Originally Posted by
ewr756drive
Just heard from an LCA..."be careful what you wish for".... He said Flt Ops is not telling him to swap seats...they acknowledge that could lead to a problem in the pit. But, he said....don't be surprised if most FO pairings are held back from monthly bidding, reserved for IOE... iRO pairing then become senior (only thing left to bid) and then when IOE is not being conducted the pairing is dumped to OT at last minute.
Games begin....now.
I was wondering what would prevent them from just holding back trips on LCA lines when they run PBS.
Can an FO Pairing not be assigned during PBS build up, AND not be placed in open time when the awards come out?
Then again.. even if they place every LCA's FO Pairing in open time on the 17th, they (the company) has until the 1500 on the 24th to put IOE pilots on them.
[Going to be interesting to see if pairings that are in the bid package HAVE to be assigned, or if the company can withhold a portion of them. In the past, I have seen "Unavailable (Frozen for IOE)" in my bid report... so I know they've done it before. But this senario could open up the can for them holding out a chunk of 764 trips, and also some prime 756 trips]
Seems this is a 756/76T issue (primarily) so it will be interesting to see what the union does next. But didn't really see how this was a "win" for us. A win will be when (if) the FO on the trip who gets bummed out of his seat for IOE either stays home with pay OR ends up as IRO2 and double pay.
Hate to type this, but not holding my breathe for either outcomes. Hope I'm wrong..
Motch
PS> How many 756 newhires are going to be doing IOE each month? If it's at least 10 (conservative number), that's only a small % of 764 trips.. but it's still a chunk.