That is the first I've heard of this. Not accusing you of anything, just curious where you "heard" this....straight from his mouth, an ALPA communication, from the guy sitting next to you, a JS, a bich board, urban myth?

I know years and years ago the Sched Comm (project pilots looking for managements approval/promotion) stated that a min day in the optimizer screwed up the commutability of the pairings. That was back when some of the pairings were commutable. Is it possible that myth is still floating around?

BTW there are ways to contractually allow for flexibility to allow both commutability and a min day. One way would be a "cut out". If a pairing started after a certain time and ended before a certain time (i.e 3 day to SDQ) then it might be subject to a different pay scheme. For example if the min day was 5.5 hours then a 3 day "Super Commute" pairing could have a flat and/or min rate of 13 or 14 hours if it complied with the start/end time provisions.