruptcy. There was nothing voluntary about it. And no, I don’t blame Fred for this, I blame Delta Air Lines.

I don't think bankruptcy played much of a role at all in this. It may have speeded things up, but the end result is the same. Delta can shift our flying anywhere, anytime. That is their leverage and they would've used it, BK or not. Blackmail, no doubt about it. The thing with blackmail is, once you give in, they still have that leverage, and they keep coming back. It has to stop somewhere.

We had the choice to walk or eat this LOA. I would rather walk out of here without a knife in my back. I also understand quite well that others may not have that choice and I place no blame on them at all.

I don't blame Fred or Delta. What they are doing is hard, cold business. I hate them for the inhumanity of it and wish things were different, but they're not. I place the blame squarely on the shoulders of ALPA. We have no leverage because ALPA has not made any move to unify regional pilots.

Young man I voted for this for one reason only. Delta Air Lines has a loaded gun and it is pointed at our collective heads. If they have to they WILL pull the trigger. Even though we voted YES, they will still pull the trigger if that is in the best interest of Delta Air Lines. That’s the way the cookie crumbles. It’s not pretty, it’s reality.

Agreed.

I respect and understand where you are coming from. I hope you can do the same. It was a tough choice for all, many factors to consider. In the end, I guess it did come down to me and my need to feed and clothe myself. I would rather do that at Comair but, if they won't pay me enough, I will find someone who will. I took a chance at saving the wage that would allow me to stay. For you, the option of leaving may not have been there, so it came down to keeping your job at any cost.

 

[Whitestoneclimb]

I get so sick and tired of people saying BS like: "I thought it would be better to make $XX / hour than have no job at all. With that mentality, you might as well give up now. Some things are worth fighting for and pilots deserve a fair wage. Making $20 an hour is ludicrous and anyone agreeing to it is a moron. For God sake, stand up for yourselves. Have some dignity.

 

[surplus1]

Is it better for me to have this job after an $11,000/yr pay cut, which will not pay my bills, or to take a chance at keeping my wage while risking the job? You know what I decided, so please don't act altruistic, as if you did it for me and others in my seat.

I do grasp the significance of the longevity and also the 4.5% wage bump that we gave up. I know too that you're taking a huge cut that will have much more impact on your lifestyle than the bigger cut I will take will have on mine. I'm also losing another 10% towards retirement which isn't far away at all. I assure you the prospect of living only on SS is not the least bit exciting. I'm also not enthused by the prospect of having to become a WalMart greeter to make ends meet. And you're right, my decision was not only altruism, it was much more pragmatism. It was not ALL for you or anyone else, that was only a part of the overall consideration.

Remember please, it was not your decision to vote NO that upset me, it was the other things you said. Based on what you have said since, especially in this post, I'm now inclined to believe that those statements were emotional more than factual. I attribute at least some of that to the difference in our ages. If we knew each other personally I think you would understand why my personal emotions have a different effect on me than yours do on you. Age changes more than the color of your hair.

We are not the only airline affected by this downturn in the industry. While I have seen others before, been furloughed, lost jobs at airlines that folded and all the other crap this career entails, this particular cycle is the worst I've ever seen. You can trust me when I tell you that I didn't start chasing aluminium just a decade ago.

I'll give you a couple of examples. I have three close friends in the business that I'll use for reference; people I've known for more than 40 years, since school. One of them retired about 3 years ago. After 35 years of service, his pension is gone. Taken away by his bankrupt company. He'll get some money from the PBGC, but he still has to sell his home to survive. The other one has been at work for more than 30 years and has two years left. He's been through a merger (many years back) that cost him his left seat at the time. He can still hold the left seat today, but 1/2 of his pay has been taken away and on top of that he's lost his pension too. He'll have to find another job when he does retire. Both of those worked/work for USAir. The other one just retired last Sept as a NW 7-400 CA. As of yet it hasn't cost him anything because he just missed the BK. However, it is virtually guaranteed that he will lose his pension too. Financial disaster will follow.

