Mesaba to enter proffer of arbitration!

[T-handle]

NMB just announced both parties to enter arbitration! buckle up boys and girls!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

[General Lee]

Is that good or bad for you???? With all of the other regionals giving away pay for growth, that doesn't sound good for you....

Bye Bye--General Lee

 

[mesaba2425]

Thanks for the advice T-handle. My seatbelt is buckled.

 

[JJJ]

Here is the story:

MINNEAPOLIS, Dec. 5 /PRNewswire/ -- Three days of mediated talks between the Air Line Pilots Association, International (ALPA) and Mesaba Airlines yielded little progress this week, prompting mediators to offer binding arbitration to settle the protracted contract dispute.

The parties received a letter from the National Mediation Board early this morning citing an impasse in the bargaining process. The letter urges an agreement as soon as possible and offers binding arbitration to resolve the outstanding issues. If both parties accept the offer, a neutral arbitrator will decide the outcome of roughly two dozen issues that remain open. These remaining issues include job security, compensation, retirement and work rules.

Should either side decline the offer, a 30-day cooling off period would occur prior to a strike deadline. If there is no agreement reached at the end of that cooling off period, ALPA is entitled to call a strike. Mesaba pilots voted 98 percent in favor of using this action if an acceptable agreement cannot be reached.

A pilot strike at Mesaba Airlines, which operates as a Northwest Airlink provider, would affect over 600 daily flights the carrier operates for Northwest Airlines.

ALPA's Master Executive Council (MEC) at Mesaba will meet Monday to consider the arbitration offer. The MEC is the union's governing body at Mesaba and is comprised of 12 elected pilot representatives.

Negotiations to amend the seven-year-old agreement commenced in June 2001. The contract includes concessions that facilitated the introduction of the AVRO RJ-85 regional jet fleet. Those concessions have saved Mesaba more than $12 million to date.

Mesaba serves 114 cities in 30 states and Canada from Northwest's three major hubs: Detroit, Minneapolis/St. Paul and Memphis. Mesaba employs 844 professional airline pilots who operate an advanced fleet of 103 regional jet and jet-prop aircraf


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My guess is that the company will agree to binding arbitration, and obviously the pilots will reject binding arbitration. Why let 1 person decide what your pay, work rules, and retirement you are going to get over the next few years? Let 844 pilots decide that.

My guess is that Mesaba pilots will be released into 30 day cooling off, the President will not extend that 30 day period, and there will be an 11th hour deal.

I'm curious about the contract in 96. What were the concessions that were approved to facilitate growth? Obviously it wasn't a pay cut to fly bigger airplanes.

 

[UALX727]

I remember one of the things the MEC agreed to at the time was a lower first officer pay scale for the Avro's. At the time, we had a new contract with higher payrates for jet first officers than for turboprop first officers. The concession given now was all F.O.'s, regardless of jet or prop, would get paid the same.

From what I remember, Brian Bedford (CEO at the time), went to our MEC and basically said that in order to get jets on the property we had to get our costs down to operate them or we may not get the order. I know it p#ssed me off at the time when our MEC caved and gave up the new F.O. rates for the jet. The jet captain rates stayed the same. Now why doesn't that surprise me???

The rational going around at the time for that move was:

If you spent your career at Mesaba, where would you spend the majority of your time- F.O. or Captain???? The obvious answer was captain so the thinking was it would be better to lower the F.O. rates than to touch the captain rates. You would make more money over time by keeping the captain rates high.

 

[JJJ]

So were there FO jet rates before bedford came to the MEC, or were they proposed pay rates and then lowered?

 

[UALX727]

The F.O. jet payrates already existed. I could open a copy of the new pilot contract in 1996 and read them in the compensation section. We were all props at the time. They were put in there just in case we ever acquired jets. There was a substantial difference between the prop and jet F.O. payrates at the time.

After the deal was made with Bedford, the MEC issued an amendment to the current contract (side-letter). They sent the side-letter out to the pilots containing the newly lowered payrates for the jet F.O.'s.

 

[JJJ]

ok thanks

 

[xjavro85]

I smell a LOCK OUT. Be prepared, I don't think our strike is a threat to them anymore. They are trying to call a bluff.

 

[saabtrash]

How could a strike not be a threat to them? It would shut the company down...

 

[MJG]

Here is the story:
prompting mediators to offer binding arbitration to settle the protracted contract dispute.

To borrow Nacy Reagan's slogan: "JUST SAY NO !"

Ask Eagle guys what a great deal binding arbitration is.

 

[UALX727]

Follow-up to JJJ's question........

In regards to the concessions took by the pilot group there was something else the pilots did for Bedford at the time. The MEC agreed to extend the new contract out 2 years as well. This took the newly signed 4 year contract into a 6 year deal.

I can't believe I forgot that....thanks to one of my former Mesaba buds for reminding me. D@mn, I'm getting old......

 

[mesaba2425]

bump