Originally Posted by Han Solo

I am curious how people can drop trips when the entirely of the trip falls over black RES coverage days. A trip which had been a Q trip recently became actual open time over 4 black days, I looked at the pilot history in icrew and the reason was DROT which I'm pretty sure is a plain drop, not IVD or APD. The RES availability for the days of the trip are 14/11, 18/15, 20/15, and 16/11 (REQ/Avail). There was no other movement on that day, so it's not like there was a sudden rush of open time trips that were picked up which gave this pilot the window of opportunity to drop. This is a dropped 4 day trip that covers 4 black days.

The trip had a Q next to it since the PBS run on the 20th and it only recently became actual open time. I thought I had a basic understanding of how PCS works but I've seen stuff like this happen a few times and don't understand why, can anybody help explain this? My only lingering thought is maybe DROT is some kind of chief pilot input since there is no help button to list what the codes stand for. Thanks.

Originally Posted by txlnnbl

DROT shows up as the reason for a drop when a pilot swaps out a trip for another open trip. If you look at the daily coverage on the same day, you'll probably see their name listed along with a "PS" for another open trip. If it was a straight personal drop the reason would be "P/D" in open time history.

Originally Posted by Denny Crane

Yeah....No. It’s just like doing a regular PD. Reserve coverage has to be positive for every day of payback day usage.

About the only place that talks about PB day usage is the Scheduling Reference Handbook put out by Dalpa.

Denny

Originally Posted by Han Solo

I believe this is incorrect. There was one PS on the day/time the trip was dropped however the employee number doesn't match. This is not the 1st time I've seen this happen, last month I saw 2 trips get dropped (using DROT as the reason) over the same weekend with 100% black coverage. A few others have posted likely reasons and even with SF's explanation of checking others schedules, I'm still uncomfortable doing so. It's not an issue where I think anybody is getting away with something, just trying to educate myself on how PCS works.

Originally Posted by notEnuf

PB days can be useless in a chronically undermanned category, which is exactly the situation required to earn them. They end up as vacation days if unused, which reduces their value. (23.S.14.c.) You end up adding them to a vacation bid and they are worth only the value of a vacation day. It’s better to use them on a high credit day of your choosing if staffing is adequate.