CRS Trip Trade Nonsense Continues
 

This issue alone is one of the biggest negatives from the previous CBA and now the current one effective 11/2/15. Unchanged. Pathetic. Frustrating.

Real time trip trading is not complicated in principle. PMU is the problem. This needs to be resolved in an LOA post haste. PMU is a relatively rare occurrence.

Personally, I feel it should have no expiration date at 125%. Call it Premium Make-Up instead of priority. Still PMU but will have no impact on Open Time or the sweet (Wolfpack only) charters. You get the trip or you don't. No expiration whatsoever in PMU bank.

I just admonished a scheduler for unsat delays in running trip trades, makeup, etc. I asked what the problem was? I was told there is no set time for processing. It's on a time permitting basis. Does that mean after smoke breaks, halftime of SEC games or what?

It's a half-assed operation from a CRS standpoint. So many examples of mediocrity that I'm left SMH. It seems a win-win for company and crew force if this is corrected.

Make it happen. Or not.
ALPA needs to get their arse in gear on this folks. Just tie it into the upcoming retirement LOA. Wait ... it's going to happen right?

Call CRS when any delay over 30 minutes occurs. I've done it numerous times. Amazing how it gets done within 5 minutes after the call. I do my job, they can do theirs in a timely manner. Remind them.

I hope you voted no.

Another rant topic is "insufficient reserves".

I am told that scheduling loads up the open time with standby's that they never intend to fill, so that they can deny all trip drops and trades.

If this is true, the union needs to grieve it, immediately.

Don't blame me, I voted no.

I need a lanyard that says exactly that. I have a feeling I'll need it.

I'm a definite NO vote as many here know.

The reindeer games played with dumping STBYs into open time around holidays and peak is standard SOP. Why do they do it? Because they can. No checks and balances. No recourse. Grieving is a joke. When was the last time we actually WON a substantive grievance?

Control, manipulation, and fear is how this place rolls.

I simply expect people to do their jobs. I sure as hell do mine.

They've been dumping stbys all year to make up for the shortfall, not just peak anymore. And those stby violate the intent of the Max OT LOA, which this upcoming CBA did not fix or address.

Grieving is a joke because Contract Enforcement is a joke. They need to be replaced by people who are willing and ready to fight for what's in the CBA.

I place this task squarely on the shoulders of the MEC and the MEC chairman. Business as usual has become untenable.

Make the necessary changes and aggressively pursue real time trip trading. It's beyond time. Hmmm ... I've heard that before.

GetRealDude, spot on.

The lack of real time trip trading after 4 years of negotiations was IMO the second biggest failure, after Retirement, in this contract.

The only way I can rationalize it not being a showstopper for the majority is that we have such a large percentage of military guys who have never worked under RTTT and the amazing QOL it affords.

Working under fully transparent RTTT changes everything, for junior and senior alike. These trip trades taking any more than what should be at most a few minutes, combined with the insufficient reserves and earlier time stamp nonsense are here for another decade. It sucks.

What company? PennAir? Skywest?

Hard to believe they ignored pilots requests for real time trip trading, and decided not to even ask for it.

They explained very clearly during the roadshow that RTTT was going to negate PMU. The "team" was not willing to lose PMU benefits and that made RTTT impossible.

Hard to believe a lot of things about this contract!:confused:

I'm sure another couple of years of negotiating would have fixed all this right up.....

Yeah...where was "Preserve PMU at all costs" on our surveys years ago?

Where has it EVER been a priority?

When "Real Time Trip Trading" is in the top 5 or so of your initial polling, maybe preserving PMU should not be something you don't back down on.

It must be....(dramatic music)....

Keeping PMU benefits the company. They can keep their willing accomplices supplied with sweet trips, and they keep a pool of people who will suck up draft. Win/Win.

We got rolled again, just like the stupid A380 rates. We had a chance to fix something and did nothing.

Nope, the correct NC, understanding the top priorities of the entire crew force, with the fortitude to challenge the company's "lines in the sand" from day 1 would've addressed this issue. Their response on this issue during the roadshows is what caused me to lose total respect for their understanding of, and approach to, negotiations. Their "lines in the sand - industry leading" talk became completely empty to me after that.

