ExpressJet evolving on the vacation bidding...

[JoeMerchant]

XJT line bidding, January vacation. Bidding over Jan and Feb I work one 4 day in 33 days, and 75 hours of pay for both months.
Top 10% FO.

I bid at 12 percent and added 15 days off in front of my Feb to March vacation. If I do the same in March, it will be 37 days off in a row for one week of vacation. If I do that for all 4 weeks of vacation, that is over 21 weeks of vacation per year with our system, or almost half the year...75 hours pay every month too...

 

[labbats]

For those of you feeling bad for management let me give you something to think about....

$70k to captain a jet all over the country in all kinds of weather in 2012 is pretty freaking low. $40k to be a copilot of that same jet for 7 years is a crime.

This isn't 1990. $70,000 now is like making $40000 in 1990 and $50000 in 2000. Now if you want to really get upset look at major airline pay during those same years for flying a DC9 that is basically a regional jet.

 

[asayankee]

I bid at 12 percent and added 15 days off in front of my Feb to March vacation. If I do the same in March, it will be 37 days off in a row for one week of vacation. If I do that for all 4 weeks of vacation, that is over 21 weeks of vacation per year with our system, or almost half the year...75 hours pay every month too...

And the whole time that John is getting 20-25 days/month off the reserves continue to get only 11 off with only 6 of those guaranteed. The rest of the days the company can move around at their whim within or apparently outside of the contract as evidenced by the Christmas fiasco.

But remember, John had it soooo much worse than anybody else ever did the 2-3 MONTHS he did on reserve over a decade ago!!!

 

[sweptback]

Sweptback, you are the reason unions have a black eye. I love our PBS. I love our vacation low. However, the company cannot survive in this environment long term with this vacation set up. I am taking full advantage of it, and I am working less than part time. 8 months of the year, I am averaging about 7 to 8 days of work a month. Next month for example, I am using 3 days of vacation and only working 7 days for the month.

I would love to stay home every day and just collect a check every two weeks....However this a capitalist society and a very competitive industry...This can't last....

Joe, I obviously like vacation low as well. But I think it's premature to say it can't or won't last. ExpressJet has a similar vacation setup, for one, and even with add pay on top of that. The company will want PBS in a JCBA, and the pilots will want to maintain their vacation benefits. I'm not sure how reduced vacation benefits will pass muster with the pilot group.

I have no idea how much vacation low costs (although it wouldn't be hard to run a quick calculation), nor how much the company is saving by us bidding with PBS. But, I do know that the company ran all the numbers before they agreed to it and decided to go with PBS+vacation low. Maybe they got the numbers wrong, or maybe they didn't fully understand what they were signing. However, the management team that was responsible for the deal is still working here, so things must not be that bad.

This is classic negotiation strategy by companies. They want to make you think what you have will bankrupt the company in the future, and bonus points if the company is actively losing money. First they tried it with our medical insurance (trying to replace our PPO with the HSA) and now they're trying it with our vacation benefits. I trust the union to know the true state of the company's financial health (after all, they have seen the books, as well as the CPAs we have agreed to), and trust that they will not ask for anything that will actually bankrupt the company. Most of the MEC is lifers these days, so they have a vested interest in the continuing success of the company.

That being said, this is version 1 of PBS bidding. I'm sure tweaks will be made in the future, such as maybe only being eligible for vacation low if you have a full week of vacation, not three days as you described above (also, for you to only work 7 days, assuming you don't have any preassigned credits, you are working an average of 7.57 hours per day, more if you didn't get exactly 65 hours. Those are some productive pairings you were able to get.)

I do find it funny, however, that some of the most vehement critics of vacation low (It's unfair! It'll bankrupt the company!) are some of the best at utilizing it.

 

[JoeMerchant]

For those of you feeling bad for management let me give you something to think about....

$70k to captain a jet all over the country in all kinds of weather in 2012 is pretty freaking low. $40k to be a copilot of that same jet for 7 years is a crime.

This isn't 1990. $70,000 now is like making $40000 in 1990 and $50000 in 2000. Now if you want to really get upset look at major airline pay during those same years for flying a DC9 that is basically a regional jet.

I don't "feel bad for management"...If this place goes tits up, they can make a lateral movement...we can't. That was and is one of our mistakes. They will be fine, it will be many of us that have to start all over again at the bottom.

