You get back to 19-20 days off when the company starts building schedules efficiently. It has nothing to do with our inability to staff. Schedule inefficiencies actually make the staffing problem worse.

You seem to think that giving concessions will somehow improve your QOL. Let me let you in on a little secret. Concessions, by definition, do not do that. The company is currently walking all over our contract and our union just gave up some pretty big things including reducing the company's need find First Officers by allowing right seat Captains and you somehow think this will improve your QOL?

We needed "operational necessity" defined. Did we get that? No. That should be worded as something the company can use only during a declared IROP and have a limit on the number of IROPs that can be declared in months.

We need language that any bonus increase to new hires must also be paid out to every pilot already on property. Did we get that? No.

We need long call brought back. Where is that?

We need the company to become contractually compliant again.

Also, the union says they agreed to the 2 year extension because they claim it will help the company be better positioned to negotiate CPA renewals. Did the company open their books to the union? Is this something we even needed to do?

Remember its the pilots that pay the dues and our representatives bestowed concessions upon us in order to help the company without so much as consulting the pilot group. Hell even something as simple as a survey asking what we would be willing accept would have been more than what they did.

 

... So you want a $17500 bonus because they give new hires a 17500 bonus? What would you be willing to give up in order to get it? Because they wouldn't give us that free.
Also, with all due respect you're wrong, the 19-20 day off schedules were when we were well staffed... because the floor wasn't raised, and there was a better mix of pairings. Right now they are absolutely making the pairings cover as much flying as possible... not by block hours but when you look at the legs.

I agree on some of your points though. This was a real missed opportunity to get some of the stuff in the contract we needed in the contract, for 2 more years, like you said the operational necessity language and other language that needs cleaning up.

 

I get your point with the floor being raised effecting days off. But having 30 hour overnights in many cities every night definitely effects efficiency. If we deadhead those crews out there would be additional legs they could fly. If we multiply that by 3 cities there are 6 less pilots that are needed. Further multiplied by a month now you really start to see savings created through efficiency.

It is my opinion that at compass we are using schedule inefficiency as a way to keep crew members in the system for more days so they can be reassigned at the company's discretion. In essence creating a reserve pool.

As for the bonus, I did not say that we need the $17,500. I said any future bonus increases should be given to all. Meaning if they want to raise it to $20,000 then every pilot on property should be given an additional $2,500 bonus. I hope you see the difference. Doing this continues to allow the company to throw straight cash at their recruiting problems as they see fit but also gives them incentive to look for other, perhaps more cost conscious ways to recruit by improving on Quality of Life issues that have been created recently.

 

I hope you’re all using your 4 commuter hotels as much as possible, since the company considers them compensation, which is not reimbursed should you not use them.

I understand if you have commutable pairings, or short base sits, but if you live in base, it’s really easy to check in before/after your trip on your drive to/fr work. At least take advantage of the free breakfast or coffee, or not having to clean the sheets after, if you know what I mean.

 

Pretty much the only place I've seen the 30 hour overnights out of Seattle is YEG and I think there's a few MFR in March but like... four. Same thing with SAT in February but only 4. There is one leg in and one leg out a day on Delta to YEG. Plane flies in at midnight, plane flies out at 6am... nowhere you can deadhead to unless they deadhead us on Alaska and they can't/won't do that. It's not a large amount of our pairings. And I am sure Compass would like to be rid of it just as much as they scramble to staff flying. Up to the codeshare partner though.

 

The ultra long YEG layover was a compromise to not make it a stand up anymore.


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Fair enough. I'll conceded my point specifically about the 30 hour overnights but I'll stand by my assertion that schedule inefficiency is the primary driver keeping you from getting the most days off possible and not necessarily staffing.

 

You're both right and wrong at the same time. It's true that if the schedules were more efficient, we'd get more days off, even while being short staffed. But the inefficient schedules are partly due to the low staffing. It's not simply a matter of "750 block hours, 10 75 hour lines, done". Because a bulk of the flying can be concentrated on the weekend, or in the morning, or the early evening. It's more like "4 crews needed this day, 6 crews needed this day, 7 crews needed this day" and what you see as an inefficient 4 hours on day 5 is you fulfilling that higher crew butt in seat on that day. With only 11 days off, you're always covering some leg somewhere.
Let me put it this way. On Thursday, and Friday, and every day afterwards, you've got SEA SNA SEA legs. And now an afternoon SEA GEG. If you build it as a SEA SNA day trip it's very efficient. But now that lone SEA GEG leg needs to be the start of another trip. Now 2 crews are needed. Or... you kill the day trip and make that crew sit for 4 hours in base and do that one leg into GEG. Now they cover your early AM GEG into SEA on Friday and one less crew is needed. Think crews per day, not hours per day. If you actually look at the Seattle 5 day pairings you totally see this in action, with late starts on day 1 and early finishes on day 5. Day 1 is covering the late night stuff and the pairings shift and cover the early. They're very efficient in the sense of covering all the legs, completely inefficient for us in terms of sits and productivity and days off, but that isn't how the company is building them or anything that they care about.
So, I'd say you're correct in looking at it from the perspective of the individual lineholder, but not the pairing mix and covering every leg of flying as a whole.

 

This probably explains why our American flying has 2+ hour sits everyday now. Can't wait for that to go away.

 

no kidding. It's getting harder and harder hitting on the ready reserve FAs over in the box with all the extra crews sitting around the crew room over there.

They be wasting my flavor.