Delta Retirements?

[tbkane]

In regards to the furlough greivance numbers that are being addressed in this thread. We almost met the numbers required for a call back of furloughees. The four month average was 13,000 RPM's short of historic and therfore we will not be calling back.

That will continue each month. For March we will need a small miracle as the historic RPM's for March were huge. In whatever year they use (either 2000 or 2001 I don't know due to the Comair strike) the RPM's were very large, and I don't see how with the reductions of mainline how we could ever meet the March historic figures.

Each month we look at the previous four months and see if we had more RPM's than pre 911. I feel our best bet will be next year Nov-Feb again.

 

[spanky2]

TK,
Who would have ever thought that you could have a "miss" by .0359%. Guess Mr Bloch should have stipulated how many decimal places to round off to. The whole RPM recall thing is beginning to look like earth's orbit in relation to colliding with Hailey's comet.

 

[General Lee]

If we get a large amount of retirements I bet the recalls would start soon afterwards. It will happen eventually. Hang in there.

Bye Bye--General Lee

 

[P38JLightning]

"stepped up", huh?

>>It doesn't sound like that would ever happen anytime soon with our furloughs, and we can't even get Comair on board to help our guys/gals out---only ASA and Chataqua have currently stepped up to the plate.<<

General, General, General...

You get accused a lot about spewing forth the exact same rant, to the point of almost pornographic redundancy. In response, you defend your "consistency" by saying you are simply providing a just response to an ever constant onslaught of opinionated individuals whom you believe are wrong.

So I'm not sure if I'm the chicken or the egg here, but come on, man. ASA, and certainly Chautauqua, has never stepped up to any "plate."

Both airlines (excuse me, "lift providers") had pre-existing policies not requiring seniority resignation. In both cases this was a management decision. Maybe they didn't care. Maybe they ran the numbers and decided more guaranteed attrition (thinning of average seniority and longevity) was cost justified in the long run compared to a potential in expected hiring and retraining costs.

But in neither case did either management or pilot group "step up to" any "plate" as you rant over and over, again and again.

Look, I think the blanket policy of blackballing ALL Comair pilots for a Comair MEC move (that I opposed by the way) is not fair. I say that to admit upfront my own predispositions on this issue. But, if you truly feel this is a cross we all should carry in the future, and if it truly provides comfort to the 1060 still on furlough to feel as if some measure of revenge is taking place, then so be it. Blackball all of us. (Just make sure you include ALL of us...the fighter buddies, Delta interns, WMU interns, sons and daughters of Delta Captains, the well connects, etc.) Afterall, you are all about being consistent in this just cause.

But please don't think for a (all THREE airpports!) New York City minute that helping out Chautauqua pilots with preferential Delta hiring is the right thing to do.

The new trend is to undercut the Comair cost structure and hourly compensation so one can bring massive growth to an already healthy and sucessful company. Particularly in the 51 to 99 seat A/C categories. So the Chautauqua pilots gladly underbid us by a comfortable margin for 50 seat rates, and a large margin for 70 seat rates. Now Delta is subsidizing republic which is able to provide an even lower cost per seat mile for their USAir and United "partners" because of the growth induced lower cost structure provided by Delta's generosity.

So you have a large, sucessful pilot group who willingly low balls, others to save their company, not to survive, just to get massive growth. Growth that they use to increase their profits and lower their costs to provide higher margins for Delta's competition. This will help United and USAir to survive, and I hope you don't think Chautauqua's shiny new United and/or USAir's EMB-170's, which is a 70 seat Mainline jet by every stretch of the immagination, flown at a sub Comair 50 seat cost structure, is in ANY WAY good for Delta or its furloughed pilots.

