you wouldn’t have to explain a thing to the Cpo. Garry Kravit and the jumpseat committee have codified the strongest language in the industry wrt the Captain’s autonomy in administering the jumpseat as he sees fit. Yes, there is a jumpseat priority list in the FOM, but a Captain can modify it if he chooses to (must rides such as FAA excepted). Shortly after the merger, CAL scabs ran to CPO’s around the system whining about being denied jumpseats. The outcome? Too bad for the scabs, it’s the Captain’s jumpseat.

Having said that, our seniority based system can be challenging for junior commuters. I suppose there isn’t a perfect system anywhere, but I’m glad our system follows the same philosophy as the rest of the career, which is “seniority is king”