Another way to say it is that, by not focusing enough attention on Reserve, we've made it so that an upgrade to a different category, on Resrve, is not an option. We've allowed/endured the creation of a bunch of little minefields we have to skirt as we try to move up.
Hope it makes sense.[/quote]
I understand what your saying but I don't think you understand the history of reserve at Delta. The reserve system at Delta is light years better then when I was a new hire. It used to be a very simple system. 19 days on call and 2 hours to report all the time. It has been improved in every contract until LOA46 to the point where reserve usage was very low and pilots could easily commute on reserve. Commuting on reserve was not a option when I was hired. You moved to your first base period. Reserve got better in each successive contract but still comutting was simply not a option under the windows system. Only with the evolution of the long call short call options and the whitlow ruling did you see large scale commuting on reserve. The current system is not as good as what we go in the 01 contract but it is much better then every contract before that.
Every aspect of our contract degraded under the LOA 46 and bankruptcy. Pay was cut 42 percent as a starter. To say reserve has been neglected is simply not true. I think in fact you could make a case since 1980 reserve has improved more then any other aspect of our contract. Yes it took a big hit in bankruptcy but so did virtually ever aspect of our contract.