It will never come as to many are not engaged at all. It maybe less than 40 Percent of the pilots even paying attention at this part. Most go to work go home and wait for a VFN to grab to make some extra money. For ALPA to be a real force for change they would need a large Majority to be in favor and if that was the case they should have had enough cards by now. Since they have been silent most likely they do not have the support to push the issue or to have a large majority of the pilots. The shut down may also keep anything from moving forward even if a majority was ready to go.

 

The consensus from everyone I've talked to is that it stalled out once the union's proposal was shown to be very reasonable along with seeing ALPA's failure with over 4 years of FDX negotiations plus multiple years at Frontier. I'm not trying to say alpa is bad but management also has to want to get a fair TA done.

 

The ALPA drive has stalled out, not bc it wasn't collecting cards rapidly, BUT, you are correct my friend. Many have disengaged because they took the bate from GU. To move the goal post and give a "glimpse" of hope with the union's comprehensive proposal. An absolute majority want ALPA but many have now fallen for the "trick", that passing the comprehensive proposal was the union's move to be more "reasonable". Even though some things in the comprehensive proposal are beyond unreasonable, and they continue to die on the the hill of unstacking. Which majority of pilots don't care. Now with the goverment shut down, and negotiations getting major set backs on stalling, the union can claim that they are willing but the company isn't.

It's not over yet, because depending on what the outcome of the elections are, and how GU handles himself, the ALPA drive might pick up again. God only knows what else will shake this place with so many talks of possible mergers in the industry. So buckle up folks, it's about to get interesting.

 

I wouldn’t say a reasonable proposal is “taking the bait.” There are obviously things in the proposal that are unreasonable, that’s the point of negotiations. I am no a GU supporter, but do feel the NC has at least shown effort into making a deal while the company has not. If the company produced any effort then we’d have an agreement already.

unstacking is an interesting topic bc of how great our scheduling currently is. There probably should be some sort of criteria if a base is x amount of pilots then it’s 30/50 and if its x amount then its 50/70, but obviously have no knowledge of what would make sense without looking at numbers. The problem we could run into is if we do 50/70 and then the company grows exponentially (and opens more bases), ultimately screwing over many pilots. Might have to consider a criteria for that as well.

Me personally, I’d prefer to just keep what we have but the company would never go for it due to how inefficient it is

 

I think most pilots would be ok with keeping what is, and just getting the big 4 major items (pay, direct contribution, loss of license and medical, scope). But company does not want CBI bc of its inefficiency. So PBS is what they want, with 50/70% unstacking. Could this be done? I'm sure it can, but there have to be guardrails negotiated and put in place. That's the hurdle to get over. The union saying "We are offering keep CBI/Status-quo" obviously is a no go for the company. We'll see how things progress.

 

exactly, there is price for everything. Whether that be more money, more sick bank accrual, scheduling hr limitations, etc. Seems the current NC doesn’t understand that.

 

You hit the nail on the head. Here's a question that was asked by a pilot to the Presidential candidate of the "Blue Skies Slate", or what I would call the "Not GU 2.0 Slate".

Pilot: "The company is asking for 50% unstacking expandable to 70% (if memory serves). The company has rejected the status quo of CBI. It seems that the mantra of this slate is to not "die on the unstacking Hill". Can you guarantee the pilot group that we will not take concessions on scheduling?"

Presidential Candidate (RJ): "The idea of “not dying on the unstacking hill” doesn’t mean compromise, it means being strategic and realistic. Traditional hub and spoke airlines with multi day pairings typically operate with 15% to 30% unstacking, but Allegiant’s model is very different. Under CBI, we’re effectively at 100% unstacking on the second pass during the solve. Moving to 30% would require the company to hire a large number of additional pilots just to maintain current flying, what’s known as driving heads.
In response, the company’s only viable option would be to increase aircraft utilization with more multi day pairings, which means more overnights and possibly a return of red eye flying. That would fundamentally change the out and back model most of us value. This is taboo to talk about within the union, but it’s the hard truth.
A change of that scale can only come from the pilot group itself, based on clear survey data, not individual opinions or politics. Blue Skies 2025 will protect scheduling, base, and ultimately job security through data and analysis, not emotions or empty rhetoric."

This is the type of information that many don't know or understand because all they've been fed for years is rhetoric, and that what the union is asking is "Industry Standard" therefore it's worth dying on.

 

Someone is going to have to show that math company or the Blue skies group to show that 30% is not possible. PBS in most cases significantly better at efficiency this is why all the other companies wanted it and their pilot groups did not want it as it meant less pilots for the same flying. If 30% and 50% is less that want anyone else has than that seems very reasonable from this pilot group to allow. Especially if it can be proven that even at 30% PBS is much more efficient than current. Any efficiency from CBI would mean it would require less pilots not more pilots for the same flying. If it was not more efficient than CBI then the company would gladly just keep that. The problem is the company does not like or want any restriction on how they schedule the pilots. They do not care what your quality of life is they just want to fly the most flying with the fewest pilots it is up to all of us as pilots to make sure they understand that we expect the same quality of life at a min as those in or trade and craft. They (the Company) needs to be held accountable and they need to start actually proving these claims of that they can not afford or do these industry standard quality of life and pay that is set in almost everyone else contracts.

 

PBS won't be able to do that much of a better job because we don't do multi days pairings.

It hard to schedule efficiently when everyone has to be at home every day.

I think this is the point.

 

Yep. RJ (Blue Skies Slate) was a big fan of 3 leg trips. That’s how they make it work with PBS.