Originally Posted by
Scoop
You bring up some fair points but your argument is based on a never ending GS palooza. There have been years with few GS going out in certain categories and only to the top Pilots in category before, and many of the recent hires have never experienced this. Like I said exploit it while it lasts, but do not plan on any category being woefully short staffed forever.
Scoop
That's a fair thought expirement.
Let's imagine three scenarios. One scenario where no one is flying any premium flying. One where there is a little premium flying. And one where there is a lot of premium flying.
1. If there is no premum flying at all, the company simply won't use GS or SS. Perhaps to your point, nothing is lost by having SS because they're not being used.
2. If there is a just a little premium flying, I think it's likely that he company will lean heavily on SSs to solve the coverage problem in advance, allowing the rest to be covered by long call and short call reserve (eliminating payback days and delays from the auto-accept debacle). If that's the case, it's reasonable to expect the premium flying to be
even more concentrated, with just a few senior pilots picking up anything premium. Theoretically, the #1 guy is still able to fly a whole month of premium before the #2 guys gets a chance at any, provided #1 can drop his trips (not a challenge when coverage is good, TLVs are low, and everyone is picking up straight pay trips).
3. If there is a lot of premium flying, it's as described in my first post.
In any case where there are silver slips, the middle/low seniority pilots are flying less/no premium (even if the top of the list has had multiple premium trips).
In any case where there are silver slips, it's a big win for ultra senior, line-holding, commuting pilots as they now get 200% on (potentially multiple) trips they couldn't have flown on a short-notice greenslip.
All that said...
I'm not a commuter, but I'm happy to see them get more of a chance at the premium flying. My bigger issue is with the lack of a decent leveling mechanism. Seniority should have it's benefits, but the ability for the very top of the list to fly an entire month of premium before someone else gets a bite at it seems a little absurd. And if you ask me, we don't need any more reason for people to camp out as ultra-senior FOs. Just a personal opinion, but there needs to be more incentive to upgrade, not less, to solve this issue of near-new-hires upgrading.
And playing devil's advocate against my own position. Some of the effect of the silver slip concession is probably gained back by having premium flying that contains credit, thus reducing the amount of straight-time flying people pick up to reach the greenslip trigger. I'm not sure how heavily to weight that effect, but it is certainly worth taking into the equation.