What's going on at LUV?

[BlueBlood]

A classmate of mine from Delta is at SWA now and says Gary Kelly is losing the battle with the pilots. They are very frustrated with his "doom and gloom" message even in the face of a profit. All he does is tell the employees how they continue to fail financial targets and how they need to do better.

He claims that Kelly is already talking concessions and even furloughs if they don't give him the "help" he is looking for. WTF? Didn't WN just post a profit? Now he wants concessions?

If this is true, I really hate it for you guys. I wanted to work there for years because of the likelihood of never having to deal with this kind of BS. Suddenly I feel much better for interviewing twice with no success.

Good Luck!!!!

Can any of you corndogs confirm?

Blue

 

[Bob_Sacamano]

Gary just offered us a raise a few weeks ago. I don't know where your buddy is based, but most of the MCO guys I fly with trust Gary.

 

[contrail67]

The SWA model is all domestic with zero international.....which is a vital resource for the legacy airlines. I really don't think he knows how this will all turn out ....so he is just looking more negative right now. They still are making money again....hopefully things will improve.

 

[Dude]

You mean that raise with an automatic reduction in 401k matching by more than half if Gary merely asks other groups for concessions. He doesn't have to get concessions, only ask and we "snap-back" to 2006 pay rates and 3.5% on 401 matching. As for the raise, he can keep the 2% and dismal bonus of 3%. I fly with folks that don't have a lot of confidence in GK, Mike VdV, or CM for that matter. I don't get all spooled up, but if someone knocks on my door for concessions, they'd better come with every other groups donations first.

BTW, if you read the memos from SWAPA and the company it is apparent that someome is full of $hit. Negotiations it seems.

Either way............

 

[learherkjay]

You mean that raise with an automatic reduction in 401k matching by more than half if Gary merely asks other groups for concessions. He doesn't have to get concessions, only ask and we "snap-back" to 2006 pay rates and 3.5% on 401 matching. As for the raise, he can keep the 2% and dismal bonus of 3%. I fly with folks that don't have a lot of confidence in GK, Mike VdV, or CM for that matter. I don't get all spooled up, but if someone knocks on my door for concessions, they'd better come with every other groups donations first.

BTW, if you read the memos from SWAPA and the company it is apparent that someome is full of $hit. Negotiations it seems.

Either way............

The 401k cut was part of one of two offers by the company.

The first was a smaller retro check followed by raises tied to profitability.

The alternate offer was a fixed 2% raise but a trigger to rollback to 2006 salaries with a cut to 3.5 matching in the 401k.

So, the company was offering a small retro check with raises based on profitability or they were offering fixed raises with the ability to cut back wages if consecutive negative earnings were encountered.

The 401k cut was only part of one offer package. Not defending or promoting either package, but that's what his letter said...

 

[Benjamin Dover]

The 401k cut was part of one of two offers by the company.

The first was a smaller retro check followed by raises tied to profitability.

The alternate offer was a fixed 2% raise but a trigger to rollback to 2006 salaries with a cut to 3.5 matching in the 401k.

So, the company was offering a small retro check with raises based on profitability or they were offering fixed raises with the ability to cut back wages if consecutive negative earnings were encountered.

The 401k cut was only part of one offer package. Not defending or promoting either package, but that's what his letter said...

So, was Kelly's personal offer more or less pay than the TA? Can't tell from your post.

 

[maxblast72]

He claims that Kelly is already talking concessions and even furloughs if they don't give him the "help" he is looking for. WTF? Didn't WN just post a profit? Now he wants concessions?
no success.

Blue

Southwest has lost money 3 out of the last 4 quarters and can't even predict a profitable 3rd quarter. Yes Southwest made a little over $50 million in the 2nd quarter traditionally their best quarter. Southwest operating margin for the 2nd quarter was only 5%. Last year Southwest made over $300 million in the second quarter. This is the type of economic environment where low costs carriers should be doing well . Note Jetblue and Airtran were able to pull off operating margins over 10%.

That is why you are seeing Kelly keep talking about route structure optimization. They are trimming some frequency in some of their core markets to free up airplanes to startup the new cities of LGA, MKE, BOS, and MSP. Southwest is looking for new markets that will increase their yields. The excess capacity in their core markets is hurting their RASM performance.

 

[Mach 80]

A lot of pilots were of the atittude that "you never take the first offer", thinking that the second TA offer would necessarily be better and be coming a few weeks later. SWA does not want that thinking to become the norm at all the unions so it is sending a message that it will not be the case or be obtained easily and quickly and that there is a price to be paid in going down that road.

 

[TWA Dude]

Sounds to me like SW is turning into a normal airline. This was inevitable, unfortunately.

 

[Herkdrv]

A lot of pilots were of the atittude that "you never take the first offer", thinking that the second TA offer would necessarily be better and be coming a few weeks later. SWA does not want that thinking to become the norm at all the unions so it is sending a message that it will not be the case or be obtained easily and quickly and that there is a price to be paid in going down that road.

