Taylorjets- I'm not attacking you, but you said something interesting. You said we need to know the facts before we vote. The "PREPARE" stuff was supposed to whip us into a frenzy. They stopped putting it out, so I don't know the whole C9, but I think it was even worse than what I read about it.
The main things in my mind are the facts that the company wants to basically make this an at will job. Even eliminating non economic stuff like the HIMS program and PRO STANS, will make this a job where if the company doesn't like you they can get rid of you without any reason. It will make this not a place I want to work, economy or no economy. Even the senior guys (you know the golden 50) now realize that they are vulnerable to this kind of wholesale destruction and many of them are now rethinking their positions.
To me the facts are
-the company arbitrarily changed the wheel roll (the way we get paid)
-tried to take away 4 days off
-stalls at every negotiating meeting with either no proposal or something rediculous
-was told by the mediator to "get off the BS" because of their tactics
-Tried to make us pay for our own hotels during training
-the C9 proposal is not the basis for an agreement (I beleive that is bad faith)
we'll see about that one
-capt upgrades based on "who's in the club"
-seniority based on who will ***** themselves out more
-last year NOI's went out to legitimate sick calls
etc, etc
My point is the company has shown to me how the they see and treat its pilot group
with a contract, I would hate to see how they would treat everyone without a contract. Our mgmt is nothing like Jet BLue. And you better believe that when a captain hits a certain seniority pay amount, they will be targeted with termination to "keep expenses low". This is what the senior guys are starting to realize. A strike vote is the only weapon we have to end this gravy train that mgmt is riding.
At my last job, we were in the same situation, and when the 30 days came and went, we did nothing. Didn't strike, and the company was so nervous about the airplanes being left at outstations, that they grounded the fleet for 72 hrs and we got almost everything we asked for. They lost almost as much in revenue as we were asking for.
Just the threat of a strike to a company is hard on ticket sales, and that would be significant pressure on one with fares as low as ours.
Just one more thing, and I don't mean to pick on you, that is not my intent, but you said we're "only" 2 years past our amendable date. Quoting a famous TV doctor who rhymes with DR. Shmil, you teach people how to treat you. Letting them think that it's ok to drag this on, we are enabling (emboldening)them to do just that. They will not up their costs until they are forced to.
Again, I am not attacking you, just getting some lively debate going.
