Originally Posted by
bored
The point of an airline having reserves is just that... for reserve. If the airline is operating efficiently, reserves are rarely used. You can't expect to fly your butt off on reserve, it's simply not possible. So using the argument that "guys are sitting around without flying" for TOWOP is misguided. They're sitting around because the airline is running well.
There is a mis aligned staffing situation. We don't have enough 900 guys in MEM and too many up north. Maybe planning is going to create more bridge flying for the northern bases to get to MEM to relive those bases and give them some reserves. Realigning however, will cause major issues and cost money.
Stop complaining! This is how it's supposed to be. Enjoy the paid time off this summer! IF you were flying your butts off on reserve, there are bigger problems and you'd be complaining about that too.
OK... i see your point Bored, but you have to look at it from our perspective. Its not only about not working, and therefore not flying, its about much more than that. For one we all know how much first year pay, and FO pay in general sucks... now I figured out one day that if you average 10 hours above guarantee and 4 trips of 80 hours away from base on first year pay that equates to about another $10,000 a year. Thats a huge difference. Becuase I've been sitting at guarantee, not flying, since I got hired a year ago I've had to work another job on my measly "11 days off" just to make ends meet. Something I wouldn't have to do if I held a line. So while you see it as me sitting at home having the days off I see it as being chained to my apartment unable to do stuff were i wouldn't be able to make it back to the airport in an hour and a half (I will spare you the full list, but theres a lot of things I can't do) -- and I won't even get into ready reserve. Then on the days I do have "off" I don't get to do those things, or use my flight benefits for that matter because I have a second job just so I can pay my bills on time every month.
Secondly you have to remember that a lot of us got hired with fairly low time, now without getting into a discussion about the merits of that, I have only flown about 300 hours worth in the full year I have been here. So for us that means if there is furlough or something happens were I or any of my cohorts are no longer working at Mesaba (god forbid) we really don't have the hours to be marketable anywhere else. While you may say that a furlough is never going to happen, being in the bottom 150 while that number is being kicked around as the "we are over staffed by" number is a serious stress factor. Especially now even if hiring does resume the market is flooded with many people that have many more hours than many of us low on the totem pole here at Mesaba. I would presume that I would even have a tough time finding a flight instructing job right now, because even though I think I'm a decent instructor there are many candidates out there who just have a ton more hours than I do. So while the not flying sucks, the fact that it may actually affect our future careers if those should not be at Mesaba sucks even more.
On a side note, there are many of us who are CRJ-200 drivers on the FO side and are still on reserve, where there are CRJ-900 and Saab FO's that had a start date of well after us (As much as 9 months) that are now holding lines, while were still battling minimum guarantee pay every month on reserve. And while I realize that there have been many injustices done to people that are now more senior at Mesaba that are much graver than this and that those months of seniority will come to our benefit later in our careers... it is a little bit of a kick in the balls for some of us.
So, while you are correct in saying that an airline that is running efficiently should not be using their reserves constantly, please take a moment to understand our side of things, and please stop telling me to "enjoy the time off."