viperdriver

Someone was awarded 8058 for Sep (RA) as 727 FO when there was only 8001-8057 Reserve lines. How is that possible and how would you get that line? Is that where your default bid of any Reserve line comes in?

MD11Fr8Dog

Someone activated after the bidpack was done! When I was the junior FO in ANC (12 months, thank you very much! ), I ALWAYS got an unpublished reserve line and it ALWAYS mirrored the junior guy with a published line.

Jetjok

MD11Fr8Dog speaks with a straight tongue. The usual reason is that someone activates after the bid pack is published. However, those lines don't always mimic the junior guy's line. I was the junior captain on the Mad Dog, being activated in June (of a few years ago). Bidding was easy then, and so I hardly looked at the December bid pack, as my usual bid was: 1) any line; 2) any VTO line; 3) any reserve line. When the Dec lines were published, my line had me working from the 2nd of the month to the 16th, with the rest of the month off. I didn't think all that much about it, except for the good luck of not working over the holidays. Anyway, a few months later a more senior guy than I, came up to me and asked what I had done in December. I told him and he went nuts. Seems that a number of guys had activated in December, forcing 3 or 4 of us down below the number of available lines. So "they" built us custom reserve lines, which gave each of us Christmas off. It's always better to be lucky than good.

max8222

When LAX first opened up there was not a lot of flying for the # of pilots we had. I was anchor man in the right seat. When I bid, by the time they got to me all of the regular lines and reserve lines where gone so I got the last VTO. Reserve was going pretty senior. Since there were not any trips left by the time they got to me on the VTO's I was assigned R days. I would put in what days I wanted to work on my VTO request and in 6 months of doing this they gave me what I asked for each month. So I basically had a custom R line each month. Guys that were senior to me could not hold lines or Reserve but would get trips on their VTO. So I was effectively getting to bid something they could not hold. This is due to the contract which basically has the company build the senior VTO with trips then if there are not trips left those junior VTO's get R days.

AFW_MD11

CBA - Ch 25.D.2.c. Secondary lines shall be constructed in NUMERICAL order.....

so, correct me if I'm wrong, but if a "senior" guy bids VTO #last (vs. "any VTO line") - in other words, the specific VTO line number that is the last number on the list in the bidpack - then his VTO will be processed LAST (after all the trips have been given out?)

Thus, a "senior" guy could potentially get a Reserve line on his VTO even if he wasn't senior enough to hold a regular Reserve line.

if Reserve is what he desired......make sense? or am I just out to lunch (again?)

Busboy

Actually, a senior guy is suppose to be able to bid a senior VTO # and request R-days. And, they are to honor his request if there are enough VTO's junior(bigger number) to his that can cover the open time. If he bids the last number VTO, he would run the risk of getting whatever trips may be left over and not getting the days off he wants.

MaydayMark

I've had this problem before and been told by my futures scheduler that VTO's are constructed in seniority order (regardless of the line number)!*?

MalteseX

So, what you are saying is that not only are the futures schedulers violating the contract, (Ref: CBA - Ch 25.D.2.c. Secondary lines shall be constructed in NUMERICAL order.....) but that they are doing it as a matter of policy---and telling pilots they are!!!!

PastV1

I believe they decided last year to build the VTO lines in line order now.

Seems there was some comm from the union about it.

Busboy

Under the new CBA, the schedulers are required to build the VTOs in numerical order. That was the whole problem with how the SIBA VTO lines were being built. All the SIBA VTO lines had a lower numerical number than any of the domestic VTOs.

So, junior guys were bidding SIBA VTO lines. And, all the SIBA VTO lines were being built prior to any domestic A300 VTO lines, regardless of seniority. Very junior people, bid SIBA, and were getting domestic, daytime, double deadheads on their VTOs, without any SIBA trips. As long as the SIBA trips went on someone's line, schedulers don't really care what goes on the rest of the VTOs.

Pretty good scam that is now shut down. They're doing just the opposite now. The SIBA VTOs come at the end of the bidpack. So, they are the last to be built, regardless of the seniority of the pilot.

From what I understand, on the next SIBA quarter, starting in December... There will no specific SIBA VTOs in the bidpack. If a SIBA pilot bids VTO, he will be assigned whatever trips he requests, domestic or SIBA trips. Of course, if the senior SIBA VTO guys don't request SIBA trips...Then the junior SIBA guys will have them assigned to them, regardless of their request.