Hate to break it to you but every single other union on property has not taken their first offer at one time or another.

 

[jmreii]

A classmate of mine from Delta is at SWA now and says Gary Kelly is losing the battle with the pilots. They are very frustrated with his "doom and gloom" message even in the face of a profit. All he does is tell the employees how they continue to fail financial targets and how they need to do better.

He claims that Kelly is already talking concessions and even furloughs if they don't give him the "help" he is looking for. WTF? Didn't WN just post a profit? Now he wants concessions?

If this is true, I really hate it for you guys. I wanted to work there for years because of the likelihood of never having to deal with this kind of BS. Suddenly I feel much better for interviewing twice with no success.

Good Luck!!!!

Can any of you corndogs confirm?

Blue

Let me see if I got this right, the worker bees think because we made a profit everthing is peachy, the people that count, the shareholders are saying where is my money and I don't mean maybe? If I don't get my money by the end of today, its going to get ugly.

 

[The Victors]

Southwest has lost money 3 out of the last 4 quarters and can't even predict a profitable 3rd quarter. Yes Southwest made a little over $50 million in the 2nd quarter traditionally their best quarter. Southwest operating margin for the 2nd quarter was only 5%. Last year Southwest made over $300 million in the second quarter. This is the type of economic environment where low costs carriers should be doing well . Note Jetblue and Airtran were able to pull off operating margins over 10%.

That is why you are seeing Kelly keep talking about route structure optimization. They are trimming some frequency in some of their core markets to free up airplanes to startup the new cities of LGA, MKE, BOS, and MSP. Southwest is looking for new markets that will increase their yields. The excess capacity in their core markets is hurting their RASM performance.

I'm guessing if swa employees were willing to work for sh!t wages like the airtran kids then things would be much different.

 

[The Victors]

Sounds to me like SW is turning into a normal airline. This was inevitable, unfortunately.

There are 2 problems. 1. The ceo is a bean counter and refuses to look past the balance sheet. 2. FO's that are having a hard time dealing/accepting reality.

 

[StopNTSing]

Sounds to me like SW is turning into a normal airline. This was inevitable, unfortunately.

Yes they are....and it is not because of the pilots. It is because we have too many bean-counters, and not enough operational types, in the top mgmt positions. Sad.

 

[ballgag]

There are 2 problems. 1. The ceo is a bean counter and refuses to look past the balance sheet. 2. FO's that are having a hard time dealing/accepting reality.

FO's......reality.........Most of us don't have a military pension to fall back on and we're not making the 200 + bills captains are. That's the reality....

We're trying to protect a livable wage on weekend reserve. That's my reality...

 

[firstthird]

2. FO's that are having a hard time dealing/accepting reality.

which reality is that? the "we're senior and we're captains already so we're going to defenestrate the lances and stick a bunch of seniority into open time that doesn't presently exist" that kind of reality?

I'd say that whoever wrote and presented a TA that passed the CA side 60/40 and failed on the FO side 60/40 has got some 'splaining to do.

 

[Red Baron]

Southwest has lost money 3 out of the last 4 quarters...

According to the GAAP and Accounting Standards, yes. According to SWA and how it has been reporting for 38 years, no. The only quarter we lost money in was the first quarter of 09. Regardless, it is tough to make better yields when we are constantly running sales.

 

[Speedtape]

which reality is that? the "we're senior and we're captains already so we're going to defenestrate the lances and stick a bunch of seniority into open time that doesn't presently exist" that kind of reality?

I'd say that whoever wrote and presented a TA that passed the CA side 60/40 and failed on the FO side 60/40 has got some 'splaining to do.

Captain versus First Officer/Senior versus Junior--Management wins everytime.

 

[pilotyip]

According to the GAAP and Accounting Standards, yes. According to SWA and how it has been reporting for 38 years, no. The only quarter we lost money in was the first quarter of 09. Regardless, it is tough to make better yields when we are constantly running sales.

In the end the consumer determines what price a seat will sell for, without sales you don't fill the seats. My wife was a frequent user of SWA, used them all the time. When the TA failed in the spring, the one way DTW-ABQ doubled for advance purchases. I mean six months in advance, went from $99 to $199. She could find cheaper fares at AAL, NWA, Frontier, and CAL. Within two weeks the fares were down to $159, then two weeks later down to $129, now they are down to $99 again. It looks like SWA tried to raise fares and saw significant drop in booking to fill those otherwise empty seats on those Tue, Wed and Sat flights.

 

[firstthird]

Captain versus First Officer/Senior versus Junior--Management wins everytime.

I agree completely. The seniority centricness of the failed TA wasn't put there by management. Management doesn't care who gets first shot at open time or whether or not there is a right of return for displaced pilots (TA still didn't have this basic concept, almost every other airline has some type of right of return if you get displaced out of a base/seat, SWA has nothing) Our union thought, incorrectly, that they could 'sweeten the pot' for the senior captains.

If they write the next TA to have more or less the same seniority benes and negatives as our current CBA then I expect the lopsided vote will go away too.