Once I've started to actually spend time over my bid, I had very good results with PBS. It does take time to learn how it works and it takes time to build a good bid. But the flexibility it provides is nice.
I have no clue about line bidding but I think with line bidding there are no superb lines and there are no extremely crappy ones. It is more toward the average. Am I right? I really don’t know I have never had that.
With PBS if you are at the bottom you will fly the worst trips with the least days off etc... But there is still some control even if you are really low. However if you are senior you can make your own line. You might have to build a few different versions of that line but you can get a lot of what you ask or even 100% if you are really on the top. It works well with a large base with many trips overlapping each other (thus providing enough variations) and it sucks with a small base.
PBS takes more away from the junior and provides it to the senior as long that senior person knows how to bid. I once shared the van in CLE with a senior CAL CA and he was not happy with PBS. (He was a super nice older guy btw.) He said he was doing good initially, but for the past few months he was getting ********************ty trips. He also said he had the same bid in since the beginning. Obviously he did not understand PBS, and he choose to not learn it while others junior to him did. Thus his bid that provided good trips initially (probably a very generic bid) became less “competitive” while others started to figure out the system.
With PBS there is a learning curve and there is a monthly homework to do to have a good line. The more junior a person, the more he/she is asking for, the longer it takes to build a decent bid. If you don't put in your time you won't use it to its extent. There is absolutely no reason a senior person should ever get a bad line if he knows what he is doing except:
If the company controls the whole thing it can get real bad. At my current (current for about another 15 minutes… yeah…) company they were withholding trips and hand building lines as they wished. Then you could go and work that month and later get $20 in a grievance. It has been said here before. If the company has control over PBS than probably better screw it. But if the pilots can run it, and there is proper training before its release than I think it is a great tool that provides some control. This or the other way the trips will be built by the company. Right? Why let them build your line too?
My 0.002
PS: Now someone please be nice enough and tell me where I can find the other two memory items in the QRH? I could only find the Loss of speed data (or something similar). Where is the other 2? I am making my flash cards for training. Thx!