Originally Posted by
Sunvox
3 stories that highlight for me the unbelievable gap in pilot and company mentality between L-UAL and L-CAL
Story 1)
L-CAL gate agent comes into the cockpit in EWR on a 767 bound for Europe and says
CSR: "Captain, just so you know, we upgraded an angry premium customer to first class and used the crew rest seat."
UAL Captain: "Well, just so you know this plane isn't moving, until we have our rest seat open."
CSR: "You're serious?"
UAL Captain: "Yes."
CSR then went crying to his boss, but ultimately the passenger was moved, and 3 days later when they returned EWR Chief Pilot said to the Captain (and this is paraphrased):
Chief P: "At Continental we take care of our customers and that's not the way we do things."
L-UAL-Captain: "At United we follow the rules."
IMHO the CP was out of line. Although I have to say, without knowing the date, that implementation status, etc., I can't know what the actual rule was at the time. Further, maybe the EWR CP didn't know the rule from the UAL side-----if so clearly a mistake on his/her part.
Story 2:
This one I was personally involved in. I overheard a L-CAL captain talking on the phone in ops in IAD. The issue was whether or not they needed a 3rd pilot to go IAD to Manchester, England since they had a 3rd pilot for the return leg. Now I may have my facts wrong here and if so I hope some CAL pilots will correct me, but it is my understanding that Section 5-I-6 should now be fully implemented. The L-CAL captain was told by the crew desk that the id had been constructed in February before the rules were in effect so it was legal. The CAL crew flew with only 2 pilots in direct violation of 5-I-6 because the crew desk said it was ok. At a minimum most UAL pilots would have gotten an order to fly, and more likely the majority of L-UAL pilots would have refused the trip until a 3rd pilot was added.
Was it a pairing that carried into March? I'm not going to take the time right now, to go look at the LOAs, but I think that all of the implementation stuff started/starts with a "Bid Month," so a Feb pairing on a carryout is a grey area.
Story 3
The EWR Chief pilot has sent out an email that says in effect "I don't want my pilots to get in the middle of a contract dispute, and this is a blanket order to fly even if you believe the 757 rest seat should have an open seat next to it.
The contract says:
and, the EWR Chief pilot says this means the the adjacent seat shall be the last assigned seat in business-first only.
I agree there are details that need clarification regarding coach passengers not showing up, but if there are 30 unassigned seats in coach and business-first fills up that clearly does not give the company a right to fill the seat next to the rest seat, and I hope to heck CAL pilots are not flying with this situation.
Anyways, I just find the difference in culture to be surprising.
Yeah, I have a problem with this one also. However, on the CAL side, our history has been to fly now, grieve later. Further, we just can't have 12000 pilot interpreting the contract their own way. This is why we pay union dues, so that the individuals in union management can fight/resolve these issues for us.