In house negotiating committee at Colgan

[Mr Wu]

Get the kid out of the lav....... Umm I know rock the airplane? If on the ground pump it full of bluejuice.
O wait use your pen open the lock and expose his meat jerking butt to the rest of the cabin!

So, you're saying that you wouldn't give the controls to the F/O, grab the crash axe, and go back and beat down the door?

 

[GEORGE DUBYA]

all you need is a pen

 

[suupah]

www.colganpilotgroup.com
www.unionfacts.com

quite posting this garbage that has nothing to do with Colgan

 

[Mr Wu]

all you need is a pen

Your future chief pilot doesn't know that.

 

[Mr Wu]

Here is something to think about when you decide to back this council. The following was copied from the council's website. No answer was given.

Name: Uknown
Company: CL
Email: [email protected]
Phone: 703-888-8888
Question/Comment: To whom it may concern:

You have a great idea, the only problem is LEGAL and enforceable
contracts, rules etc.

First off when has scheduling ever done us a favor other than letting
us call in sick, which at times becomes a guilt trip when they ask are
you sure you can’t just do…..

The way I see it, it is not ALPA working with contracts which makes it
so alluring, but rather the legal services, medical protection, and
other pilot services which no independent council can provide.

Sure it is 2% of pay but how much is a lawyer to retain if something
happens (your fault or not).

Your ideas are good and have merit but lack the credibility to
withstand long-term negotiations and defense of a pilot group.

What leverage do you offer or have if the Colgans' refuse to change?
Go union then, as you have stated in your website? How do you plan on
changing the rules, conditions and pay without a federally backed
organization that will financially support your decisions?

The following are some important questions I feel need to be answered
by you:

How can you defend pilots from biased PC checks? What standards will
you use to verify this? What appeal processes are there?

How can you enforce duty times and "roll back" attempts by scheduling?

How can you provide uniformity to the pay structure? I.E. can you
enforce what the written company standards are if a problem arises and how
can you "lean" on the Colgan enterprise to pay?

Can you resolve the repeated problems with overnight hotels not being
reserved? More importantly can you ensure the Colgan credit card will
work so pilots don't have to pay out of pocket at 2am?

The concept of renting a car and driving to another base is obscene.

Do you plan on providing a committee elected by pilots? What if pilots
don't agree with your negotiating tactics or even less complex your
terms and settlements?

How can you provide certificate defense if need be?

I am sure the list can continue but at least it shows you how much you
need to offer for people to move away from the idea of ALPA.

A committee of ombudsman is not going to cut it. You must provide
solid documentation on how you expect to change the current and future
problems within our pilot group. Provide something other than the "don't
sign the card we can do it from within" mentality.

This is not a light topic nor should you all expect us, the foundation
of the company, to sit and hope you make the right moves for us without
proper consultation (I.E. votes and open forum.) We are not uneducated
people. We know the risks from choosing either ALPA or your good, yet
very nascent idea.

Clearly now, the only organization that has provided a semblance of
formality and structure is ALPA. Sure they have had the past 80 or so
years to formulate a template for operations, but that fact does not lend
leniency to your lack of apparent organization and correspondence. If
you are going to provide an alternative method for our pilot group, we
need to start seeing concrete and verifiable evidence of a plan, a
method, something other than rhetoric found on flight info or word-of mouth
propaganda.

I urge you to take this guidance and turn it into something concrete so
most of us can vote for the lesser of two evils. Good luck and I look
forward to seeing your future progress.

-A concerned pilot of Colgan Air.

 

[Prop2Jet]

That is one interesting and well written series of questions!

 

[suupah]

Changed my life!!

 

[Fred Rogers]

I agree. ALPA is the best choice by far. Anyone who is still a "naysayer" needs to understand what is all involved / at stake. Send in your cards people!

 

[Prop2Jet]

I am still affected by that list of questions. What a smart individual. He/She should be the next President!

 

[A-V-8]

Take a look at Skywest's SAPA or JetBlue's Pilot Compensation Committee (I think that's what they call it). These two groups have absolutely no power, zero leverage, and therefore produce no results. Management still gives you whatever they want, because the independent "negotiating committee" has no real backing. The Skywest pilots ended up with a 1.5% raise for jet pilots, no raise at all for Brasilia pilots, and a very meager override on block-time for the 70- & 90-seaters. The JetBlue pilots were so upset at the raises that came for the EMB-190 and the complete lack of raises for the Airbus pilots that they now have a group of pilots meeting with ALPA to get an organizing drive started.

