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Who in the heck is REPUBLIC!!!

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Eventually the music IS gonna stop, and our job next contract is to make sure CHQ is a livable place for everyone here, in every seat.
Ideally this is a great mindset, obviously everyone wants the next contract to be the "one." The reality is that by the time the next contract rolls around, the mainline partner will be either shopping around again for the low bidder or asking the regional for relief which translates into what you have now will probably be about it.





 
selling out FO pay for growth (pay for upgrade)

aewanabe said:
Yeah, I agree wholeheartedly with this. It will not last for ever; I wish guys would stop crowing about it. Eventually the music IS gonna stop, and our job next contract is to make sure CHQ is a livable place for everyone here, in every seat.

PS I've been saying this for the last two years, long before I upgraded.

Yeah but did you vote for your current book or not? Even if you were enlightened enough not to, most did. Those who fought in recent history in the regional sector to help the profession (not limited by any means to Comair either) have a problem with that. Your management and union leadership at numerous roadshows told your pilot group if Comair didn't sign Randy's pay cut offer and you signed this contract you would get so much DCI growth it would blow your minds and everyone on property that day would see a 1.5 year upgrade or less, your collective pilot group creamed themselves and went for it. They made a deal with the devil and lucky for them the devil paid up this time.

This wasn't about staying alive, or feeding your family, or making your mortgage or saving your company. Chautauqua was incredibly profitable at the time and did not need such a generous, pro management contract. Your pilot group smelled upgrade and that's all that mattered. Comair fought not only for one of the top contracts this sector of the airline industry had ever had, but long before that, we fought to put an end to substandard FO pay. FO's make 60% Captain's pay just like the majors of olde. We fought to carry that over in our current book, and refused numerous company offers to create a pay for upgrade B scale. Even the pay freeze gave special exception to FO's, making sure they got second year pay on their one year anneversarry even though everyone else won't get a raise. We made sure the pay freeze won't affect a new hire at all, even though those of us already here will take a sizeable hit.

Immagine how much "bargaining credit" we could have gotten by sticking them at first year pay for 2 years. Immagine how much growth we could have bought. And for what its worth, no CHQ pilot has the moral authority to complain about our pay freeze. That right is reserved exclusively for 39% of us at Comair who voted against it, plus everyone at ASA and Horizon and maybe, depending on profit sharing and other things, Xpress-Jet. That's it.

Believe it or not, you are not the only group of aviators who figured out that captains make more than FO's, so its desireable to make captain sooner. You just led the modern era charge to sell out FO rates to buy your upgrade and undercut others to get it if necessary (and it was necessary) not only for the raise but for the resume time as well. By the way, congratulations on keeping your contract down to only 3 years ammendable date. When everyone is fighting to raise the bar, that's an accomplishment.

When you signed your current book however, we as an industry were on the leading edge of the new race to the bottom by very profitable carriers just to get growth, but you were also hot on the heels of a time when everyone fought when it was their turn to help jack up the house. When your current book is expired and you're back in negotiations, good luck trying to shore up those FO rates. You will always have 50% of your pilot group who will do anything for an upgrade (that's why they came there in the first place) and you will have to be "competitive" in the pilot bidding price war not only to get any growth, but to keep what you have. The last year of your contract could very well be your high water mark. That is, unless you are willing to sacrifice growth, which you clearly will not be.
 
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P38JLightning said:
Yeah but did you vote for your current book or not? Even if you were enlightened enough not to, most did. Those who fought in recent history in the regional sector to help the profession (not limited by any means to Comair either) have a problem with that. Your management and union leadership at numerous roadshows told your pilot group if Comair didn't sign Randy's pay cut offer and you signed this contract you would get so much DCI growth it would blow your minds and everyone on property that day would see a 1.5 year upgrade or less, your collective pilot group creamed themselves and went for it. They made a deal with the devil and lucky for them the devil paid up this time.

In short, yes I did vote for the current book. I think we've had this discussion before; I voted for it not for growth but to keep RAH flying on my seniority list. I'm not sure where you guys keep getting the "sign this and you'll get Comair's flying" road show information. The road show I went to talked a lot more about how quickly the company was moving towards starting the original incarnation of Republic Airline, which was to be a non-union 145 operator under J4J, flying at less than our LAST book rates. Don't have my copy of the old contract available, but I distinctly remember that second year FO pay was about 24 an hour.