So they never did JACK to help your furloughs, never stepped up to any "plate" as you suggest, and will pull the bar down for growth by any means necessary. In exchange for all this, you are vowing they will be rewarded with generour preferential Delta hiring because a few Delta furloughs ended up with a temp job over there. The logic behind that is you want to provide an incentive for future hiring of future Delta furloughs by creating this perpetual carrot that will be effective in all future furlough situations by motivation regional pilot groups to "step up to the plate" in the future.

Interesting concept, but when you consider they never stepped up to begin with, and pulled the bar down (not only within DCI but for the entire REGIONAL industry...which by the way, puts more pressure on you, your mainline buddies, and the furloughs) just to get growth and 18 month upgrades, just to get their PIC time just to "qualify" for the majors faster, the fact that their low balling will be rewarded so generously by the Delta pilots is sickening.

Now we all hope the furloughs will be brought back to mainline ASAP. The current hope for ALL of them to be recalled seems to rest with Delta's 100 seater. Probably an EMB-190. Chautauqua's pathetic 70 (and 90) seat rates will DIRECTLY help USAir and United put tremendous pressure on mainline Delta's 71-100 seat cost structure. So much so that it may never materialize. Your furloughs will be out longer, and return to even lower paying jobs, with more and more mainline flying being outsourced. Don't think for a second Delta will put basicaly the same plane on the mainline that United and USAir have being flown by outsource lift providers at a fraction of Comair's 50 seat rates. Ain't gonna happen.

But if you really want to reward the Chautauqua pilots for something they had NOTHING to do with, and in the process provide even more incentive for them (and others) to continue the race to the bottom, in ever expanding equipment (size and number) then go ahead. I'm sure somewhere in all this logic there is a tangeable benefit to the furloughs. There's got to be, right?

 

[spanky2]

GL,
Thanks for your support for the furloughees. Vision, if you will, the scene at HQ Delta the following scenario... FM I recall trigger, the May 04 pay raise, and a bunch of senior Capts retire...all at the same time.

 

[General Lee]

Spanky2,

That would be interesting--all at the same time. But, that might have deletarious effects on our company---and I don't want that either....But overall I want recalls to start---and I think that is a view shared by most on the line. I personally won't be satisfied until TBKANE is back on the line....


P38lightning,

First of all, I am not in charge of hiring (nor am I a negotiator...) and I do not know exactly what the criteria will be when we hire down the road again. But, there will be inputs made by a lot of people--and there will be suggestions to anyone who will listen. (probably the retired DL Capts who sit next to the HR people in the interview) They will be well aware and brought up to date on who helped who. That doesn't mean that one group would be excluded---and we will have to see how that pans out. I would press on them that some helped more than others---by their rules or whatever. ASA's management team or MEC could have raised a big stink---but they did not. They saw that adding pilots to the bottom of their list didn't affect them much. As far as Chataqua goes, they have gone out of their way--on this board and other venues, to tell our furloughs that they are WELCOME to interview and that they do not have to give up their numbers. That will be noted as well---the main idea here is helping people in need.

As far as the Chataqua politics goes---yes, their pay on their new Emb-170s is low, and so is Mid Atlantic's --and that will probably affect us even more. Jetblue will also be affected--as they try to figure out their own pay scale. This is a losing battle---the wage game. I bet in the end our new 100 seater will be a "Delta Express" style operation, with the junior guys flying it for a lot less than mainline (just like what happened to Express in MCO). The furloughs will return and be Capts on it, and the new hires will go to the right seat--probably making $35-40 an hour. That is exactly what happened in our '96 contract when the furloughs returned, and it will happen again.

I know that there are Comair pilots who do not agree with their policy---the policy that could never be changed. I am not saying that they would NEVER have a chance at attaining a Delta seat if they wanted either. I hopefully wouldn't be retired by then (21 more years to go)--so I probably won't be in the interviews. But, those guys will be aware of what has happened--no doubt. First though, we need to get our furloughs back on line--and then we will worry about the other stuff. Future early retirements and pay cuts will start that ball rolling soon....

Bye Bye--General Lee