Originally Posted by
ManFlex
Off the top of my head:
Delta has trip averaging, like we do (5:15 for them, 4:30 for us).
We can only work 6 calendar days in a row. Ask a Delta pilot about 'unstacking'.
We have better health care available to us than both Delta and American Airlines pilots. (Not familiar with UA)
And what's 'the double edged sword' regarding four days off between work blocks? I'm not familiar.
Look, I'm not trying to be argumentative and I've stated plainly we have some obvious work to do. Many of your criticisms are valid especially regarding pay rates, LTD and retirement. From some of these comments though, I'm left to conclude you and some others on here are ignorant of many sections of other carriers' contracts.
Originally Posted by
WelcomeToBen
"Unstacking?" Please explain. Double edged sword with the 4 days off is that it results in the majority of our lines being 6 days on, 4 days off, 6 days on, 4 days off and so on. If you're junior and want weekends off, you'll get two weekends off. If you're senior and want weekends off, you'll get two weekends off. Not saying that I don't see the benefit to the 4 days off (I am a commuter), I just feel that a higher daily min and higher monthly min day off may negate the necessity of the 4 day off min. I know this is sacrilegious around these parts so it's not really worth my time getting into. My point is that it's a great work rule, but let's put it in perspective.
Trip averaging may work, if paired with a higher daily min credit like DAL but with our current 4:30 per day it results in pretty inefficient trips.
I think we're pretty much on the same page. I just get concerned when I talk with guys on the line and they think that the only thing we need to fix is our pay rates.
Unstacking is a sorta-downside of PBS. I'll try, in a nutshell:
Since you are building your own lines out of the trips in the pot, everyone is going to request Christmas (or any big holiday/event off). PBS will comply. Problem is you're going to end up with a ton of open trips over said holiday. More than the reserves can cover. So PBS will, in reverse seniority order, "unstack" enough of those open trips and rework the junior lineholders schedules until the open time over those holidays are manageable. Thereby having those guys work over the holiday when they otherwise could have held it off.
Sounds really bad, but if you think about it, under line bidding, the company would've built the lines to not have that many open trips over said holiday to begin with, so it's really a wash.