Pilots at Airtran pick up open time???

[tubelcane]

To the guy wanting to know when to hedge,

When I came to this company 3 years ago there was a major screw up on the hedging in ATL. Management has said they can make money with oil somewhere in the 90 - 100 range. If it's in that range and trending up would'nt you hedge your bet around there and know you could make money? These guys are not good at this, they need to hire someone who is. I would rather see them do it now and know they can make money, even if its only 50% heged at 100 or so, that's better than nothing. If oil goes up after the election is over and they didn't, it's gonna be tough to blame anyone but the "best management team in the industry."

 

[FlyFastLiveSlow]

GT, it's not always what you do. it's also how you do it, and when you do it, and what you say to employees.

This is where this management team falls down every time. At some point, if you kick a dog enough times, he's going to bite . . . . Copy?

Took the words right outta my mouth.

 

[gt1900]

SS... Now your just being dumb.. Have you seen the ticket prices?? Have you seen the news articles?? Ticket prices have come up a ton.. Just look at the prices from the east coast to the west coast. AAI has raised ticket prices a lot.. Do they still offer ticket sales?? Yep.. But last year you could buy a ticket from SEA to ATL for $99.. This year that same ticket has been around $180 during the cheap fare sales.... BTW... Nice cop out on telling managment its thier job to hedge fuel... However, you still never answered my question.. At what price do they hedge.. You seem to be so smart except when it comes to actually throwing out a number... Ok Ill do it.. If oil get into the $70 a barrel range AAI should hedge.. But not until then.. AAI can make money at 100-110 a barrel suposidly.. So now would be a bad time to buy fuel hedges......... BTW... Nice try on the article about SWA not hedging in a few months... That article doesn't show a date.. I will try and find the article that does, but I might not be able to... BTW... IF SWA has been heding in the last couple months they are really screwed and not as smart as youd like to think..... The SWA ride will end and they will eventurally be in the same boat as everyone else.. No airline has ever sat at the top for ever.. SWA will be no exception.. They will make their mistakes and it will be just like pre 9/11 when guys were bailing from SWA to fly for UAL, DAL, NWA, etc... How quick you forget the past.... Remember when Eastern was the highest paid pilots in the industry????

 

[FlyFastLiveSlow]

Nice cop out on telling managment its thier job to hedge fuel... However, you still never answered my question.. At what price do they hedge.. You seem to be so smart except when it comes to actually throwing out a number...

I had to throw in my two cents here....

Secret Squirrel is not part of the "best mgmt team in the industry", is not collecting millions of dollars in "performance" bonuses, and I'm guessing is not an MBA holding executive at FL. When he joins that club, then it will be his decision.

Until then, those who ARE grossly overcompensated to make good decisions, but don't, should actually make one.

 

[twepilot]

they get what they negotiate for just like us.

RV

 

[PCL_128]

they get what they negotiate for just like us.

RV

The difference is that they're negotiating with their golf buddies who give them whatever they want.

"Hey guys, can I have a 20% raise this year?"
"Yeah, sure Bob. When we hitting the links?"

 

[Secret Squirrel]

SS... Now your just being dumb.. Have you seen the ticket prices?? Have you seen the news articles?? Ticket prices have come up a ton.. Just look at the prices from the east coast to the west coast. AAI has raised ticket prices a lot.. Do they still offer ticket sales?? Yep.. But last year you could buy a ticket from SEA to ATL for $99.. This year that same ticket has been around $180 during the cheap fare sales.... BTW... Nice cop out on telling managment its thier job to hedge fuel... However, you still never answered my question.. At what price do they hedge.. You seem to be so smart except when it comes to actually throwing out a number... Ok Ill do it.. If oil get into the $70 a barrel range AAI should hedge.. But not until then.. AAI can make money at 100-110 a barrel suposidly.. So now would be a bad time to buy fuel hedges......... BTW... Nice try on the article about SWA not hedging in a few months... That article doesn't show a date.. I will try and find the article that does, but I might not be able to... BTW... IF SWA has been heding in the last couple months they are really screwed and not as smart as youd like to think..... The SWA ride will end and they will eventurally be in the same boat as everyone else.. No airline has ever sat at the top for ever.. SWA will be no exception.. They will make their mistakes and it will be just like pre 9/11 when guys were bailing from SWA to fly for UAL, DAL, NWA, etc... How quick you forget the past.... Remember when Eastern was the highest paid pilots in the industry????