The problem is that I am making $100K to fly a 50 seat RJ and work about a third of the year while many of my competition get paid far less to work far more in 70 and 90 seat jets...I have to take that into consideration...Maybe if ALPA had done a better job with scope, this wouldn't have happened, but it didn't and we have to accept it as the "new normal"....

 

[JoeMerchant]

And the whole time that John is getting 20-25 days/month off the reserves continue to get only 11 off with only 6 of those guaranteed. The rest of the days the company can move around at their whim within or apparently outside of the contract as evidenced by the Christmas fiasco.

But remember, John had it soooo much worse than anybody else ever did the 2-3 MONTHS he did on reserve over a decade ago!!!

asayankee, reserve sucks...always has, always will...That's why I didn't want to start over again anywhere. It doesn't suck as much as it did when I did it, which was more than "2 to 3 MONTHS". We had fewer days off, no "long call", and there were no rest rules for reserves. Your duty day didn't start until you were called.

If a reserve at ASA wants a better life, they better hope and pray that we don't shrink and that we grow so they can get off of reserve....That is their ONLY hope to have a better life....

 

[JoeMerchant]

This is classic negotiation strategy by companies. They want to make you think what you have will bankrupt the company in the future, and bonus points if the company is actively losing money. First they tried it with our medical insurance (trying to replace our PPO with the HSA) and now they're trying it with our vacation benefits. I trust the union to know the true state of the company's financial health (after all, they have seen the books, as well as the CPAs we have agreed to), and trust that they will not ask for anything that will actually bankrupt the company. Most of the MEC is lifers these days, so they have a vested interest in the continuing success of the company.

1. The HSA is the way health insurance is going to have to go. I've been using it and I like it. Health insurance costs are going up too fast. They aren't sustainable. You have to give the individual some "skin in the game" and the HSA is the way to go. Health insurance should only be for catastrophic "big issues"...Smaller stuff should be paid for out of pocket.

2. Unions have historically negotiated deals that companies cannot afford. How about United's Dubinsky "We don't want to kill the goose that lays the golden egg, but we do want to choke it to give up the last golden egg"...UAW and the auto industry and the legacy major airline unions negotiated deals that weren't sustainable long term.

3. The ASA MEC and the XJT MEC don't currently agree on the point you just made. I agree that our CURRENT MEC is fairly level headed in this regard....The XJT MEC not so much...Wait until the Pinnacle and Eagle cuts come...That will move the goal back even further...

I do find it funny, however, that some of the most vehement critics of vacation low (It's unfair! It'll bankrupt the company!) are some of the best at utilizing it.

I'm not a "critic of it"...I LOVE IT. I also would love to never work and simply get paid...However I realize that isn't realistic.....I will continue to take advantage of it as long as we have it, but I don't think it is realistic. I can coast for 10 years or so of "CMR like shrinkage" and then hang it up...It is those junior guys on reserve and those junior guys that need to upgrade so they can get out of here that will suffer....

 

[greyhound]

I staggered my vacation and got 31 days off in a row.. Off from Jan 21 until Feb 23.
all with two weerks of vacation and I am a very junior line holder..U number in IAH.

No way with PBS I could have done this.

 

[JoeMerchant]

I staggered my vacation and got 31 days off in a row.. Off from Jan 21 until Feb 23.
all with two weerks of vacation and I am a very junior line holder..U number in IAH.

No way with PBS I could have done this.

What weeks did you have vacation? Using 2 weeks of vacation, you already get 56 hours of "credit" under our PBS system. You only need to build up to 65 hours of "credit" in a vacation month. You would only need 9 hours of credit to complete a month.

 

[greyhound]

What weeks did you have vacation? Using 2 weeks of vacation, you already get 56 hours of "credit" under our PBS system. You only need to build up to 65 hours of "credit" in a vacation month. You would only need 9 hours of credit to complete a month.

Jan 30 to Feb 5 and again Feb 13 to 19..

No flying scheduled from Jan 22 to Jan 29 and from Feb 6 to 12th OFF.

Trips that touched any of those vacation days above were dropped..Hence 31 days off.

I credit 81 hours in Jan and so far 75 in Feb.