Originally Posted by FangsF15

Some folks weren't here for past contracts, and may not understand the special place Pilot Sick has in the heart of the company. They HATE it. With a passion. (At least in part, because we have pilots who abuse it. To what degree is beyond the point). IMO, the company over-reacts to that 'abuse', but the point is the company has an absolute burr up their backside over sick.

It was one of their major gatekeeper issues in C15. At the time, we had voluntary verification of sick (but foolishly gave that back in C19 because somehow self-reporting/documenting was too onerous on their admin folks). C15 required a MD note after 160 hours, but also had a provision where the company could always mandate an MD note. We are the only major carrier (I am aware of) who has GFB in their contract, much less an over-30-day medical records disclosure clause. C15 also tightened up the language on mandating a "bonafide relationship", where your spouse/parent/cousin could no longer write your sick note. It also had exclusion from lookback for 'major bone' or a hospital stay, but not a knee replacement. It was silly. I mean, what valid reason can one give to say that a PA or NP couldn't verify your sickness in some instances? How cynical do you have to be to say, "No, you MUST go to an MD!? C19 did slightly expand the threshold for 'lookback' from 100 hours to 120 hours. All that said, we do have a much larger annual allocation than other companies. We have all these little nuance rules and exclusions, all because the company hates sick and wants to create disincentives to using it.

My point is that for the company to transition from disputing whether MiCrew 'worked' for sick reporting, to now agreeing to waive sick verification is a BIG deal. That's like Seinfeld's Soup Nazi suddenly not caring how you ordered the soup. Or, like the pilot group suddenly saying "we'll waive PB days for the next couple of months". That in and of itself tells me we had some serious leverage/proof hanging over them, and giving that up should not be dismissed as a small thing - not because of how it's good for us, but for how important it was to the company.