You better be careful throwing around terms like Dumb. Your posts reek of it. First The average ticket price for the second quarter 2007 was $93.33. Do you know what the average ticket price was for the same quarter this year? $99.99. Ok, I was wrong. So that is an increase of like 7%. But inflation over the same term was over 5% (and inflation in the airline business more than that). Jet Blue for instance was able to raise their average seat price by 18%. Where are your huge increases in ticket prices. I am getting my information from the 2Q report. Where are you getting your information?

Now lets talk about fuel hedging. The first problem is that jet fuel is not publically traded so companies have to trade oil or heating oil futures. The market fluctuates, and in the case of oil and heating fuel it fluctuates pretty regularly. GOOD management hedges fuel this way. They invest in oil and heating oil futures when it is at the bottom of cycles (buy when low) and they use the profits from the sale of their contracts to supplement the purchase of their fuel (Jet Fuel is not a publicly traded commodity). It takes the uncertainty out of their fuel costs and helps them price their product better. They hire experts to manage these accounts, not ask pilots, and they are very successful. There are other ways also. But my point in all this, and the answer to my question is that GOOD management decisions would have us hedging fuel all along so we would have not been exposed to this spike in fuel prices. Southwest, Alaska, and to a lesser degree JetBlue made good decisions about one of the major costs in their business model and they are benefiting from those gains. But what our management did was reactionary and will cost us more money than if they did nothing at all. As oil prices went up the cost to hedge fuel also went up.

All right I am done. I like a good debate. I think I won, you think you won. But in the end managments decisions have led us to the place we are. Employees have done everything they can to make this place successful. In the end they are being punished for their hard work with threats and heavy handed tactics. I personally think it is disgusting. I guess you think it is the cost of doing business and employees should just take it. We will just have to agree to disagree.

 

[maxblast72]

Having a bunch of pilots sitting around doing nothing cost a lot of money. I laughed when everyone said the LVI would drop to 70hours.. That doesn't help the company at all..

Building 85 hour LVI lines and then having 80 reservists that actually earn 40 hours of credit but get paid for 70 is more expensive than 70 hour LVI and only having the normal 45-55 reserve lines (there would be less soft pay).

Since you want your pilots to fly alot, you reduce the workforce until you have enough pilots to fly 82-85 a month in the heaviest months (May-Aug, Nov, Dec). Then in the slow months (Jan, Feb, Sep, Oct), you reduce LVI to reduce overall pay, not increase the amount of reserves (not actually "earning" their full 70 hours of pay). The soft pay enters the picture when you have too many reserves sitting at home still getting paid 70 hours.

We flew over 50,000 block hours a month this summer. With the aircraft sales we will be completing this fall, I doubt we will flying over 50,000 block hours a month until we get back up over 140 aircraft. Unfortunately until that time, we won't need 1650+ pilots.

 

[gt1900]

Max... I don't believe we have a lot of reserves that are only earning 40hours of credit. Im on reserve and I currently have over 50hours of flying for Sept (btw.. I have only been assigned trips within 24hours of my reserve time). Thats 2 reserve periods and 50+ hours... At this rate I will time out at the end of the month.. I may be the exception, but I think the reserve guys are flying more then you think... Heck, I'm at almost 90hours of pay already (until they urp me)... This reserve thing is great.... just kidding

 

[FlyFastLiveSlow]

Max... I don't believe we have a lot of reserves that are only earning 40hours of credit. Im on reserve and I currently have over 50hours of flying for Sept (btw.. I have only been assigned trips within 24hours of my reserve time). Thats 2 reserve periods and 50+ hours... At this rate I will time out at the end of the month.. I may be the exception, but I think the reserve guys are flying more then you think... Heck, I'm at almost 90hours of pay already (until they urp me)... This reserve thing is great.... just kidding

Must be nice. I'm on reserve. I have 6.5 hours of flying so far, and 61 hours credit.