UPS to FURLOUGH!!

[WhiteCloud]

Re: Re: not a rumour

Sorry to hear this gents ... this really took me by surprise. I wasn't expecting this from UPS or any of the other package delivery firms.

I'm sorry to hear it too. I thought (rightfully so) that business was booming. I took my little UPS bound package to the US post office today. Ziggy1

 

[UPS Capt]

This is nothing more than posturing by the company during our ongoing contract talks. No pilot on the property believes it's because of UPS's bleak economic woes (sarcasm)!

The only thing the company has accomplished with this anouncement is to unify the pilot group even more than before. We'll take care of our own as we have always done in the past!

 

[UPSFO]

I got turned out on my last hours of CA reserve in Phl to
do SVT sim support with min rest. The scheduler said
he has no choice since they are critically short of 727 FEs,
yet they are furloughing 19 next month. As UPS Capt
said, it appears to be bad faith posturing by the company.

Just a quick thanks to guys like UPS Capt for all the support
we 100 bottom dwellers are getting from our brothers.
The IPA is truly a great group of people. For those of you
who plan to be here in the near future, we're preparing
for a good fight that will benefit you as well as us.

 

[Sammy@US]

This industry SUCKS.

 

[HA25]

I got turned out on my last hours of CA reserve in Phl to
do SVT sim support with min rest. The scheduler said
he has no choice since they are critically short of 727 FEs,
yet they are furloughing 19 next month. As UPS Capt
said, it appears to be bad faith posturing by the company.

Just a quick thanks to guys like UPS Capt for all the support
we 100 bottom dwellers are getting from our brothers.
The IPA is truly a great group of people. For those of you
who plan to be here in the near future, we're preparing
for a good fight that will benefit you as well as us.

I think that every UPS pilot should fly their schedule and not an hour more.... no overtime and that should be an "unwritten" rule!

 

[WhiteCloud]

I think that every UPS pilot should fly their schedule and not an hour more.... no overtime and that should be an "unwritten" rule!

Technically there is not need for overtime since they seem to have enough pilots to meet their needs. A pat answer to an overtime request should be bring back a furloughee. Fly safe! ziggy1

 

[HA25]

Technically there is not need for overtime since they seem to have enough pilots to meet their needs. A pat answer to an overtime request should be bring back a furloughee. Fly safe! ziggy1

Yes.. True..

 

[Publishers]

pro anything

I am trying to figure out where my comments support management.

I was merely pointing out that UAL is in the business of an airline, and, UPS is in the business of moving packages, for the most part by means other than aircraft.

UPS has historically shown that it does know how to manage and it's financial performance ranks miles ahead of any of the so called "airlines". Any airline would kill to have their historical performance.

When you work for UPS, or FEDEX, or ABX, you are not working for an "airline". One of the problems in labor relations between pilots and management is exactly that failure to recognize that simple point. Pilots represent what portion of UPS employees?

If nothing else, it should be apparent that the customer--you know that person I am always talking about paying the bills and wages-- care not one lick if his package or freight ever sees an aircraft or not. He does not care about the experience level of the crew, the comfort of the seats, he does not care period.

That means this is a different animal.

 

[Singlecoil]

Re: pro anything

If nothing else, it should be apparent that the customer--you know that person I am always talking about paying the bills and wages-- care not one lick if his package or freight ever sees an aircraft or not. He does not care about the experience level of the crew, the comfort of the seats, he does not care period.

That means this is a different animal.

Hmmm. Your statement is true if the customer doesn't care when his package gets there. But if that was the case, he'd take it to the post office and walk away. If he wants it there overnight or 2 day, it is going to go on at least two airplanes, and he's going to get a tracking number to make sure it gets there. He cares very much if he paid $20 to send a document overnight, and finds out it got put on a truck because the pilots have walked. The margins on their overnight business are much higher than the ground business.

 

[HA25]

Publisher, I'm not sure UPS isn't an Airline.. sure it's more than Airplanes, it's major presence is in Trucking, however, Airborne and Fedex are far more weighted in aircraft than trucking, though Fedex is now going after the trucking market, but they have a long road ahead of them before they achieve the presence of UPS in parcel, and Swift in short-haul freight..

That said, if UPS operates an airline in support of it's trucking business, it still operates "an airline"... and as such, it's treatment of these pilots is going to do little to get the union to see them as good faith bargainers..

 

[de727ups]

A few facts about UPS...

UPS doesn't give pilots, or other employees, discounts on shipping....however, I heard a rumor we could get discounts on Fedex...

If you want to recieve your bid package at home, you have to pay UPS to send it to you. They will payroll deduct it, though, very convenient.

While we are furloughing union line pilots, we continue to hire non-union management pilots who make a lot more money.

