Lots of folks talk in the hub or ask their buds to try and figure this thing out. Both of which I think are bad ideas. The only way to guarantee good info is to talk to or e-mail Marynelle. She is the one who generates and sends the notice to pay to start your passover. I believe ACPs and everyone else get their info from her.

I would not put SO anywhere on your bid. You are already an SO. They won't take it away from you.

BTW, you will only get passover with newhires junior to you in a better seat in certain circumstances. By starting newhire class between bids you are considered to have been a part of the last bid. Any newhire junior to you going to a higher seat will trigger passover after the one year mark, IF you did not turn down an FO position during indoc.

The reason is you are considered to have bid FO in the last bid (even though you weren't here yet) and it "should" have been offered to you in newhire class if any slots were still available. Giving out all the FO slots early is not optimal. The company wants to space out FO training as FO's go to MD and Airbus school AND encourage you to go to widebody FO instead of 727 FO on the next bid.
This helps the company keep manning semi-normal and will minimize training costs.