Mesaba Redistribution of Snapback Raises

[CaptainJaguar]

OH GOD! plain and simple! Mesaba and Pinchnickle suck! They are a joke of an airline made up of good chumps and chumpets just trying to make a living and make it in this sh*t career. Mesaba guys, keep fighting. But in the end you know how this is going to end. Why? well b/c your airline sucks due to it's shi**y management and useless ALPA reps. There! now lets all get back to work.

 

[WayBack]

Ah yes, the typical "ALPA is looking out for the FO's again" speech. Only those FO's will later be told "We did everything we could. We just couldn't get you guys anymore money. Actually FO's will be taking a pay cut. Management promised all MEC members new BMW's if we signed on this. Sorry, we're more important than you".

 

[xjhawk]

I wont read anymore than the first page- But here I go

A little history, the same MEC leadership that promised greater FO pay rates in the 04' contract (never happened) and gave the greater dollar amount (same %) to the Captains in the bankruptcy snap backs are the ones who proposed this. On the surface it seems like the right thing to do but it is deeper than that. Yes it would be correcting mistakes THEY made back then. But it is once again taking something that was promised from part of our pilot group! I will not even get into the long term money lost by anyone spending any time as a captain at Mesaba. Or the fact that when negotiations do start, the company will not give any pay increases to the captains since we obviously make enough to "give" away to the FO's. They will want the captains to give up more I can assure you on that.

I am not a "greedy captain" as some of our more vocal FO's have called any captain who voices opposition to this. I am a captain that may very well be an FO again within the year and am still against this. I was also a FO at this company for over 4 years, never passed on any upgrade and have been on reserve for about 7 years at this company. THIS IS A BAD IDEA. I never called our captains greedy when our MEC left the FO's pay in trade for gains for captains and scope (really?????) and when many of our most senior captains kept their top rated pay through bankruptcy because of a training snafu.

I would like to spout off about that guy who is complaining about captains not wanting to give up their raise who was hired with sub 500 hour experience, went straight to the 900 and complained that their had to sit on reserve for an entire month when they were hired. Oh and they are pissed that our upgrade times are not under three months anymore and they are also pissed because they paid their dues and deserve an upgrade since they have been an FO for almost two years! No I will not say that The truth of the matter is that what I described is a very small minority and most of our FO's are awesome people who deserve more money than what our last contracts got for them (us). But this proposal is wrong. Fix it in negotiations!

 

[SEVEN]

Don't worry guys...this joke of a proposal will never even make it to vote. This train has almost derailed.

 

[Blade Runner]

Don't worry guys...this joke of a proposal will never even make it to vote. This train has almost derailed.

I agree, the bigger issue here is ALPA's incompetence. We are stuck in the proverbial Doldrums.

 

[xjhawk]

Look at it this way the head guy in our union is the one who submitted the proposal. The guys who vote on this (not us, remember the "vote" we got was a survey) are half FO's. It would only take 1 captain to swing the vote (if it works the way I think it will). Then as they did before in other contracts, Mark will ask for everyone to stand together and everyone vote yes to show solidairity. I have talked to my rep and I trust him to vote how the pilots he represents feel about this proposal. I do not think there is as much support for this proposal on the captains side as they are making it seem. I have sat on ready reserve 4 times this month and have not encountered 1 captain who was for this proposal.

 

[Twisted Mind]

Jet CA's are making 80,000 sitting right next to a FO making 20,000. Doing nearly the same job under the same conditions. Airlines have been sucessful in upgrading people in 6 months. And you are worried that the company is now going think you are over paid?

 

[ImbracableCrunk]

For all the guys who say: I had to walk three miles uphill in four feet of snow to get to my plane when I was an FO - deal with it. There's always going to be someone who got on with less time than you, someone who got a quicker upgrade, etc.

The pendulum swings. And you're not going to stop it.

The only thing you need to look at is parity. That's it.

 

[Monster Buck]

This isn't about who is a ca or fo right now, when did they get to Mesaba, who paid the most dues, blah blah blah. It is about which pay scale, FO or CA, is the furthest off(below) industry average. Every contract we see comparisons about what is being asked for and what is industry average. You need to look more broad and remember how pissed each person felt in the last contract when Mesaba pilots wanted Comair rates and kept getting Mesa rates thrown in their face by management. Bring up the one that is the lowest in comparison to the industry, keeping in mind that the Saabs are going bye bye. The fo scale is a crj scale not a Saab scale for the future.