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The true ASA vs SKW pay checks

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OCP

Well-known member
Joined
Sep 15, 2005
Posts
976
Every one is talking about hourly rates this and hourly rates that. The real indicator is what the W2 will say at the end of the year. Now I can only say for where I am. I am about to enter 4th year pay as an FO on the 50, at ASA next month. So basicly I've spent this year at 3rd year pay rate as a line holder. By the end of the year between all credits and such I expect to clear around $40,000, maybe just slightly over. Most of the year I was only having 3% come out into my 401k.
So what is a 3rd year pay FO at SKW going to clear?
And please Capts on both sides chime in.
 
On a 6 year payscale, my W-2 (minus PFT reimbursment) was just over 78K. At a payrate of 61.6, that's 105+ hours a month credit. This is an exception for most pilots. I milk the system has hard as I can. Just using Skywest rates, looks like I would have made an extra 2000$ for the year.
 
In order for this to be a reasonable comparison we need some more details. What kind of schedules do you generally fly? Average days off in a month? Do you pay insurance for your whole family or just yourself? Do you pick up any flying on days off? Is that before or after taxes?...etc.

for me, 3rd year jet FO, avg. 15 days off/month, no picking up trips, insurance for a full family, 2% to 401k: after taxes = projected at roughly $37k
before taxes = closer to $44k. Though for more than 1/2 of that year, I was at 2nd year pay.
 
My W2 from my second year (1st quarter EMB FO, training, then RJ FO) shows just over 45k.

Interesting note on the first "Margin Based Incentive Program" (profit sharing) check: I took my first check and divided it by the number of block hours I flew for that period (as line-holding RJ FO) and it worked out to an extra $2.90 per flight hour on top of the regular $34.54. I haven't crunched the numbers for the most recent checks. That was flying the 50-seat exclusively.

Currently 3rd year CP, so we'll see about that in a few months...
 
Bluto said:
In order for this to be a reasonable comparison we need some more details. What kind of schedules do you generally fly? Average days off in a month? Do you pay insurance for your whole family or just yourself? Do you pick up any flying on days off? Is that before or after taxes?...etc.

for me, 3rd year jet FO, avg. 15 days off/month, no picking up trips, insurance for a full family, 2% to 401k: after taxes = projected at roughly $37k
before taxes = closer to $44k. Though for more than 1/2 of that year, I was at 2nd year pay.


More details. Spend about half of the year doing 4 days or 2 days back to back and the other half doing 3 days. Avg days off doing 4 days was probaby 13-14 (we have integration so we pretty much ALWAYS work the first 2 to 3 days of the month. ) 3 days average 15-17 days off. Insurance only my self.
I don't usually pick up any flying and my stated W2 would be gross pay.
 
3rd year Skywest CRJ FO, mostly 4 day trips, 18hours of overtime pay(time and a half, picked up in addition to my line) 700 hours credit from flying the line, 180 hours training pay(upgrading). Haven't received my first paycheck at the captain rate. End of October shows me at $40.3k. So, if I had the higher credit from flying the line the last 2 months and extrapolated my pay out to the end of the year it would be in the 48-50k range before taxes and etc.
 
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What do you mean time and a half for extra time? Does Skywest pay 1.5 to pick up open time? It is straight time for ASA. We only get time and a half for stuff added involuntarily.

I'm on the 700 in the right seat, 5th yr, and w-2 will be about 45k. Obviously, there are pay differences on the equipment. The other big differences I see are the 2% to ALPA (which is the want of the majority) for the ASA pilots and the profit sharing checks for the Skywest pilots. That, with their higher 50 rate, I'd say the average money in the bank might be 10% higher than ASA. Remember that as management tries to shove "Zero Net Gain" down our throats.

