Originally Posted by
aa73
Eagle fly... The ual contract blows ours out of the water. with the exception of their reserve rules, their contract is superior to ours in just about every area. Check your facts man!
Check with your ual buds and ask them their insurance premiums.
Ask them about their premium pay (200%)
Ask them about double dipping when displaced for training
Ask them about their hotel language
Etc, etc.
Bottom line... ALPA has done a much better job for ual/dal contractually wise. Good management or not - the bottom line is that the company would much rather face a small independent association with very little political pull. That alone is more than enough reason to give alpa a try. Even fedex recognized that and went back to ALPA after their in house union turned out to be a joke. Same with USAPA... Same with APA. Why do you think AA pilots were only allowed to strike for 30 minutes in 1997 when NWA was allowed to strike an entire month one year later. I guarantee you it wasn't because Clinton was buddy buddy with the NWA pilot group.
In the end, you're right that we don't have the leverage and we get easily neutered. Therefore, what better reason to have strength in numbers and be part of a strong union with a lot of political pull! Instead of a small independent association that management laughs at every instance they can. the proof is in the substandard contracts we've had while dal/ual have blown us away consistently.
A united pilot front... and one powerful union representing all legacy airline pilot groups... is management's WORST nightmare. The more we can stack our cards in that favor, the better off this profession will be.
Wow, this all flies in direct opposition to what a couple of pilots I know at UAL say and that is things there aren't good. The company has been effectively stonewalling them and ALPA has been minimally effective and also mired in some internal conflict. I just checked the latest info on the core items like pay and that was dated 11/30/2015 and it shows UAL 737-8 12/ year hourly scale @ $211 and F/O @ 144. 75 hour guarantee, 16% 401(k) and the reserve system there is very bad (a lot of talk over on the UAL thread on how managements offered (AIP)
agreed to by ALPA leaves reserve untouched among other deficiencies). Some of the soft things you mention I don't think in any way propel the UAL contract to the point of "blowing ours out of the water", but perhaps it would be helpful if you could list specifics of items of comparison to see where these supposedly HUGE differences on major core items lie.
I don't see ALPA strong-arming UAL management anywhere or placing them in knee-knocking fear and the pilots I talk to give quite the opposite impression. Just a larger, more expensive version of APA from what I've heard. I DO know for a fact that ALPA has essentially thrown the regional pilots they represent under the bus and especially Envoy and evidenced by Lee Moak's letter to them of a couple of years ago that told them in no uncertain terms to essentially not rock the boat and accept marginal compensation.
It sounds like we live on different planets.