I also know a great many people with more than 15 years at USAir that are now on the street. A ton of my close friends from EAL lost everything when they folded, so did friends from PanAm. All of them had been captains for many years when those things happened. They had to start all over after more than 15 years of service. Buddies from TWA were furloughed so many times that after 20 years some of them didn't make it out of the 3rd seat. Others who were captains started over by being stapled to the AA list, only to be furloughed a few months later. One of them put a bullet in his head.

None of that has happend to you as yet and none of it has anything to do with what you need to make your living. I know that. I only mention it to help you understand that if you stay in this career, it could turn out as you have hoped or it could be the roller coaster us older folks have been riding for a long time. This is bad but my point is it could be a he!! of a lot worse. You culd be at FlyI instead of here. Then what? You might have been a former Midway pilot (many of whom are now with us).

I did too, but I figured most of them would still have a job, whether it be servicing our aircraft or others. The flight attendants now have the full heat turned up on them because we were unable to hold the line.

Those are valid points. It is also a valid point that most FA's don't make a career of the job anyway and can readily find employment elsewhere as you point out. I don't have to tell you that when a pilot has to start over he doesn't take his number with him. With more than 10,000 experienced people furloughed and thousands more entry level people looking, it doesn't make things easier. $32 /hr is not enough. However, it is $10 better than being a new hire at most places you could go.

The difference between CA and FO wage reductions, as you know, is that you may have to change your lifestyle or sell some toys, while I will have to take food off the table or file BK.

That is only true if you make the assumption that this airline would survive without these concessions. I made the assumption that it would not. If that were the case, I would definitely be changing lifestyle and selling a lot more than toys I assure you.

What I said was that I am embarrassed to work for a company that pays me not only less than the average RJ pilot, but less than all RJ pilots except Mesa. I'm surprised that you don't share that feeling to some degree. There has to be some shame in putting on the uniform of the lowest paid carrier in the business.

While I don't like anything about what has happened, I'm not embarrassed or ashamed. We pilots did not cause this to happen, it was going to happen with or without the vote. You only need to feel ashamed by things that you do wrong or problems that you create. This event is beyond the control of Comair pilots. Yes, we could have chosen to quit our jobs, but that would not have resulted in higher pay o the same pay for any of us.

You seem to be ignoring the fact that our airline is bankrupt. If that was not the case this would never have happened this way. We did nothing to make that happen, we are merely victims of the circumstance. Shame should not apply when you are not the cause of the problem.

I came to CMR because I respected and admired the way you all had fought to raise the bar. I wanted the guaranteed good pay and QOL over the quick upgrade time at other companies. I also wanted to be a part of a group that had each other's back and showed unity when times got tough. Well, it hasn't worked out that way. Had I gone to CHQ, or even Mesa, I would be making more money, have better QOL, and have at least equivalent unity, as there is none here.

I don't think you're being totally honest about why you came here and not somewhere else, but that is not really important. I think you're mistaken when you say there is no unity here. Maybe you see the closeness of this vote as an indicator of the division between us. That's an option I agree, but I prefer to look at it a different way. To me the close vote tells the mangement that they have reached the limit. Had they attempted to take one more thing from us, no matter how small, the vote would have gone the other way and we'd be closing the doors. Should they come back for more, that will happen. There is a line in the sand and we have drawn it. It can't be crossed again and I think they know that. They may still shut down this airline but there will be no more concessions.

If our company survives it will be bigger and stronger in the future. We will be at the bargaining table again. They won this round but they have virtually guaranteed a major upheaval again when the time comes. I hope we can grow and make some money by then. If we do, when the time comes we will take the territory back or the village will burn.

This makes you, if you fly the 50, the second lowest paid RJ captain in the industry.

The same applies to the -70.

I knew pay cuts were coming. I knew they would be steep. I was willing to accept them if they were reasonable. In my opinion, they were not. Delta did not bargain in good faith, nor did they offer us anything reasonable, fair, or average.

