That is not accurate. This is really how the whole 5-day trip concept has played out re the merger.

- pre-merger, there was no such thing as a 5-day domestic trip on the DAL-S side--most guys would have shunned the idea
- NWA had them, and due to their higher percentage of commuters, they were mostly favorably received

- POST merger we had to figure out, "what about five day trips?" For awhile we had the somewhat silly approach of, if the category was uniquely PMNW (A320) then it would contain five-day trips, and if it was uniquely PMDL (737) then it would not. It MAY have also applied even by base, but to be honest, I cannot remember.

At some point however, we needed to make a decision that applied airline wide. "Are we one airline, or are we not?" essentially.

- So the decision was made to approve 5-days system-wide, with the understanding that the company would attempt to limit them to 10% of the trips in the bid package--fair enough.

- The problem is that the company has run roughshod over that reasonable perspective. My first captain's gig was ATL 717A. I loved the airplane and the crews--but I surely didn't love a bid package that one month was 93% 4-5 day trips, and contained more 5-days than 1,2,and 3-day trips combined!

- There has been (and continues to be) negative feedback to that. A couple of months ago, crew resources eliminated all 5-days from the 320 bid packages. ALPA didn't ask for that--just a reduction in the numbers. Now of course the company is back to the other extreme, as detailed. 26% of the ATL 320 trips for Oct are 5-days. That's not "reasonable."

At no time am I aware of an airline-wide decision to remove all 5-day trips from every domestic category since the merger. PMDL fleets, yes. However I am not sure that the PMNW fleets (320, -9) ever had zero 5-days. I could be wrong.