Yep. And I wonder if the team actually talked to one single pilot who requested not to get real time trip trading so they could keep PMU. How rare it is to get PMU for most people anyways.....and they could have kept the increased pay in place for it. As opposed to the 100% of pilots that trip trade, real time trip trading affects them every trade.

This pilot group needs to look in the mirror and realize that 'we" are the problem. "We" voted, recalled and elected our leaders. Thus, deciding what type of leaders were going to lead us into and through contract negotiations. And, we're surprised at the outcome?

If we're happy with a contract that passed with 57% of the vote after the rainbows and unicorns roadshows...Then I guess the MEC, and the NC they selected, really does represent us.

If you don't think keeping PMU at 125% is important to the majority of the pilots you don't know ALPA. Somethings like Carryover and PMU are stupid and popular.

PMU could have been maintained at 125% with real time trip trading. The only thing that would have changed is the priority request. In fact,there could be an option to use your PMU in the view/add window for 125%, and people would have loved that. Easy and simple.

What company is CRS?

That is EXACTLY what should have been negotiated in the 4+ years they had to do this. That's why I kept saying "my NC speaks for me". I thought they were in fact working to achieve what we set out to achieve as defined by the top priorities etablished by polling of our crew force. I was ****ed at the explanation: "we caved on RTTT and in considering options to get the RTTT you overwhelmingly wanted solely to protect OTP/PMU" (paraphrasing).

I have not had PMU once in over 5 years. RTTT, I and all other guys outside of the top 5% of each seat, would use every single day (previous airline), to improve the monthly schedule = huge QOL.

Throw work rules and QOL under the bus. All we need to pass a TA, is a TA with Cola and slick spin roadshows. We're so predictable.

It's people like you who shot ourselves in the foot. We had leverage, lots of leverage. I ran into a CRS fella at a bar this week. He was telling us how bad it was getting. He told me as soon as the TA came out, suddenly everything changed and everyone started flying extra again.

CRS was calling me in the morning and evening, maybe during the afternoon as well, for draft trips. Every day! Since the TA was passed, I've not received a single call.

We had leverage, the MEC ****ed it away when they sent this substandard TA, along with all kinds of problems that it doesn't fix, to the pilots.

And FedEx announces the TNT announcement just moments after the TA is passed. Coincidence?

We had leverage ... had ...

Once again, played masterfully by the Corporation!!

I guess we'll never know. I see you're part of the problem.

Ah, yes. Abuse. Rock out, dude.

The lovely thing about being on the losing side - any area of abuse by the company and you can jump out and point and say "A -HA! We told you!"

This was business. It was a bargained-for exchange. For the majority of us, the plusses outweighed the minuses. For you, it didn't. That's life in the big city. I don't think that's anybody shooting anybody in the foot or anywhere else.

So.. is APC just going to be an echo chamber for the Twelve Angry Men? Are other people even invited? This site went that way in 2006-2007, over the FDA LOA vote. If that's what you want, go with God.....

You dont realize that you, and all of us, are on the losing side. The difference is that you agreed with it. JMO.

Don't forget r-24 .. Standard ops now on day 1 to get 4 days hotel standby, just because they can. Never the intent but wording allows it so its done. Hopefully we create a Union group that works the wording in a positive direction instead of only saying "yeah they can do that"

Over simplistic, inaccurate assessment. I'm sure you weighed your pluses and minuses, and having just upgraded to your first wide-body left seat and having moved your family to Hong Kong, it made sense to you. Pluses versus minuses. And if you happen to retire and live a long life of retirement enjoying your "A" Plan monthly check, I doubt you'll thank the people who stuck up for it.

Far more pilots fell prey to "This is the best we'll be able to get" or "The MEC said it was OK." Today I was astounded by one particular Block Rep's unfamiliarity with certain important aspects of our new CBA. If there was an examination of pluses and minuses there, the equation was missing some very important parts.

Yeah, you're going to encounter opinions here, maybe even some which are contrary to yours. If you remember the story line of 12 Angry Men, you'll remember that by the end of the day, 11 had changed their minds.