They are steep and steeper than most anticipated. They are not reasonable, I agree with you. The one good thing is that we did not lose our work rules. Those are still better than, I would argue, everyone. The dollars we can recover. The retirment B plan will be harder.

Again I remind you that this is bankruptcy. The company that owns this airline is in failure mode; flat broke. We, as a subsidiary of that company, have no money of our own; zero. We were not "negotiating" with Comair, we were handed an ultimatum by Delta. Delta management doesn't care about you or me. Their interest is the survival of Delta. They will take from us whatever then can and whatever gives them the most cash. This was not bargaining and it was not about good faith or fairness. They have no interest in any of that. They are looking for a way to get the most cash out of Comair that they can. If we can't find a buyer for this company, Delta will take it apart to cut their losses. That's just how it is. It just wasn't possible for Comair pilots to change that with a NO vote.

In this environment growth is the product of only one thing: lowest cost. The guy with the lowest bid get's the contract. When our costs are higher and they were, you either lower them or you lose the business.


Continued

 

[surplus1]

Part 2

We are a "virtual airline" and we generate no business of our own. Delta made certain of that. We sell a commodity; seats. Delta will buy the seats it wants from the cheapest vendor. I don't like that but neither am I under any illusions about it. That isn't about to happen, it has already happened. We cannot operate with Delta as the only buyer because other companies sell to Delta for less money. How they do it is immaterial to Delta; they do. Delta hasn't even allowed this company to bid on outside business. Comair's eggs are exclusively in Delta's basket. If we can't get them out of that basket we're history. The only way to do it is to come up with the lowest bid. Sure that sucks, but it is what it is. You are experiencing pure capitalism, nothing else.

The legacy airlines to which we sell are like Wal-Mart. Either you sell to Wal-Mart at the price they want to pay or they find a vendor who does. That is why Wal-Mart doesn't sell much of anything made in this country. They can buy it cheaper elsewhere. The supplier must have a market and he gets it one of two ways. Either he is the only one with that product (and we sure aren't) or he sells at the lowest price. We can now compete with Mesa or anybody else. Well, right now Delta isn't buying anything more than they have already because they don't have the money to pay for it. If they won't let us sell to others or we don't become independent, we will not grow. That is the law of supply and demand.

I agree with you that we have nothing to prove, no bar to hold up, but that's not what this was about in my mind. It's about my pride and what I can survive on.

I am glad you agree with at least one thing. Remember this old fashioned phrase, "pride goeth before the fall." False pride gets us nowhere. We must be smart enough to correct the situation and turn this company around. If we succeed in doing that we will have a great deal to be proud about. It isn't going to be easy for Delta has done a da_mned good job of destroying it.

You are right about experience meaning little in this business when it comes to pay. However, a pilot with a certain level of experience can command a certain wage in the open market. For me, with no PIC turbine, that wage is around $35-40K. That is what I will be paid to fly airplanes, my bottom line. If no one wants to pay it, I will leave the industry.

At this moment that starting wage is not available at any "regional" airline. If you leave the industry, your experience as a pilot becomes irrelevant. You'll have to fall back on what ever field your degree is in and hope it can produce a starting salary above 35K. If you stay in the aviation industry, you'll have to get hired at an LCC, a legacy carrier, FedX, UPS, or SW to start at that scale, or move into a corporate job.

I believe Horizon is the best paying "regional" at present. If you went there and start in a turboprop, it will take you 3-5 years to make that. If you start in the CRJ-700 you could do it in two years. Those are the numbers.

I don't think bankruptcy played much of a role at all in this. It may have speeded things up, but the end result is the same. Delta can shift our flying anywhere, anytime. That is their leverage and they would've used it, BK or not. Blackmail, no doubt about it. The thing with blackmail is, once you give in, they still have that leverage, and they keep coming back. It has to stop somewhere.

