Originally Posted by
Herkflyr
I am not sure what your objection is. First, Vacation Any came about because of the Scheduling Optimization Team's recommendation, and specifically it was a very popular feature at pre-merger NW. It was largely due to the PMNW pilots' inputs that we have Vacation Any at all.
Further, do you even understand how it works? Under Vacation Any, you will still have just as many vacation days in your bid month as you do now, and they will STILL count towards your PBS calculation for a full month.
What it DOES do is give more guys a chance at either a better regular line, or a regular line at all. Here is a great example.
A guy has his third (tertiatry) week of vacation in mid-February. He doesn't really care about vacation that month, whether this week or that; that is just where it ended up because he is fairly junior. In fact, he hops back and forth from regular to reserve lines due to his "juniority." Prior to Vacation Any, perhaps his vacation week was posted over the only days where there were still trips remaining in the PBS pot--but because he had vacation then, he gets a reserve line. Again, he doesn't care where his vacation really ends up.
Or....in a similar situation, let's say that there are some really good trips that he would like to fly, but again, his vacation days overlap the days of those trips. Vacation Any would fix both situations. Now PBS can move his vacation anywhere in the month, and even split it up IF NECESSARY (and only if necessary) to get the guy what he wants.
Vacation Any gives pilots more flexibility to get more of what they want, more of the time. How is that bad? I think if you give it a few months you will find that it will be a very very good thing.
That is a very good explanation. It proves my point.
I understand it just fine. Did you even read what you wrote?
Guys "don't really care about February vacation" , "his vacation was on days when there was trips in the pot" , "there's really good trips he would like to fly but his vacation overlaps" , "now PBS can split his vacation to get him what he wants" , "prior to
vacation any he would have got a reserve line" , "he doesn't really care where his vacation ends up" (as long as it doesn't interfere with work).
Don't you understand the consequences of all that? If guys are able to get trips in vacation months that they otherwise could not have, then fewer pilots are needed to run the airline.
Bottom line is simple. With "Vacation Any" there is more flexibility to pack more trips in vacation months. That costs jobs and that is my objection.
Where it came from is irrelevant. I don't care if it comes from NWA or Starfleet Academy. If it came from PMNW pilot input then we have them to thank for killing those jobs.
If it was up to me we'd go back to the "touching trips" system.
We are our own worst enemies. Our union leaders should be explaining that concept to the rank and file instead of enabling these 100 hour months with their PBS "improvements".