I'd also be curious about your scheduling and work rules. For most of us, that has a bigger impact on our lives than does a few percent of pay. Here is some of our life:

reserve system:

1. you can only bid for your 4 day block of unmovable days off.
2. beyond the above statement, seniority means absolutely nothing.
3. 2 hour call, however scheduling maintains a list of those can make it sooner. Don't believe me, comply once, and then see what you get from then on.
4. no method that can be determined for who to call for an assignment. Some are called daily, others once a month.
5. No ready reserve or long call reserve.
6. Can not bid for open time.
7. not eligible for cancelation pay. (typically not an issue)

relief lines:

these are lines made up from vacation and training drops. Once final they are hard lines, but you have no idea what you are doing until 27th of month prior. Almost all of these lines have only 10 days off as reserve days are added to fill up schedule. You can swap stuff.

hard lines:

1. you can not simply drop trips, or flights.
2. FLICA, we pay 8 bucks a month to help the friggen company with electronic bidding. in the grand scheme of getting what you pay for, we're getting hosed.
3. Swaps with open time must be day for day. Example, a 4 day trip worth 15 hours cannot be swapped with a 3 day worth 20 hours. The braintrust views this as getting an extra day off and there are quite simply no provisions for that.
4. We can only schedule up to 27.5 in 7 days. This is to protect against going over. Even though most flights are underblock. Most reserves are used to cover open time that others could not pick up. Then, when someone calls in sick, line holders are extended to cover. I just finished this month with 20 hours of credits, most of them "gifts" from the incompetence of the 7th floor.

Well, thats a good start, I need to go take my blood pressure meds and then go kick the dog.

Pup
 
Well, I can address a few points:

Anything picked up out of Open Time within 10 days of the trip will be paid at time and a half. Calls from C.S. for Junior Man trips are not mandatory, but they will be paid at 1.5. Some guys have been known to negotiate with C.S. and when they're really desperate get double time or extra days off in exchange for helping them out.

Reserve schedules are built as hard lines (as far as which days of work are concerned) and bid on. Days off do not change unless you ran into a legality issue between months (like last month ends with four days and next month begins with four days on).

Bucket systems used to determine who gets called. Say within the "4 days available" bucket there are 3 guys available: Most junior guy gets called first, then the next, etc...

Hour and a half call-out system wide except ORD and (I think) LAX are two hours.

No long call reserve, but at some domiciles (ORD, DEN, SLC) some guys are getting a day of reserve replaced with a (shorter) day of ready reserve.

Reserves are not paid for canceled flights. Line-holders are.

Relief lines are kind of a grey area. Most months you can call your transition scheduler and tell them what days you want off and they'll work with you (within means: if you bid a relief line in NOV and say you want Thanksgiving off, good luck). You cannot swap or drop trips.

With hard lines trips can be put on a swap board and taken by other crew members, or you can swap it out for a trip of higher credit, regardless of days worked. This month I swapped out a low paying three-day for two high paying locals.

I've never seen or heard anything from C.S. against building a line up to 30 hours.

We never seem to have enough reserves either.

P.S. Much of our interaction with Crew Support is currently going through a change as half of the domiciles are now using Preferential Bidding to build lines, while the others are still bidding on hard lines. The word from the bases using PBS is that it is a SIGNIFICANT reduction in QOL and many are pissed. We'll see if they can get the bugs worked out before it hits the larger domiciles (SLC, DEN, ORD).
 
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$8 for FLiCA

ASAPuppy, I have to take issue with your statement that we pay $8 to help the company with electronic bidding. FLiCA is actually provided for FREE! Yes. Use it at work free of charge. However, I elect to pay $8/month for home access. It is for MY own convenience. It sure as heck ain't to help the company. Ofcourse I also believe we shouldn't pay for that crap at all :p
 
Rogue5,

Most of what you said is exactly what we at ASA are pissed about. Most of what you say is all we are asking in our new contract. You're QQL sounds worlds better than ours. Especially when it comes to scheduling!!! And time and a half for open time would be great too. We just get straight pay.
 

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