Originally Posted by
sailingfun
I am surprised at some of the things posted here because they don't match the facts. SWA made their opening offer. It included seat and pay protection for the FAPA pilots. Seat protection was for 2 years in Denver. There were no plans to furlough FAPA pilots and no pilot at SWA has ever been furloughed. There could have been furloughs but with the yields trending back up now that is not likely as SWA will probably swing back to a expansion mode soon. They are far more likely to expand then any other airline.
I would put the chances of a furlough far more likely with RAH then with SWA. In addition the chance of a complete liquidation is an order of magnitude great at RAH over the next 10 years then SWA.
No negotiations actually happened once the initial positions were put out between SWA and FAPA. Its likely there would have been some movement on the SWA side had negotiations occurred. I am surprised that FAPA did not at least show up with their merger team and try and accomplish something even though the time line was very short. The chances that career earnings and quality of life at RAH would exceed that at SWA is virtually nil.
All i know is SWAPA wouldn't budge from a staple and we walked. You may be right when you say SWAPA offered 2 year seat and base protection. I don't recall because it isn't important now. I do know SWAPA offered pay protection however. As far as furloughs well that's debatable. The fact is SWA is already overstaffed. Maybe you have never furloughed but you would've most likely had to in this situation. We ran the numbers and it was around half of our pilot group.
I just think the original post is silly. To say FAPA sold us up the river is completely false. They did the best thing for our pilot group. SWAPA did the best for theirs. It went down the way it had to.