Originally Posted by
notEnuf
APD and IVD perhaps but APD is unpaid and IVD is essentially unpaid because you are just shorting yourself later. If your intent is to drop to adjust your schedule these tools are a waste. Both APD and IVD days can't be used to pick up so you have to be stategic with using a single APD day which makes the other 3 APD days useless. IVD days are paid at vacation day value making them worth less than a trip of equal length and you lose pay and time off during your real vacation.
I am going to agree with Sailing here. First off our vacation “value” as paid days off sucks and is industry lagging. I am talking accrual times hours per day. Most airlines have a higher value than us.
OTOH our vacation “flexibility” is awesome. IVDs are not unpaid you are just moving your vacation forward, ie flexibility. APDs are in fact unpaid, but if you want off in the summer they are awesome. The only downside is that I miss the summer GS “feeding frenzy” which is why I think some guys skip summer vacations.
Last summer I was about 80%, this summer about 65%. I was able to hold over 30 straight days off both summers, the last half of July and first half of August. I am not even discussing PB days since most guys don’t have them, but wow if you have a few PB days the sky is the limit.
Like I said our vacation “value” blows in my opinion and we need to improve it, perhaps a higher per day value and a return of paid APDs. On the other hand the ability to work your schedule for days off is awesome. Yes you have to plan ahead and need it lined up by the 20th. The plugs IVDs will drop before #1s APD drops, the plugs APD will drop before #1s PD drops etc.
Granted you only have 1 of each but it works pretty good for the busy summer time and if you wait until after PCS runs start it might not work as well but I am typing this in the middle of 30 plus days off.
Scoop