PBS fixes nothing if the trips are still constructed in a detrimental non-commuting kinda way (early start, late finish) which is still now a majority.

If you are reasonably senior (top 60 or so %) you will be able to at least pick your days off for the most part which is a highlight.

That fixes a big something in my case. I’ll reluctantly trade crap pairings for being able get the days off I need. There are 3000 different sets of priorities out there. Be careful with the blanket statements. I trust our negotiators are doing their level best to look out for our cumulative interests.

Outside of holidays, almost 100% of non-reserve pilots can pick THEIR days OFF under PBS. And I mean that in the sense that from month to month, it's much easier than line bidding to get your target off days, as needed.

Obviously, getting weekends OFF will be difficult below a certain seniority, but it won't be impossible, especially if you're willing to settle for the weekday trash pairings.

Reserve doesn’t bid any differently than line holders. The company will publish “open flying” lines (uncovered lines after line bidding finishes) and the reserve lines at the same time. Look for the reserve line that suits your time slot/days off and then bid accordingly.

You are able to swap reserve days around to create a block of more days off, depending on reserve coverage. It’s been a little while since I’ve been on reserve, but I usually had limited success with swapping my days. Not sure how it is currently.

Not sure what you meant with your other question? Flexible in what way?

The latest reserve schedules, in SEA, show 55 choices of reserve lines, 11 of those being long call lines. Each one has different days off/on combinations with the most of each being 5 days in a row. Each one also has a period of only 2 days off in a row.

Hope this information helps. Welcome aboard!

Sorry for being snarky in my other post, I just meant that there are plenty of rumors in aviation and they’re not always accurate. There is a good chance we will switch to a PBS system, it’s something that is being negotiated.

Plan for what we have currently though.. it’s a line big system that then has two trading windows where you can attempt to trade trips in a seniority system. It’s not really reliable as a super junior person, and most the time any day you would want to trade into will be closed, unless you’re just trying to get a random weekday day off.

Then is the open flying lines and reserve bidding. Open flying lines are made up of extra pairings and trips that drop for conflict and vacation. Reserve lines have “12 days off” each month, although they’re not calendar days, they’re blocks of time (48 hours, etc). You can try and move days around to have 6 reserve days in a row.

Welcome aboard!

Thanks, and no worries. What’s an airline without some good rumors. What I meant about scheduling and being flexible is probably not what is used at AS. One of my previous employers had a couple of people in the scheduling office that would work with you one-on-one if you needed a day moved around here or there. Line bidding is completely new to me. It looks simple enough, but not much flexibility to get the specific trips you want based on how you need your month to look when it comes to time off.

If I understand it, a junior person, such as myself will be, only looks at the reserve bid lines and picks one and hopefully that’s the one you get. If you don’t get the one you want, what happens then? Do you just get assigned one and if it sucks, it sucks?

As mentioned above, you ‘might’ be able to move some of the reserve days around. It all depends on reserve coverage, etc. i’ve had pretty good luck moving a few reserve days around, to get the days off I need.

You can’t drop reserve days though, it’s still just 12 days off no matter what, and you still need to comply with min rest between reserve blocks, so no more than 6 in a row on short call.

Schedulers won’t do that for you here. Your best bet if you need time off is to contact your BCP. I’ve had some family/health stuff pop up a few times and every time they’ve been very helpful and accommodating. It’s also worth mentioning that a reserve day is only valued at 2.8hrs. Just saying….

You don't just bid one line, you bid as many as you need to cover your seniority in descending order of want. IE, if your seniority number (in base) is #250 then you need to bid at least 250 lines. If you know you are going to be bidding a reserve line then you just need to figure out how far down the reserve list you will be. IE, if you will be the 25th reserve holder for that month then you'll need to bid 25 reserve lines to cover your position. I've never bid reserve for this airline but I'm pretty sure that's how it works. If not someone will be alone to straighten me out.

That is exactly how our seniority based line bidding works. Seniority 1 in base. Bid 1 line. Seniority last. Bid all lines. SEA is the only base of size. All the others are small so sorting through the lines is simple. We are passed the retirement surge here so movement will stabilize and seniority will stabilize. Reserve and OF(Open Flying) pilots are put on a list after line bidding closes. That list is made up of all the junior pilots in their seat in their base, and all the pilots who opted to cherry pick the regular lines and came up short. The second round of line bidding called Open Flying is built out of everything dumped in line bidding. Reserve line bidding occurs at the same time. All seniority based.