Notices

APA PHX Scores AGAIN!

Old 04-02-2015, 03:11 AM
  #1  
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Default APA PHX Scores AGAIN!

APA PHX Domicile Update: March 31, 2015

Orderly Access to Union Services


There is little doubt the transition to representation under APA has had its challenges, and we appreciate your patience as we continue working together to figure it all out. The structures of ALPA and USAPA differ in many ways from APA. This isn't necessarily bad, but it has led to confusion as to how to get timely help from your reps or others within APA. We are doing our best, but with only two of us (who regularly fly the line), it is often a challenge to ensure your needs are met. Fortunately, APA has expanded a few committees in an effort to better and more quickly serve our pilots.

We have recently had a handful of instances when a pilot needed help and called both reps, the negotiating committee, contract administration, the contract compliance committee, the company's benefits department and the chief pilot’s office almost simultaneously and without advising anybody that assistance had been sought from others as well. Only after everyone spent considerable effort researching the issue did it come to our attention (largely by chance) that many people were working on the exact same issues for the exact same pilot. This, of course, results in a tremendous duplication of effort on the part of the union volunteers as well as union and company employees. Although this obviously isn't the intent of any pilot, it is the net result when someone gets impatient and employs the “shotgun approach” to resolve an issue. Employing this approach is certainly understandable because knowing where to turn hasn't been clear, but we are working to correct this and ask you to abide by the following procedure until further notice. We will also try to have this guidance placed on our PHX APA Web page within the next week:

Email is the preferred method of contacting the association for these purposes if time and technology permit.

Please “reply all” (rather than only to the individual responding to you) during any email conversations. This helps keep everyone on the same page and allows us to see if trends are developing about any particular issue.

If the issue is not an emergency and/or involves implementation of the JCBA:

1. Send your question or a description of the issue via email to all of the following email addresses:
▪ [deleted]
2. Allow 24 to 48 hours for a response.
3. If no response within 48 hours, call one of your reps at 256-457-0801 (John), or 817-437-6929 (Eric), and we'll check the status of your inquiry. Please leave a detailed message if no answer.

If the issue is time-critical:

1. Contact the PHX chief pilot's office first at 480-693-5305 and attempt to resolve the problem. A complete listing of all Chief Pilot Offices and numbers throughout the company can be foundhere.

2. If your issue is not immediately resolved, call APA Contract Administration at 800-323-1470 and press 3. If Contract Administration is unable to help with your issue because it is unique to PHX, they will forward your call to one of the reps, or to Jeff Koontz who assists us in many contractual areas.

3. If Contract Administration forwarded your call and you get one of our voice mails, please leave a detailed message (including information about anyone else you have discussed the issue with). It is often more expeditious for us to screen your message and enlist the help of others before returning your call.

4. If no response within 15-30 minutes, please call or text us directly at 256-457-0801 (John), or 817-437-6929 (Eric). Technology permitting, please text us both concurrently. Be advised that we are occasionally in the air at the same time.

When using the above processes, please exercise patience, professionalism and courtesy in all of your interactions with others. Remember that everyone is either a fellow AA employee or an APA employee, regardless of whether you are interacting with a company representative or a union volunteer. Nobody responds well to someone who is rude or overly demanding. That would be the fastest way to a slow response. Try not to act as if something is an emergency if it is not. We believe quality and accuracy are more important than speed, so don't expect an instantaneous response in most cases. Email is usually the preferred method, and it may take a few days to get a correct and final answer, especially if the situation is non-routine.


Implementation Delay of Single SLI Due to “IT” Issues

At the last BPR meeting, we learned the company, as of now, doesn’t plan to implement the single integrated seniority list until it has a single pilot database ready after the summer of 2016. Fall of 2016 is now the projected implementation date, which lags the original projections by about a year. This is alarming because predictions such as these are rarely accelerated and often extended. Needless to say, we find this wholly unacceptable and suspicious. We cannot understand how the company, at the onset of the merger, was so eager to get a single integrated seniority list and finally realize the synergies of a combined airline that it offered the union a $4 million reward to produce an integrated list before Dec. 9, 2015. This was one of the reasons PHX, with near unanimity, voted to ensure its passage and supported the MOU and the AA merger in the first place — to complete the deal quickly, rather than drag it out for over a decade, like the AWA–US Airways merger that still hasn’t concluded.

This decade-long delay wouldn’t be such an issue if the Phoenix base had been allowed to share in the gains of these mergers, but the company seems hell-bent on keeping PHX on the island that USAPA created. Management's announced plans will prolong this unfair situation that deprives PHX pilots of opportunities found everywhere else throughout the system by turning a blind eye toward the obvious, and remaining deaf to our many complaints while continuing to reward behavior that is detrimental to the company as a whole. To our knowledge, management still has no plans to bring new pilots or equipment to PHX in the interim, so we should expect things to only get worse in PHX (and for longer) before anything improves.

