Originally Posted by
EskimoJoe
Agreed. I'm prepared for a complete screw job. VX has absolutely nothing to lose in any of this. The Arbitration panel is required to consider the effects of Longevity...how much they weigh that is obviously unknown. It will be interesting to see as the longevity disparity is unprecedented.
One upside for AK is a default fence between the Bus and Boeing. I don't see a whole lot of people wanting to go through 3 months of training to get the same pay. Some will for base reasons but not many. No one asked for any of this, so blaming either pilot group for anything is ridiculous.
Two things here.
First in our SLI 8 years of longevity difference between pilots moved the seniority percentage about 3%. That was with a 35% weighting for longevity. I have no idea of the voodoo math behind the algorithm they used.
Second, there were many UAL pilots who were on reserve on the Airbus, who post-SLI could be in the top 10% of the 737, MANY of them did exactly what you mentioned and switched to the exact same pay category just for seniority.
Also, each pilot group flooded into the other legacy bases. UAL pilots living in TX came into IAH in big numbers. Friends of mine in EWR complained about moving down the 737 Captain list as UAL pilots bid into that base. CAL pilots had no problems filling vacancies in ORD, LAX, DEN, SFO, and IAD because we had pilots living in the area that were commuting previously.
We still have guys that argue over our SLI and that was 4 years ago!