Originally Posted by redeyeAM

I would echo this sentiment (limiting concessions from the labor side of things) from a fundamental perspective. In other words, given management's penchant for changing operations and/or the revenue/business model based on how the tea leaves and chicken bones shake out in the Emerald Palace, I think all labor groups at F9 are at a non-trivial risk of serious QOL disruption due to the constantly changing tides. As such, any position the MEC takes with negotiations should attempt to insulate us from the whims of management and the consequences of their poor decision calculus. ...I would hope that the MEC's starting point is not to surrender anything given the risk that the F9 rudderless ship would abruptly change course and put us in a worse spot than before. I suspect this has been discussed (at least the 1% non-cynical remaining part of my brain hopes...); but then again, I would also wager that it's really hard to create a solid, enforceable contract when operational parameters and variables are all over the place... and will be as we try to deal with an oversupplied domestic market and solutions that involve costume bear paws.

I continue to see the importance of an enforceable contract with teeth... and I reckon that's why management is so reluctant to concede to our points about dispute resolution, examples in the CBA, etc. Case in point... Management is all for letting us drop to 30 in FLICA? Cool. Except that even now scheduling can't keep up with faciliating open time/trade requests in compliance with CBA rules and timelines. So now scheduling is expected to potentially deal with a 40% increase in requests if folks can drop from 50 to 30? Now, I get it... that's an edge case; not everyone in the company drops to 50 and would then drop to 30 if given the opportunity. But hopefully you see the example for what it's worth. I think you could find lots of other scenarios where a lack of investment by the company has either a direct or indirect negative impact on the supposed QOL that the contract affords to us. I hope the negotiators are addressing this in some way that doesn't leave us holding the bag when F9 decides to eliminate contract gate agents and replace them with self-service kiosks and a recreation of the showbiz Rock-a-fire Explosion greeting pax and reminding them to check to see if their hefty garbage sack of clothes fits in the sizer.