Airline Pilot Forums

Seeing how it looks like this merger is gonna happen with UA/CAL, can you give us a quick brief on how it goes down.

A few things,

1. How long after the announcement was the SLI unveiled?

2. I am assuming you all tried to put a list together then decided on arbitration where each side made their arguments, the decision then took days, weeks, months???

3. Does each side (NW and DAL) vote separately on the new JCBA which then must have simple majority at each airline to be approved??

4. Was the list mostly relative seniority?

5. When did the 2 year no furlough clause begin?

6. How long after the SLI was published were the 2 list actually integrated?

thanks guys, just trying to figure out what to expect.

Seeing how it looks like this merger is gonna happen with UA/CAL, can you give us a quick brief on how it goes down.

A few things,

1. How long after the announcement was the SLI unveiled?

2. I am assuming you all tried to put a list together then decided on arbitration where each side made their arguments, the decision then took days, weeks, months???

3. Does each side (NW and DAL) vote separately on the new JCBA which then must have simple majority at each airline to be approved??

4. Was the list mostly relative seniority?

5. When did the 2 year no furlough clause begin?

6. How long after the SLI was published were the 2 list actually integrated?

thanks guys, just trying to figure out what to expect.


1. A couple of hours

2. About 3 or 4 weeks, the arbitration panel had a timeline imposed by the agreement but they seem to take whatever time they need anyway

3. Each side voted on the JCBA just like any major contract change at each individual airline, two separate votes

4. Yes, plus or minus a minor amount

5. At DCC, I think it was late October or November 2008 (date of corporate closure, when the deal was finalized).

6. Since the list was done after the DCC and after the JCBA was approved it was effective immediately. In order to bid on each other's equipment we had to be past the single operating certificate being issued by the FAA. So for the year between DCC and SOC, we essentially had separate lists for bidding purposes. We just finished up the process of having the fNWA pilots come under our flight planning and weight and balance system so now we can fly each others aircraft. Our first joint bid closed on Jan 1, 2010 so we have a mixing of crews already occurring.

The bottom line is you should expect a lot of air and noise generated by each side and in the end the list will be pretty close to a relative seniority list plus or minus. You will probably have to go to arbitration to get it done.

I'll let someone else post the DAL/NWA chronology.

Here's a tip though:

Get your MECs together immediately. Preferrably yesterday.
If they can settle on a list and/or a joint contract without a long battle, then they could sell that to management for substantial cash.
You can get real dollars if you are able to get your stuff together prior to the corporate deal closing.
Delta ALPA and Northwest ALPA were almost able to achieve that but it fell apart at the last minute and cost us all a lot of money. The two MECs came very close but just couldn't bring themselves to trust each other in the end.

Management will pay for guaranteed labor peace. It eliminates major risk and makes the financiers and Wall Street boys very happy. Use that to your advantage.

The promise of both pilot groups cooperating with the corporate integration rather than trying to obstruct the process is something you can sell.

Here's a tip though:

Get your MECs together immediately. Like yesterday.


I believe our MECs have been in talks since the last merger attempt.

I believe our MECs have been in talks since the last merger attempt.

That's definitely a hopeful sign. Are they cooperating or battling?
You can extract significant rewards if your MECs are able to work together.
The last thing management wants is another USAir fiasco.
They'll pay to avoid it.

Raise the bar for all of us!
777 Captain should pay at least $300. (hint, hint)

I believe our MECs have been in talks since the last merger attempt.

The biggest obstacle to SLI discussions is skewed views of the future. Most arbitrators have seen that projections 5 or 10 years out in this industry are worth nothing. Projections that are 20 or 25 years out are a joke. It took Delta five years to go from top of the world, printing cash, to bankruptcy.

Each pilot group will create a view of the future that is all rosy for them and all gloomy for the other group. They will then use this skewed vision of the future to justify putting their pilots at the top of the list and the other pilots at the bottom of the list. Usually, each pilot group will stand firm on this view until an arbitrator knocks them out of that view.

I can say that at least the Delta pilots on this last go around came around to the fact that the list was pretty much going to be relative seniority and kept their proposals centered around that. In fact, their last proposal in mediation was pretty much accepted by the arbitrators. It is the first time in a long time that that has happened.

Because the future is so murky, arbitrators are inclined to just fold the lists together in some sort of ratio, mostly it works out to about relative seniority. The sooner that each pilot group can wrap their heads around this fact the easier it will be for all involved.

The biggest issue in this case is the large number of United pilots that are on furlough. Generally, furloughed pilots get stapled onto the bottom of the list.

As Check Essential said, whatever benefit you think you may get by fighting over those last few seniority numbers you want to move up will probably not be worth as much money as you will get from your company up front to get it done quickly. In our case, the Delta pilots lost about $15 million per year in compensation and the Northwest pilots lost about $55 million per year by going to arbitration. In the end, the list was pretty much what the Delta pilots had offered from the very beginning. Pretty expensive arbitration for both sides.

To reply to my own post, one more piece of advice. Have each MEC send out one communication to their pilots about the SLI. It should say, "We have elected a merger committee, they will represent the pilots and the MEC, there is no vote on the seniority list. We will not comment any further on the SLI process."

If you can get each side to avoid trying to attack the other through their MEC communications, you will come out the back side of this deal much better off.

The biggest obstacle to SLI discussions is skewed views of the future. Most arbitrators have seen that projections 5 or 10 years out in this industry are worth nothing. Projections that are 20 or 25 years out are a joke. It took Delta five years to go from top of the world, printing cash, to bankruptcy.

Each pilot group will create a view of the future that is all rosy for them and all gloomy for the other group. They will then use this skewed vision of the future to justify putting their pilots at the top of the list and the other pilots at the bottom of the list. Usually, each pilot group will stand firm on this view until an arbitrator knocks them out of that view.

I can say that at least the Delta pilots on this last go around came around to the fact that the list was pretty much going to be relative seniority and kept their proposals centered around that. In fact, their last proposal in mediation was pretty much accepted by the arbitrators. It is the first time in a long time that that has happened.

Because the future is so murky, arbitrators are inclined to just fold the lists together in some sort of ratio, mostly it works out to about relative seniority. The sooner that each pilot group can wrap their heads around this fact the easier it will be for all involved.

The biggest issue in this case is the large number of United pilots that are on furlough. Generally, furloughed pilots get stapled onto the bottom of the list.

As Check Essential said, whatever benefit you think you may get by fighting over those last few seniority numbers you want to move up will probably not be worth as much money as you will get from your company up front to get it done quickly. In our case, the Delta pilots lost about $15 million per year in compensation and the Northwest pilots lost about $55 million per year by going to arbitration. In the end, the list was pretty much what the Delta pilots had offered from the very beginning. Pretty expensive arbitration for both sides.

Thanks everyone for the info. Out of curiosity why did going to arbitration cause a loss in compensation. My guess is DAL had a bonus that was to given if the list made a deadline which wasn't met??

Thanks everyone for the info. Out of curiosity why did going to arbitration cause a loss in compensation. My guess is DAL had a bonus that was to given if the list made a deadline which wasn't met??

We had a compensation deal in February 2008 but no SLI deal. When the merger was forced through in April 2008 management's second offer was less than the first. We did have a deadline in February and it was extended once but that was all we got. Speed matters.