USA Jet IS a lost Cause

[USA Jet Pilot]

Any Thoughts or feelings after todays snow job?

 

[N817AA]

What did they say today?

 

[pilotyip]

Business is bad, when business gets better the temporary cut back will be fixed. We are increasing our DC-9 staffing due to the addtion of another passenger DC-9, and to fill expected turnover.

 

[canadflyau]

"when business gets better"-PilotYip

I think I was looking for that to be defined yesterday, some sort of transparent benchmark or goal we all could see and work toward.

I also went to the meeting for them to gives us a report card and info on the health and future of USA Jet, in the end I hope our questions informed them more than they informed us.

 

[canadflyau]

As I understand the DC-9, they are adding a pax bird, but are using the engines off of one of the Cargo -30 birds to power it.

 

[pilotyip]

We did the same thing when we purchased our DC-9-10 191US (301ME) from Midwest Express, makes the new airplane a good deal.

 

[pilotyip]

No manning projections are based upon flight crew hours available per month, as long as you do not approach the airframe flying limit per month your ability to generate trips is predicated upon crews available. Since we are not approaching the limit of airframe flying on the cargo birds, it will not effect the needed crewmembers to operate cargo airplanes. However, the additional of another dedicated passenger bird will require another three crews to be available just to cover the passenger birds, i.e. more manning for the pax birds and an actual reduction in the crews available to fly cargo

 

[3M1900FO]

So Pilot Yip Hook Us Up Whats The Process To Get In Usa Jet

 

[pilotyip]

go to jsfirm.com and look for our ad when we start interviewing and hiring again, probably sometime next year.

 

[Country Wild]

So? How did the State of the Union Address go? You guys going to be around long term?

 

[asipilot]

Our pilot group is so demoralized that I don't think any of us take pride in our company anymore. I still take pride in the flying I do, but not the company I work for. USA Jet is just like all the other non scheds, the owners and management simply don't care how they affect people's lives. Obviously I'm still looking for work in the Detroit/Flint/Pontiac area if anyone knows of anything.

Thanks, J

 

[pilotyip]

As Mark Twain said, "The rumors of my death are greatly exaggerated”. Working in the on-demand business sucks. It has wild swings in the business cycle. It is the nature of the beast. The pay reduction sucks, but to get the same savings in dollars almost 30 pilot would have lost their jobs and another 10 Captains would have been bumped back in pay and seat to F/O. As business returns, pay will return, this was stated at the state of the union by Brian and Chris, just no date was given. USA Jet is a long-term player in my book, sound management, and a good business plan to diversify outside of the on-demand cargo and many things in the works to make this a better and stronger company. Our DC-9 are flying a lot, with Ameristar parking one of their 73’s and the canx of a 73 initial class; plus Zantop’s L-188’s collecting dust at YIP, there is a something promising on the horizon. Our passenger business had almost tripled in three years. Unhappy campers who bail out early will only know if they made the right move 5 years from now. Like the friends of mine who left North Central in 1973 for EAL, or left GM Corp for Braniff in 1978, or the pilot who left SWA for UAL in 2001.

 

[Everett Howe]

USA Jet is a long-term player in my book, sound management, and a good business plan to diversify outside of the on-demand cargo and many things in the works to make this a better and stronger company

Yip, somehow I get the notion here from the replies from JUS Pilots, that they didn't get that message from their management. The fact that a check airman has to correct the angle of mgmts sayings during a private meeting, on a public forum of all sorts, wouldn't make me all warm and fuzzy.

 

[2LT]

An impartial observation...

From the outside looking in I'll bet some of the,"...unhappy campers...," fall well outside the SWA to UAL type of analogy. Assuming a 1st or 2nd year F/O on the DA-20 doesn't break guarantee --which, if I'm correct, the vast majority haven't been-- they'll stand to gross approximately $26310./year plus whatever they might manage in per diem. Excluding per diem, they stand to net $1820./month minus whatever health care/401(K) deductions, etc. they elect.