We disagree on the role of bankruptcy. I agree that Delta can still shift the flying anywhere any time and would use it to get lower costs. They have that advantage because they deal with several vendors (the portfolio concept for which you can thank Fred, for the name, not the system). As and independent company we could counter that by not flying exclusively for Delta. As a subsidiary we never had that option.

Delta bought this company because as an independent it was the best managed airline of its type and they saw it as a threat. They eliminated the threat by spending 2 billion dollars. Since then they have managed to reduce its value to around 500 million by mismanaging it to perfection. However, they did eliminate the threat.

Along the way before the Delta buy out our management made some mistakes as well. It had the chance to prevent its acquisition five years prior to the fact and decided not to. The rest is history and is today irrelevant.

We had the choice to walk or eat this LOA.

Yes, that is true. The big difference is this. You still have the choice to walk if that is what you want to do. But, I have the choice to stay if that is what I want. The YES majority does not force you to stay against your will. A NO majority would have forced me to leave against my will. The YES votes did not remove the choice of any individual. We are all free to stay or to leave. A NO vote would have taken away that freedom and forced everyone to make the walk-away decision like it or not. That's another reason I decided to vote YES.

I don't blame Fred or Delta. What they are doing is hard, cold business. I hate them for the inhumanity of it and wish things were different, but they're not. I place the blame squarely on the shoulders of ALPA. We have no leverage because ALPA has not made any move to unify regional pilots.

I agree that the ALPA plays a major role in the situation. However, I don't think it's because of a failure to "unify" regional pilots. Unifying all regional pilots is in fact impossible. ALPA doesn't even represent all of them.

On the other hand ALPA is definitely the reason that Comair has the wrong fleet mix at the wrong time. We have too many 50s and not enough 70's and ALPA is responsible for that. Additionally, ALPA doesn't want to unify all regionals, what ALPA wants to do is get rid of the regionals and return the flying to the mainline carriers. The union's duplicity is legendary.

The portfolio concept is also a factor that produces the wrong fleet mix. Being a subsidiary is another for it prevents us from raising our own capital.

The problem has become very complex and is both management induced and ALPA induced.

I respect and understand where you are coming from. I hope you can do the same. It was a tough choice for all, many factors to consider. In the end, I guess it did come down to me and my need to feed and clothe myself. I would rather do that at Comair but, if they won't pay me enough, I will find someone who will. I took a chance at saving the wage that would allow me to stay. For you, the option of leaving may not have been there, so it came down to keeping your job at any cost.

I also respect your NO vote and said that in my first post to you. What I don't respect is the 3 things you said originally that started this exchange. I acknowledge that it did come down to keeping jobs or losing them. As I tried to explain above, you have not lost your option to leave the job if you so choose. Do you really believe that it would be best to take away my opinion to stay because of your pride? I hope you don't. This way we both retain the option to do as we choose.

That is the difference between a vote based on pragmatism and a vote based on emotion. Please think it through and then do what you believe is best for you. However, I encourage you not to make the decision based on pride.

In a way it's like flying an airplane. I have a great deal of professional pride that I don't want to lose. But, my crew and passengers have individual lives each of which is worth far more. A great many years ago I learned that in my cockpit there is an invisible switch that I use every time I fly a trip. It is located inside but near the cockpit door near the hat hook. When I hang up my hat before taking my seat, I never forget to select that switch to the OFF position. It stays in OFF for the duration of the flight. When the flight is over and the parking brake is set at the gate, I leave my seat to say goodbye and thank our passengers. I take my hat off the hook, put it on and select that switch to the ON position then head aft to my pax. It stays in the ON position until the cycle is repeated on the next leg. That switch is called the P-R-I-D-E switch.

I believe that PRIDE has no place in the cockpit. The day you forget to turn it off before you take your seat, you become a hazard to the safety of flight. I also think that pride is of very little value in any serious business decision.

I wish you well.

 

[pilotyip]

surplus, great dose of reality on a pilot board. I wonder how well it will be received?