Also, to put a perspective on our "phenomenal" DCI growth. The company had 15 DL 145s and 15 135s on property when we signed this contract. We now stand at a whopping 22 145s and 15 135s. Net gain of 7 airframes. Future 37/50-seat options have ALL been cancelled. In addition the DL 170 flying is 16 airplanes. So all told we have a growth of 23 airplanes on the DL side, 16 of which aren't even on the property yet.

As to the Comair pay freezes, I've never been one of the guys who criticized y'all for that; I do think, however that since you did what you felt you had to, you need to lay off us. Definite case of "pot, meet kettle".

Lastly about our payrates: I've been on the record as saying we got hoodwinked on the FO side. We bought into needing a 35/hour cap because of the mass influx of J4J FOs who would be topped out. Oops. I'm not opposed to a blended pay rate for FOs, because otherwise guys who hired into the 145 side would be screwed through no fault of their own. Unlike the CRJ 200/700 there is no "differences" training between the 145/170 and the company will likely NEVER train FOs from one to the other. I strongly believe, however, that the blended rates need to be much higher for the FO side next time around. Last contract we spent our negotiating capital on keeping RAH flying on our list, next one we're in a much stronger position to strengthen pay rates. Just my opinion.
 
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aewanabe said:
Yeah, I agree wholeheartedly with this. It will not last for ever; I wish guys would stop crowing about it. Eventually the music IS gonna stop, and our job next contract is to make sure CHQ is a livable place for everyone here, in every seat.

PS I've been saying this for the last two years, long before I upgraded.

I wish you guys luck next time around. However, it sure seems like it will be an uphill climb. With all these certificates, intergrations, and fast upgrades it sure seems like the pilot group is disorganized. Let's face it Bedford is a lighter shade of Orenstien, so there is serious work ahead. Hope you have some strong leaders that emerge to become negotiators.

Make no mistake about it some serious saber rattling will be necessary if the CHQ group is to come even close to earning what they deserve. You guys are becoming a leading operator of 70 seat+, so it will be largely up to you to turn the negative around. I'm pulling for you guys to make some improvements, because every time I see a E170 I fear for the future of this profession.
 
Wholeheartedly agree. Right now the pilot group IS disorganized, and there are guys who've been on the property for 15 months going to 170 Captain school. It's gonna take a lot of work to get the whole group moving in the right direction. We've got some really strong leaders in the pilot group who've seen the airline grow from BE-99s to where it is today, plus a bunch of us who realize that every new 170 here really is one less DC9 or F100 type airframe at a major. I hope those of us that realize it will be enough.

The "good" news is in these prosperous times management has been going out of the way to screw guys in everything from scheduling to pay. I think those moves are going to be more valuable in getting our group organized than anything else.
 
P38,

You loud mouthed Comair FO's really give a bad name to your carrier. Yes, back in 01, your fellow pilots walked the line to make you #1. Those days of respect for you guys went down the drain when you took that pay cut for growth. Get over it, you guys are no different than any other carrier. You took it in the A55 for a couple of CRJ's. You must be very proud. So proud of yourselves that all you can do is point out everyone else faults and pass the blame.

P38, if you are that bitter and uneducated, it is best you leave now...If not you have a whole lot of dissapointment and heart ache heading your way.
 
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ERJDRVR2 said:
Yes, back in 99, your fellow pilots walked the line to make you #1. Those days of respect for you guys went down the drain when you took that pay cut for growth.

Careful, fella, the line-walking was in '01 (a few months before 9/11; and we all know 9/11 had no effect on the airlines and is no reason whatsoever that subsequent contracts may have been somewhat less than ideal), and it wasn't a pay cut, it was a pay FREEZE. :)
 
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P38, you dildo, i walked that line back in '01 for 89 days, to give us a better contract, the idea was it would be the basis for other regional to build on, but we all know what happened to that. Welcome to the aviation world P38.

PS don't count on growth lasting for ever, when i came to comair upgrade times where 18 months. You can still get a pretty fast upgrade if you want to live in GSO or JFK
 

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