It should be no surprise that the company uses the easy excuse of “IT issues” to explain these delays. Debacle after debacle now has many AA pilots waking to the reality that the management team they insisted run “New American” isn't nearly as capable as they were led to believe. But other than inconvenience, they have little reason to complain or demand a swift integration. Would you insist on a speedy integration with an unknown seniority list while enjoying the highest pay and most rapid advancement your career has experienced in the last decade? You wouldn't, especially if you were a pilot or rep from any other former US Airways base who expressly sought (by resolution, even) “permanently separate operations with pay parity” because you are getting that and so much more. How long before many of these same people again try to block this integration even as this very management team never ceased rewarding that obstructionism? As a result of these ongoing separate operations, the Phoenix pilots and their families have lost, and will continue to lose, millions of dollars in salary, benefits and quality of life. We are telling management here and now: No more excuses. You must finish this integration, on schedule, and before the opportunity passes. End the injustices suffered by our pilots as a result of management practices and the actions of the former bargaining agent over the last decade.

We've already gone on record strenuously objecting to any implementation delays with the BOD, the negotiating committee and the contract compliance committee and we have strongly encouraged APA to avoid agreeing (even tacitly) to any additional delays. Company-wide opportunities are what mainly induced PHX pilots to support the MOU in the first place, and we'll be damned to let those opportunities elude us one day more than necessary. More ominous is that fact that the protections outlined in the MOU (now found in MTA “Supplement D” and attached to this email) will end around or well before fall of 2016 based on the company's likely interpretation of that language, which states:

The protections in Paragraphs 1 through 15 below begin on December 9, 2013 and last until the earlier of eighteen (18) months after US Airways, Inc. (“US Airways”) and American Airlines, Inc. (“American Airlines” or “American”) obtain a single operating certificate, or the date on which the joint collective bargaining agreement (“JCBA”) contemplated by the parties’ Memorandum Of Understanding Regarding Contingent Collective Bargaining Agreement (“MOU”) and an integrated seniority list are in effect.

Remember that this is largely the same management team that wantonly violated the block-hour minimums (as affirmed by the TA-10 arbitration award) specified in the AWA/US Airways “Transition Agreement.” Eighteen months after the single operating certificate (which will happen just over one week from now) will be early October 2016. But these protections may sunset on an earlier date when the JCBA (already done) and “an integrated seniority list are in effect.” Does “in effect” mean the same as “fully implemented?” We're not certain, but take a look at those Supplement D protections, and we think you’ll agree the company wants to terminate them as soon as possible. Once that happens, the majority of synergies will be realized whether or not our pilot groups are fully combined. When our pilots become exposed without these protections, the only defense against management attempting to whipsaw three groups against one another will be total integration.

Our message to the company is simple: Try harder. Do what you agreed to doand stop punishing PHX for abiding by every agreement we've made even when others would not. Enough is enough. Find an interim fix if you must, but do not continue to deprive the former AWA pilots of opportunities available to every other pilot at the company (including many new hires).

We are highly trained and adaptable people: Learning a new bidding and/or crew system would be no problem for any of our AA pilots. If the company must use three different crew tracking systems in the interim by adding and removing pilots according to the domicile awarded, then it certainly can do so. It does this now with new hires and returning pilots, so the only remaining excuse is company convenience. In fact, we have former West pilots flying out of the CLT, PHL and DCA domiciles. There is simply no reason to allow this professional isolation to continue. Waiting until it’s convenient for the company is simply not acceptable, and if it insists on delay, failing to provide equal opportunities for our PHX constituents in the meantime would be the height of injustice.


Employee Parking and the East Economy Discount

According to one of our pilots who has chosen to pay the additional fee ($7 per day) to stay in the East Economy garage, the parking company appears to have made parking there an extremely difficult process. Upon departing, employees now have to hand over their company ID, the ticket and a credit card. The attendant then walks back and writes down the license plate number, fills out paperwork related to the employee discount and then begins the payment process. This can add more than 15 minutes of additional time spent exiting the airport. Please report any of these inconveniences to the company and your PHX reps.


IPad Currency

It has been a year since we started the EFB program using iPads. Although it has been a successful launch, some major issues have been identified, mostly involving confusion regarding updates. In order to keep the program moving forward and keep us “out of the weeds,” an iPad help desk will be available in the T4 pilot lounge conference room for the next several weeks. This will run seven days a week, with hours to cover most check-in times. Please allow 15–20 minutes for our iPad gurus to review some of the procedures and perform a quick quality control check on your iPad. This is a “non-jeopardy” form of iPad recurrent designed to ensure your iPad is fully up to date. Participation is strongly encouraged.

It is important to note that if you start a trip with your iPad current and an update occurs while on that trip, your device is still considered current while on that trip.The company would prefer that you do your updates over any company crew room Wi-Fi. The concern of using hotel Wi-Fi is the chance it will corrupt or disable your device. We are aware of a few instances when the FAA, while checking a crew's credentials, has also checked their iPads for current information. The phone numbers for iPad assistance while on the road or at home are 1-800-872-7456 or 480-693-6029 (prompt 1-3).