If you want any control over your career at all, you need a union. I hope you choose ALPA, but any union is better than none at all.

Mesa is ALPA. What bargaining power do we have. Skywest is far better than Mesa. This is not a very good arguement in my opinion. There is a difference in the way that management thinks about labor at those companies.

 

[Rez O. Lewshun]

Mesa is ALPA. What bargaining power do we have. Skywest is far better than Mesa. This is not a very good arguement in my opinion. There is a difference in the way that management thinks about labor at those companies.

So its the management?

 

[DrewBlows]

Mesa is ALPA. What bargaining power do we have. Skywest is far better than Mesa. This is not a very good arguement in my opinion. There is a difference in the way that management thinks about labor at those companies.

This is a neat comparison until you actually think about what you just said. Take the union away from Mesa and you guys would be working for minimum wage. Add a union at Skywest and who knows what would happen. I'm guessing they wouldn't get a big raise initially, but they could tighten up their work rules and work on the ASA/Skywest whipsaw (a merger of lists would be best in my opinion).

Skywest treats their employees well by any account. That wouldn't change with a union, because, apparently, it's a part of their business model. It wouldn't make business sense to all of a sudden oppose your employees because they decide to unionize.

Mesa, on the other hand, doesn't treat it's employees well, and wouldn't treat the employees well if they you went non-union. There is an adversarial relationship between the pilots and management. You could get rid of the adversarial relationship by voting ALPA off property, but it would cease to be adversarial only because one of the adversaries was gone, leaving management to give you what they want, which they have already expressed (it ain't much).

 

[Dr King]

I am still affected by that list of questions. What a smart individual. He/She should be the next President!

What a smart individual, written by ALPA lawyers who are paid with your dues.

 

[PCL_128]

Mesa is ALPA. What bargaining power do we have. Skywest is far better than Mesa. This is not a very good arguement in my opinion.

You have a lot of bargaining power thanks to the Mesa pilots who came before you that sacrificed quite a bit to achieve industry-leading scope language. Judging by your profile, you probably weren't around during the Feedumb debacle, but ask your more senior Captains about it. The bad contract you live under now is the result of having to buy iron-clad scope language to require JO to operate with only one seniority list. Now that JO can't outsource your flying, you have tremendous leverage in this round of negotiations. A strike would cripple Mesa. Don't underestimate your leverage.

 

[chicksdgme]

I thought this thread was about a pilot group not ALPA>

 

[Mr Wu]

I am still affected by that list of questions. What a smart individual. He/She should be the next President!

Or, He/She should join the organizing committee.

 

[Grey Ghost]

New hires, Stop complaining about the 1.9% dues and realize that all your work rules and potentially your pay and QOL may go up. without the union, it won't! Besides , it's tax deductible! If $$$ was so important, then you would'nt have applied there in the first place! Just think, potentially no more 16 hour "scheduled" days... no more being fired at will! these are just two major changes! there are many more to come...

 

[Dr King]

New hires, Stop complaining about the 1.9% dues and realize that all your work rules and potentially your pay and QOL may go up. without the union, it won't! Besides , it's tax deductible! If $$$ was so important, then you would'nt have applied there in the first place! Just think, potentially no more 16 hour "scheduled" days... no more being fired at will! these are just two major changes! there are many more to come...

First, a new hire does not need the tax advantage becasue they will recieve all of there money back anyway- they dont make enough to money to have anything withheld. Second, if you are worried about getting fired at will then you are either a bad pilot, or maybe have cursed at a mainline flight attendant. The four years I have been here I have seen maybe four people get fired.Thats not alot compared to the stories I have heard people get away with.

 

[Fred Rogers]

I'm real slow to be calling people "bad pilots". It's like Karma. You never know. Bad things happen to EXCELLENT pilots. Vigalance is paramount.

SEND IN YOUR ALPA CARDS COLGAN PILOTS!!!!!!!!!

 

[suupah]

anyone else smell a professional PR union consultant when lookin at the cpg website?