- Be prepared to and expect them to make a class for you. The class most likely will start the first possible date following your reemployment date. You will in fact receive an email which aircraft you can train into, and a request to inform them what you want. That email will include training dates to help your decision. I would update your standing bid.
Trust but verify! If the email doesn't reflect what you think you could have held on a bid while you were gone, you have grounds to get that fixed. For the 757, you will have no issues though.
- The B Fund contribution is paid out exactly how written above. They will in fact do a one year look back (12 Months) before you went on LTMLA and use that to base your contribution. That look back will be based solely on the number of hours paid out that 12 months, but will not include anytime you were on MLA that year. I am not sure how legal/correct that is, as my understanding B Fund would be based on what you could have earned, so 844 hours a year (Except when the company implemented 4A2B). Numerous attempts to clarify that with our Union Military Rep were not returned.
USERRA permits two types of calculations to determine what you should consider your income. If you were salaried, it's simple and it is what it is. For us, we can bid different amounts of hours (and, thus our compensation is variable) and USERRA permits the company to do a look back. They should use the 12 months prior as your sample. But, if you took two months of military leave during that 12 months, the company doesn't get to use 10 months of pay as your average. This could be important to you since your multiplier (7 years) is high. USERRA says you can never be harmed by your service. For anyone who lost out when/if the company didn't impute military leave in that 12 months look-back, the company did it wrong. [I never experienced help from the union and had to do all of my MLA "fights" on my own.] Contact crew pay data or Vanguard, get your 12 month average that is used, compare it to your own figures and contact Capt Sam Wright as I listed previously and he'll provide you absolutely fantastic information and help.
- Sick accrual is also given by the company to returning pilots coming off LTMLA. As described, they look at how much sick you used the 12 months before you went on LTMLA. The less you used, the more you receive... and in your case X 7. If you used 72 hours of sick the 12 months before going on LTMLA, you will receive nothing. If you used no sick the 12 months preceding LTMLA, you will receive 72 x 7. I'd watch this like a hawk and ensure it gets in your account. Someone's sick usage does not matter when calculating the next year's accrual per the CBA, but for some reason does when calculating it for returning from LTMLA. Clarification requests to our Union Military Rep and Enforcement were never returned, but this method of calculating sick is not complaint with the CBA.
While I'm not a lawyer, I did a LOT of research on USERRA and have read every law review article on Law Review Index it's great information. From Law Review 59 "Q: Do I continue accruing vacation days while I am away from my civilian job performing service in the uniformed services? A: Probably not, because vacation days do not qualify as “perquisites of seniority.” The pertinent USERRA provision is as follows: “A person who is re-employed under this chapter is entitled to the seniority and other rights and benefits determined by seniority that the person had on the date of commencement of service in the uniformed services plus the additional seniority and rights and benefits that such person would have attained if the person had remained continuously employed.” [38 U.S.C. 4316(a).] This provision codifies the “escalator principle” first enunciated by the Supreme Court in its first case under the Veterans’ Reemployment Rights (VRR) law, which was replaced by USERRA in 1994. The Supreme Court held, “[The returning veteran] does not step back on the seniority escalator at the point he stepped off. He steps back on at the precise point he would have occupied had he kept his position continuously during [his military service].” Fishgold v. Sullivan Drydock & Repair Corp., 328 U.S. 275, 284-85 (1946).
The escalator principle applies to perquisites of seniority. A two-part test determines whether a particular benefit qualifies as a perquisite of seniority: (a) The benefit must be intended to be a reward for length of service, not a form of short-term compensation; and (b) It must be reasonably certain that the veteran would have attained the benefit if he or she had remained continuously employed. A vacation day is deemed to be a form of short-term compensation, not a reward for length of service. Thus, the escalator principle does not entitle the returning veteran to the vacation days that he or she would have earned if continuously employed. See Foster v. Dravo Corp., 420 U.S. 92 (1975).
On the other hand, you can claim the accrual of vacation days under USERRA’s “furlough or leave of absence” clause, if and to the extent that employees on some form of non-military leave of absence continue accruing vacation days. [See Law Reviews 41 and 58.]"
RSA is similar to vacation days as not counting as perquisites of seniority, but at FedEx RSA accrual is unique in that our overage of RSA over 686 goes to your pension. That fact is what makes FedEx "pay" us RSA for the time we were gone--it's because it's pension related. We should never give up this overage clause in our contract because then we don't have Federal Law to stand on to get our DSA bumped up when we return. Now that we've established that FedEx must "pay" us RSA, there are two ways to calculate it...just like pay for pension purposes. Since all pilots don't have a firm amount they use each year, FedEx is allowed (per my investigation) to use the same type of look back as they do for pay. That's why there's a bit of luck involved here. If you didn't get sick and didn't use any RSA the 12 months prior, you'll get a big bump being gone 7 years. If you used a lot, you lose out...not very fair, but I couldn't find any way around it during my research.
- 401K Contribution Make-up. (First I heard of that and wish I would have known that)
Remember you have 3 times the amount of time you were gone (not to exceed 5 years) to make up 401(k) (not to exceed annual maximums if you contributed to TSP)...this goes for anyone coming back from MLA. So, don't pass up the "free" $500 each year if you still have this available and are reading this note! Contact Vanguard, as I said before, they got it right and are easy to work with.
- The contract signing bonus paid out during your absence was not returned to me after fighting it. Attempts to contact our Union Military Rep for backup to this fight were not returned. The company would not return it, but I hope you have different results.
As far as my research shows, this should have been paid and I know it wasn't. From the previous Law Review I quoted: A two-part test determines whether a particular benefit qualifies as a perquisite of seniority: (a) The benefit must be intended to be a reward for length of service, not a form of short-term compensation; and (b) It must be reasonably certain that the veteran would have attained the benefit if he or she had remained continuously employed. I believe (b) is absolutely correct for anyone on MLA so we have to look to part (a) of the test. If you believe "The benefit must be intended to be a reward for length of service" then you should get it, but if it's a "form of short-term compensation" like vacation or RSA, then you shouldn't. I have never asked Capt Wright this question...any of you like to present him the facts and get back to us on this?
Good luck and welcome back!