Enjoy DB.






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The great unknown will always be.... would we have done better or worse by continuing negotiations. I noticed that Delta is just now getting around to polling their pilot group about what they would like to focus on when their negotiations resume. They voted down their TA on 10 July. That was about five months ago. No word on when their negotiations will actually resume. Nothing on the books yet. Would we have moved the ball forward any faster? I doubt it. So flash forward 5 months. It's 20 March 2016. Peak has come and gone. The company is hiring at a steady pace. And we are working under our 2011 CBA hoping we will still be short in all seats approaching the 2016 Peak because for all our talk about "leverage" we really don't have any other than "flying the contract". In that environment, are we "winning" or "losing"?
I might have missed it, but has CD addressed the pilot group since the TA passed? A little leadership from the MEC probably wouldn't hurt at this point.

"And if you happen to retire and live a long life of retirement enjoying your "A" Plan monthly check, I doubt you'll thank the people who stuck up for it."

Don't you worry about who I thank. My family's been in ALPA 48 years. I've given my view- I think the A plan is too much of a gamble to worry about. I want to work, and get money. Let me handle the rest.

I can deal with opposing views. I can't deal with sanctimonious victim hood. I spent too many time at other places.

So- Tony you guys have fun. I'm going the way of Danger kitty. .....

And they haven't even reached their amendable date yet.






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Don't forget your marbles.






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Good point. Looks like they move a lot faster than we do. Probably not fair to compare our notional way ahead timeline to theirs. We seem to move a lot more slowly.

You may be right; you may be wrong.

If you're wrong, will you still cash the checks?






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"The great unknown".....Here we go again! I suppose based on that thinking, I should always vote yes.

Of course there are unknowns. It looks like 57% didnt want to find out what those were, and 43% were willing to see.

The fact that the TNT deal was done shortly after signing, along with, from what some have said, CRS is relieved that covering trips is now much easier (meaning it wasnt so easy before), we did have leverage.

And the fact that it passed with 57%, to me, is an indictment of how lousy it was.

The yes folks can give their reasons same as the no folks. IMO (I know, nobody asked me) we are a weak, lame, wimpy group that still hasnt learned how to stick up for ourselves. We have selfish pr!cks flying DPs, OT, and draft when they shouldnt. And because of that, some think that if we turn down a TA these folks and others wont do what has to be done. Maybe so. But you dont know until you try.

As I have stated before, Behnke is probably crapping in his grave over our behavior. We all ought to be glad that in the late 1700s there was a minority, whom dispite the unknown, decided to take a gamble.

I prefer to think that 57% had enough insight to eliminate enough of the unknowns to realize there wasn't much profit to be gained from waiting. It's like trading equities. The only reason you can buy shares is because someone else thinks it's a good time to sell shares. Both sides have done their own due diligence. Both sides believe they are right. I'm still very comfortable with my position. I've learned nothing new that indicates our negotiating position will be stronger in the next year than it was 5 months ago.
Regarding due diligence, the TNT deal has not been finalized. It is still under review by the EU and will be until they decide extending their deliberation won't net them any more gains. Their timing has a lot more to do with their internal politics than our CBA. They are well aware we would never be released to strike. And it was no secret that we had the company by the short hairs with manning issues prior to the TA being released for a vote. It is also no secret that releasing the TA also released a significant amount of that pressure. Yeah, we're short pilots going into Peak, but we will always be short going into Peak. The company will never base our numbers on Peak manning requirements. That's why they wet lease.
So I did my due diligence and decided our strongest buying position had been before the TA was released and that we were getting weaker every day since. In other words, waiting wasn't going to improve our chances of negotiating a better contract. So sitting around waiting to figure that out was going to cost us the gains we could be making with what was already negotiated in the new contract.
No yes or no voter can definitively declare the other side is wrong. Waaaay too soon for that. We'll have to wait a year or two before we know what the variables that impact our negotiating environment look like during the actual time a newly formed NC would be sitting down across from the company and the NMB.
In the meantime, keep half an eye on Delta, SWA and UPS as they work through their negotiations. And consider rolling your signing bonus into FDX. It's not a bad bet right now.