So, assuming the above "unhappy camper," is it fair to categorize him/her as the same sort of person who would leave SWA for UAL back when it was unarguably for financial gain? Is somebody presumed guilty of bailing on their employer because they simply can't afford to work there any longer? The analogy is presumptuous. I'll bet those who bail on USA Jet are doing so not out of callous greed and/or personal financial gain. On the contrary, assuming they have bills to pay, they are probably doing it because they simply can't afford not to.

 

[knight]

Can't aford to quit. Can't aford to stay. Can't pay my car payment, insurance, electric bills. Getting bad credit. Who knows when we will get our pay back? Who knows when the pay will be cut next year by almost 25% again and for how long that time? Is this the new way of doing business?

 

[pilotyip]

There is no guilt associated with bailing, when a pilot leaves us for a better job, we wish them well, and thank them for a doing a good job for us. We use our industry contacts to help pilots gets interviews at places they might like to work. We know the on-demand business is not for everyone, for many it is a stepping stone. And no one will deny the experience of flying jets at a 121 air carrier is a good stepping stone. But pilots uniformly sometimes do not make good career decisions, they make decisions based upon for the wrong reasons. Such as "I will show them I do not need put up with this BS". Giving up senority at a viable company in pursuit of greener pastures, could be a bad move. I know of four first year DA-20 F/O's who will be getting pay raises next month when they move into the DC-9. I firmly believe this is temporary.

 

[Freight Dawg]

Hey Pilot YIP dude relax on the pro management stuff. I wonder how your owners can sleep at night in their nice houses with nice cars and fly around in their nice personel jets while eveyone goes with out. Dude thats just ain't right. It seems to me they dug the hole and now everyone else lies in it. I heard that the Mechnics took hits and the Broker side did as well. Are you guys doing that bad. Yo pilot dudes hope fully stuff will start looking up.

 

[Habib]

"We use our industry contacts to help pilots gets interviews at places they might like to work."

Are you serious, how can you say that, as long as you don't want to go to Kalitta, I guess, a place some way want to work.

You forgot to put this in your orginal statement, and the P.S. too.

 

[pilotyip]

Responses

Fr8dg, I would expect your response, after all this is a pilot board and anything that is posted as pro-mangement is debunked or blamed on kool aid drinkers. If you think that nice houses and nice cars are managment perks you would desire, you should attempt to get into management and get 8 days off a month maybe, no overtime, and your butt chewed on a regular basis.
Hab guy, there is no evidence, other than rumor, that there is a barrier at Kalitta big. I challenged our pilots to give me a name of one of our pilots who tried to get on a Kalitta and was turned down. No one has said anything yet.

 

[WillowRunVortex]

As Mark Twain said, "The rumors of my death are greatly exaggerated”. Working in the on-demand business sucks. It has wild swings in the business cycle. It is the nature of the beast. The pay reduction sucks, but to get the same savings in dollars almost 30 pilot would have lost their jobs and another 10 Captains would have been bumped back in pay and seat to F/O. As business returns, pay will return, this was stated at the state of the union by Brian and Chris, just no date was given. USA Jet is a long-term player in my book, sound management, and a good business plan to diversify outside of the on-demand cargo and many things in the works to make this a better and stronger company. Our DC-9 are flying a lot, with Ameristar parking one of their 73’s and the canx of a 73 initial class; plus Zantop’s L-188’s collecting dust at YIP, there is a something promising on the horizon. Our passenger business had almost tripled in three years. Unhappy campers who bail out early will only know if they made the right move 5 years from now. Like the friends of mine who left North Central in 1973 for EAL, or left GM Corp for Braniff in 1978, or the pilot who left SWA for UAL in 2001.

USA JET was built and maintained from Auto Industry dollars. Those dollars are no longer there. Ford and GM are in dire straits. It will probably take 3 to 5 years for these 2 companies to recover ( if they adopt sound business plans themseves). If USA JET is just now deciding to seperate themselves from Ford, in my opinion it is time to sit back enjoy your drink, listen to the band play and wait for the inevitable. Robbing Peter to pay Paul (taking one freight 9 out for one pax 9-10) smells of last minute desperation. USA should have went big 3 years ago like K AIR.