Originally Posted by
bidnez
Every regional out there is 'whipsawing' each other. Remember, we are regional guys here- there will ALWAYS be a lowest bidder. Why not express your disdain toward the TSA pilot group as well- since anyone accepting employment there has accepted one of the worst contracts in the business, further dragging the industry to its bottom.
Look at Transstates historical record- they win flying because they are the low cost carrier. Anyone's glib expectations of changing that is a fool.
Everything you said is true but I think what most of us are trying to point out is that both TSA and GoJet are now going to face internal whipsaw against each other along with the usual external whipsaw. That will certainly worsen both of their abilities to negotiate better contracts than if they were under one list. That should terrify all of us since they have 50 96 seaters coming with options for 50 more.
The question now is how much lower can both of their bidding go because of this added internal whipsaw?
It was a bad situation made worse and it didn't have to happen. They all shot themselves in the foot and they don't even realize it yet. They allowed Hulas to walk away from the table.
Would TSA have gotten an Industry leading contract for the CR7s? Who knows but it would certainly be better than the current GoJet one and they would now be in a better negotiating position if the second list hadn't been created. For those who think the past is in the past think again. Every day that second list grows provides Hulas with more and more power to whipsaw both groups. Sure they can integrate but it will cost them a lot to get something they could have had for free in 2005. Moving forward it will just get more and more difficult to integrate as that second list grows. If they don't integrate both groups will always be in a weaker positions to negotiate better contracts and thus they will always be stuck at the very bottom. I don't think anyone wants to see pilot groups handicapped like that.