UPS and the IPA are in contract negotiations....

While I agree with almost nothing Publisher has to say....I'm glad he pointed out the following:

"When you work for UPS, or FEDEX, or ABX, you are not working for an "airline". One of the problems in labor relations between pilots and management is exactly that failure to recognize that simple point."

This fact is not lost on the UPS pilot group. While many airline pilot contracts are being raped and pillaged at money losing companies, the freight business is still in the black. Our pilot group does not work for a company that is in, or near, bankruptcy, and we hope to make significant gains on our next contract.

Some IPA pilots feel our timing is bad to be working on a new contract during this slump in the airline business. I think we need to seperate ourselves from the pack and remember that we are NOT an airline, but a profitable package delivery company.

 

[B727FE]

FedEx is not an airline? Maybe you should trade in your ATP for a class A. I will not even think about sending anything with Brown.

 

[busdrver]

Whether UPS or Fedex is an airline or not I will not argue, but there is 1 difference between an UAL, AA, or Delta and Fedex and that is the fact that there are only 4200 unionized workers at Fedex vs 160,000 that aren't.

 

[Michael Knight]

Capt Ted Stryker,

Are you going to be one of these 100? I hope not. I really hate to hear this bad news for anyone but especially considering why it is happening.

Obviously being able to claim that they HAD never furloughed a pilot was not that important. I wonder what the overall cost savings for them will be considering a probable short furlough and much increased animosity from some employees. I can imagine that there are quite a bit of management folks that are also upset about this news. You have got to wonder where this order came from... accountants, senior folks?

Good luck

 

[WhiteCloud]

Re: A few facts about UPS...

While we are furloughing union line pilots, we continue to hire non-union management pilots who make a lot more money.

Where are these management pilots coming from? Are they actually flying?

 

[KingAirGuy]

UPS Fourlough

Talk about increased training costs. They are already pusing people back to the 3rd seat in many fleets. I love this article. Enjoy!

 

[HA25]

Re: UPS Fourlough

Talk about increased training costs. They are already pusing people back to the 3rd seat in many fleets. I love this article. Enjoy!

whata bunch of $hit!

 

[F18-FDX]

Publishers,

As a matter of fact, FedEx is an airline, always has been, except that we haul boxes rather than people. And oh, by the way, 100% of the packages delivered on FedEx Express touch an airplane. If you do some research and look at the origins of the company, you'll see that. In recent years FedEx has expanded into a "full service" company by acquiring more and more trucks for many different uses, including the newly launched FedEx Ground service. About 2 years ago "FedEx" or Federal Express Corporation split its operations into what you see today in FedEx Express, FedEx Freight, FedEx Ground, FedEx Custom Critical and FedEx Trade Networks. Different companies under FedEx Corporation that "operate independently, compete collectively." FedEx Express IS FedEx Corporation's airline. Even though we compete with UPS in many markets, we are not the exact same type of companies. FedEx' origins are in airplanes in the 1970s, UPS' in trucks in the early 1900s. FedEx is an airline with trucks, UPS is a trucking company with airplanes. UPS' "airline" is an extremely important and necessary piece of the pie, and UPS wouldn't be where they are today without it. Please, do some more research on both companies, then come back to me with your wisdom.

In any case, we all, especially at FedEx completely support our brethren and see this as a BS move that will make the pilot group stronger.

 

[greg20]

Airline employee numbers

EDIT: F18-FDX, I see that you edited your post as I was posting the reply below. I have removed what you said but left the employment statistics intact because I still feel they may be of general interest.


The latest DOT statistics concerning systemwide employees are for YE2001. Granted, that data is now almost 14 months old, but if anything the following "total" values are now lower. This data is just for the DOT's "major" classification of 121 carriers. I also have data for the nationals, etc.


Format: Full time/Part time/Total:

Alaska: 9,179 1,336 10,515
America West: 9,677 2,504 12,181
American: 77,692 13,384 91,076
American Eagle: 7,859 1,179 9,038
American Trans Air: 6,208 759 6,967
Continental: 31,695 7,766 39,461
Delta: 62,401 11,702 74,103
DHL: 8,705 1,929 10,634
Federal Express: 93,710 47,318 141,028
Northwest: 43,913 1,788 45,701
Southwest: 31,945 729 32,674
Trans World: 12,717 554 13,271
United: 77,465 6,648 84,113
United Parcel: (no data)
USAIR: 33,820 3,275 37,095

Total Majors: 506,986 100,871 607,857

 

[F18-FDX]

Your numbers are definitely of general interest, obviously more detailed. But I realized the point I wanted to make was really moot, the number of union vs. non-union workers has no impact on how the basic company operates, in this case FedEx Express. Thanks for a good comparison.