APA/AA “Wingman” Program

Under Contract 2004, pilots could donate vacation to other pilots in need. This is not a right found in our new contract, and PHX pilots learned the hard way that the new AA implemented the lack of this provision immediately. Thus, our ability to contribute vacation time directly to other pilots in need was eliminated, while no similar provision was immediately available.

While not codified in the JCBA/MOU/GREEN BOOK, AA management and APA have agreed to a similar program through the creation of Project Wingman. Phoenix-domiciled pilots may contact the chief pilots to donate to this worthwhile program by filling out the vacation donation or assistance request forms attached to this email. The benefits of the Wingman program go well beyond possible monetary assistance. The following information is reprinted as sourced from the March 26 APA News Digest:

If you find yourself or a fellow pilot struggling with a troubled mind because of personal or family difficulty, please call (817) 823-7965. The call is confidential, and a Project Wingman pilot trained to address mental health issues is available 24/7. The first step to treat assessment when we fly is to make sure we are taking care of ourselves and our fellow pilots. Our demanding profession is not forgiving of distractions, so please do not hesitate to use the many resources available to you through Project Wingman.
Take care of yourselves and take care of your fellow pilots.

PROJECT WINGMAN: (817) 823-7965


Sincerely,

John and Eric

Last edited by vagabond; 04-03-2015 at 12:52 PM.
Route66 is offline  
Old 04-02-2015, 03:12 AM
  #2  
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So.....how is that "pilot unity" working for you all in the desert???

Welcome to the "New American".
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Old 04-02-2015, 06:04 AM
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I'm surprised that PHX wants everything combined so quickly. Don't they realize that once the company can displace those pilots to other hubs, PHX is going to get synergized to the extreme?
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Old 04-02-2015, 07:07 AM
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Ha, ha, the "shotgun approach" obviously worked and got a huge reaction. It interrupted their dinner.
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Old 04-02-2015, 08:26 AM
  #5  
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Enough is enough eh?

Okay, now what?

The Bobble Headed Army voted the PHX dom screw-job in by 86%.....

WHY DOES ANYONE IN PHX WONDER WHY THIS IS HAPPENING?????

Because of the Bobbled Headed Army. A domicile of "nice little airline pilots" that push 10 early while the dildo slides further up thier collective arses.


Enough is enough......

Yo, Bobble Heads, wanna know who's responsible?

LOOK IN THE MIRROR!

Peace.
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Old 04-02-2015, 01:58 PM
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Originally Posted by 757HI View Post
Enough is enough eh?

Okay, now what?

The Bobble Headed Army voted the PHX dom screw-job in by 86%.....

WHY DOES ANYONE IN PHX WONDER WHY THIS IS HAPPENING?????

Because of the Bobbled Headed Army. A domicile of "nice little airline pilots" that push 10 early while the dildo slides further up thier collective arses.


Enough is enough......

Yo, Bobble Heads, wanna know who's responsible?

LOOK IN THE MIRROR!

Peace.
WHOA! Might want to read the last part of the APA PHX post.
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Old 04-02-2015, 07:01 PM
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lol, don't worry, I love working with all of my PHX pilots, but man am I tired of getting crummy contracts to live with, and then an update like that comes out AFTER the crummy contract is in place.

Great bunch to work with, chit-chat and drink beer with, but jeez the PHX group as a whole has never fought very hard for anything, oh, except the Nic. Somehow Bradford and his crew of thieves got the PHX base more unified than any Strike Preparedness Committee!

Originally Posted by Route66 View Post
WHOA! Might want to read the last part of the APA PHX post.
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Old 04-03-2015, 04:47 AM
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Originally Posted by 757HI View Post
lol, don't worry, I love working with all of my PHX pilots, but man am I tired of getting crummy contracts to live with, and then an update like that comes out AFTER the crummy contract is in place.

Great bunch to work with, chit-chat and drink beer with, but jeez the PHX group as a whole has never fought very hard for anything, oh, except the Nic. Somehow Bradford and his crew of thieves got the PHX base more unified than any Strike Preparedness Committee!
I know. There's always a few in any group.

"Crew of thieves". Funny how that works. Same could be said for PHX pilots, or APA pilots, or ALPA pilots, or Envoy pilots, or ______ pilots. The only common word in those groups are....PILOTS. Without any measurable, objective standard for how pilots value each other look no further than....PILOTS. Arbitrators, passengers, the Company, Congress, Judiciary, Executive Branch....we are ALL overpaid and underworked according to them.
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Old 04-03-2015, 03:12 PM
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Be patient.. We will get them "next time".. It's not "next time" yet.
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Old 04-03-2015, 10:25 PM
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Originally Posted by PurpleTurtle View Post
Be patient.. We will get them "next time".. It's not "next time" yet.
Haven't been on this site in a while. Good to see you are still trolling. Hope you will enjoy being junior for a very long time.
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