Life on reserve at swa

[easydoesit]

I know this has been posted before, but I am trying to decide whether or not to stay on the 717 as an FO and not commute, or go to the 737 and commute with the pay raise. I have 2 elementary school aged kids. I 've been reading the swa cba and it seems like reserve is a lot better than at AT.

Could anyone at swa expand for me?

 

[scoreboardII]

don't commute, stay with the little ones, you'll never regret it.

 

[N1atEcon]

Where are you trying to commute from, what city pairs? If your going to burn alot of time then no. I was lucky when I was a commuter as I had 20 plus flights a day between city pairs. And I rarely had to overnight on my nickle. Also what kind of $$$ a year difference are you looking at?

 

[Whataburger]

You will get max 15 duty periods/month. ie. On months with 30 days, you will have 15 days off. Months with 31 days you will have 16 days off. 90 TFP/mo. Unless you pick up extra flying which is paid at second year pay.

Max days in a row of work is four. Min days off between trips is three.

Reserve lines are pure AM or PM initially.

You have to do whats best for your family. The kids grow up quick. They don't understand money, they understand if daddy is at home or on the road.

 

[wood pecker]

From what I have gathered from old pilots is that when retirement is approaching the 2 things you never have enough of, are money and time with the family.

Both decide which nursing home you get sent to. Only 1 decides if you will have visitors or if sit in your room all day looking at birds until your vision goes out.

 

[Lear70]

Doing the same thing... looking at foregoing the pay raise and moving back to the 717 for Quality of Life. It's a $40-45k a year loss for most of us that would be above the 50% line on the 717, probably for 18-24 months (unless you're super-senior and on the 737 in ATL and can go over before Oct next year).

The issue is, most of the 717 lines are running around 16-17 days off a month, some are commutable, depending on where you live, some aren't. At Southwest a junior guy either holding a line or on reserve is going to get within a day or two of that anyway, so the only real difference is that on the 717 you get to hold your weekends off and some/most holidays if you're senior over your SWA schedule.

So is 1-2 more days off a month and holding the weekends and holidays off worth $100k over the next 3 years? That's the question many AirTran pilots are asking themselves right now...

 

[slaquer5]

Lear

If ur getting 2 more days off that is money also.

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[50Pesos]

You will get max 15 duty periods/month. ie. On months with 30 days, you will have 15 days off. Months with 31 days you will have 16 days off. 90 TFP/mo. Unless you pick up extra flying which is paid at second year pay.

Max days in a row of work is four. Min days off between trips is three.

Max days is 6.
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[PropPiedmont]

And you will work your butt off on reserve. SWA doesn't pay reserve pilots to sit at home and cover sick calls.

 

[Lear70]

Lear

If ur getting 2 more days off that is money also.

Yeah, I hear you, and that's what I mean...

Is 2 days off a month worth $4,000 a month loss?

How about 2 days off a month plus holding partial holidays? That's a lot of green... Makes it a harder decision when the days off are that close to what a 717 guy would hold. Hence the original poster's question about reserve QoL.

As such, the 717 F/O seat is going surprisingly senior. If I bid 717 FO, I'm already in the bottom 40% of an ATL base (if it went pure seniority later) with all the guys senior to me who are bidding 717 FO, and 1/4 of our pilots haven't bid yet, and I'm not exactly "junior", bidding #1,155 out of 1,737.