Gunter

All the scare tactics have come out again. I don't believe in them. But I do think we have something different to deal with this time.

The NPRM gives the company a valid excuse, in the eyes of the NMB, to delay negotiations an extra 2 years without penalty.

Doesn't the company want ULR? That's also going to be affected by the NPRM and didn't make it into the TA. I wonder how big of bargaining chip that is?

FDXLAG

As Busboy says we cant wait four months to find out?

TonyHaus

I have to disagree with even with the premise that under 4a2b line holders didnt take a pay cut. I know I sure did. The concept that you could have stayed home more days for less pay is completely irrelevant. The point is that I am guranteed 68 credit hours per month and I was forced, not my choice, to fly 54 credit hours month in and month out. Not senior enough to hold carryover, no trips in open time. My guess PT is that if that was your experience you would sing a different tune. Maybe not, I don't know. What I do know is that for over a year my pay was reduced by roughly 20%. If they did not do that to me, I would have worked full time and I would be $40,000 richer than I am today. No matter how you slice it, that was a pay cut. No way will I vote for a TA that allows that to happen again.

TonyHaus

Different day, same old sh!$. There is always a reason for their excuse to delay real bargaining with us. That is union busting 101. It's their job to come up with reasons. We have to be smart enough not to fall for it. We certainly don't want to validate it with our own actions. I am very dissappointed to see the union sending out communications that justifies managements excuse du jour. Gunter, the bottom line is this, we weren't going to be released between now and the Aug. (NPRM date) anyway. It is just too soon since our openers. But the last thing we want to do is to delay our timeline even further by agreeing to codify the delay with a TA. No, we must vote this down, go back to negotiations and begin to build pressure to bring us a fair TA that reflects the objectives set forth by our pilots.

ptarmigan

I had the same experience as you did. I just tend to look at the positive side of things, and that extra time with the family was fantastic. I would also venture that my economic consequences were worse than yours. I lost my house in that process. Did you?

FDXLAG

So have you continued to dropp trips to stay at 52 hours a month? The point is we have a contract that guarantees us 68 hours a month. With this TA that guarantee is still meaningless. The company at will can reduce my hours below 68 hours.

Gunter

You mean we won't get released until after the 2 year implementation period from the NPRM release in Aug 2011, right? The company START scheduling talks summer 2013. The complexity of that section would take a few months at a minimum.

You are really saying is, "The last thing we want to do is get an interim payraise while we wait."

You really are optimistic to think future retro will exceed the amount we pass up now if we just choose to wait it out. This TA will be at least 3 years in the past when we agree to our next big CBA. Pay raises, bonuses and retro are paid from the current and following years and is costed out looking forward. It's not paid from profit from that far back or the perceived inequities from that time period. How far back are you really looking? Back when Delta and UAL outclassed us? We are never going to make that up.

Then there is the reality that a retro package would most likely come out of whatever monies the NEXT set of company negotiators have to offer. It usually doesn't matter what the total cost of the package is, it's how much more expensive it is from the current package.

You're making an assumption that everything - global trade/economy, US politics, world politics/war, postal contract - will all be favorable 3-4 years down the road and more money will be available for what you think we'll get. Your making quite a bet.

Bottom line - we need to enter the next tough set of negotiations with the bar already set higher if we want to maximize our gains.

magic rat

I just un-f@&$)d myself, forgot the obvious, they can't open the FDA....

Send it back, we can do better. Reject the first offer, I am voting NO!!!

Busboy

Why would we need to wait until the rules are implemented? We, and the company, only need to know what the rules are.

Is there some reason the company can't start bargaining, once they know what the rules are, in Aug?

FlybyKnite

They already know the implications of the proposed rules. So do we-- by one estimation over 300 of the 376 lines in the March MD11FO are illegal because of one or more of the proposed rules. We just don't know how they would fix those "illegal" pairings/lines.

They need time to figure out how to minimize the impacts of the issued rules [aka: experiment w/the optimizer]. Remember how they "needed" 6 months to re-program for the 3.75 Trip Rig. The result was more hard time trips that negated the new trip rig starting in the 5th month?

Serious August/September talks-- yeah right . The company isn't going to seriously discuss anything until they know All the moving parts and angles-- the question then becomes not how long for them to actually figure it out but how long before they are ready to talk? Not to mention the extra time involved if there are challenges to the announced rules that need to be resolved [in court?]. I believe anything under 6 months would be astounding, and 6 months is [coincidentally?] ALPA's Feb 2012 decision point.

There's a lot of discussion about how new FDA flying will dilute our bidpacks and lines. No doubt there will be an effect, the real question is how big an impact. But-- if they have to de-tune (JG phrase) the flying operation for the new rules, do you think your lines are going to be better or worse than present day? Will the change overcome the FDA dilution? Knowing our company, the answer will be probably as close to cost neutral as possible, which means a draw for us.

So it becomes a question of timing-- How long will it take to fully stand-up the new FDA's and actually dilute our lines? How long will they delay before seriously discussing work rules based on the new rules? What is Your time value of money in the meantime? Just asking.

Watched the videos and read the TA mailed to the house. My instinct says No, but when discussing new paradigms as embodied by this TA, extra thought and careful consideration are required. So I'm taking the extra time to consider [the timelines, my time value of $$, the politics of a new paradigm, etc] and then decide.