How can they ever do that? The entire reason there is a DCI in the first place is to whipsaw DCI carriers against DCI carriers. There really isn't even any DCI versus Mainline whipsaw anyway, as DCI automatically underbids and gets the work so it comes down to DCI vs DCI.

This has been tried before and never got off the ground. In fact the race to the bottom only accelerated as ACMI providers shoved each other aside to win the next RFP. Pay for training has been replaced with pay for flight time and pay for upgrade. Any DCI carrier that tries to raise the bar in any significant way for any length of time is punished severely. Some contractual gains are seen from time to time, but they are modest and quite often given back before the ammendable date anyway.

RFP's aren't just for growth flying anymore. They are for current flying and the cheapest wins. That DCI carrier at the alliance meeting sitting right next to your guy will underbid your group in a second when the time comes and if he doesn't, you will uderbid him and he knows it.

There is nothing any alliance can do to change the fact that DCI flying is a zero sum game and every plane one carrier gets another carrier doesn't get. There will always be a pilot group willing to "deal management an ace" to get the work. Always. Also from time to time, new DCI carriers will be signed on as well as created from thin air if necessary, where everything is cheaper and everyone is on first year pay.

How will an alliance convince one DCI carrier to overbid another knowing the one that underbid them got the work? How will a DCI alliance stop non DCI airlines from putting in a lower bid? How will it stop new DCI's from being created?

This is a mainline problem and the solution has to be a mainline solution. Mainline and DCI can collaborate to a point, but anything greater than a staple with some reasonable DCI protections is a non starter. Yet even that requires 100% mainline bargaining to secure for it to have any real meaning (scope recapture). Only mainline pilot groups can fix this by reclaiming scope. There is no other way.