Feb line awards
 

Does the gateway 2000 that runs our schedules get maintained by a [now unpaid] government worker that isn't at work?

They have till the 17th at 1800 to have them published.

Thanks for the obvious. But in Feb....a pretty easy month....A awards would typically be published...

Per the contract. But status quo usually has the As out by the 13-14 and the Bs out the following day. This must be a work action. Haha.

Few notes from the scheduling VC...they identified illegal 717 rotations and the company decided to rebuild them. The company guys didn't work Saturday, not that I blame them. They have until the 17th to get the awards out. I can't even imagine what FB and this place would look like if they actually were awarded on the last day contractually required.

I was wondering if the timing of the AE coming out had anything to do with the delay.

Write you reps to get the contract changed to the timeframe you desire.

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They are confident they can produce the awards quickly now and no longer work weekends. If the bids close Friday night they don’t start working them until Monday. It’s been this way for some time.

They should not have notified the company..The effected pilots would have been pay protected on those rotations.

Yeah I'm hoping he meant the company identified the rotations and decided to fix it. Bidding for the time off paid rotations have been a trend on the 717 in recent months

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As sailing said, they are not working on them over the weekend. Plus with the ATL717 bid closing yesterday, I am not shocked they have not been piblished yet.

Interesting stuff. I'm a bit cranky anyway after having my 17 hour bid-for and awarded layover at home converted to a short night somewhere else with a double DH through ATL. 7 hours total deadheading with nothing better than 757 economy. Naturally I'm annoyed today.

I'm officially 1 for 4 on awarded layovers at home remaining on my schedule. I'm not telling them where I live anymore.

It does get old playing the waiting game every month. I wonder if it takes 4 or 5 days for awards to get published at UAL or AAL too. Seems like it shouldn't take more than a few hours.

The 17th at 1800 is their contractual requirement. Anything ahead of that is icing on the cake.

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Yup, Only thing we can do is ask to change it in the contract. Which we should IMO.

What are you willing to trade for it? I don't disagree with your sentiment but unless it's a freebie outside normal contract negotiations I'll just sit tight until the 17th if/when required.

I'm much more interested in fixing this. Each and every RR should receive RR pay. Without having to call ALPA or wait months and months for adjudication.

Maybe the possibility of a delay in the A220 certification is making them look harder at trying to cover that flying?

And EVERY SINGLE DEADHEAD over 2 hours should be comfort+ at a minimum. Anything in economy should be 150% pay. And no middle seats ever unless it's Delta one. But I may be a bit partial, since I'm about twice the height the economy seat was designed for.

As for UAL, they probably do get lines faster. Consider this: their last vacancy bid had published mock awards EVERY BUSINESS DAY so guys could see what they could expect and make adjustments. They also are much more limited in how much crew resources can "adjust" what's awarded vs what's offered. Ours take days, are done by hand, and often reflect something totally different than the seats initially offered.

And yes I put all of that in the surveys a while back.

Same.

UAL - Close on 12th. Capts due by 0001 on the 16th, FOs 0001 on the 18th
AAL - Close Noon on the 13th. Due by noon on the 16th.

Bad data as usual... they have come out on saturdays and sundays in recent months.


There was one case around 2010 where they didn’t come out until after the deadline on the 17th.

Good Lord, the amount of complaining by A’s (on the FB group specifically) about the bids not being posted 2/3 days early is crazy. I thought Millennials were supposed to have the ‘entitled’ attitude.

All about what you're used to I guess. What's normal turns into an expectation.

I was involved in the union auditing job at my last airline. I watched the computer publish the bids for 1700+ and it took on average 22 minutes for the program to spit out be resukts (FLICA, not our MSDOS software that Delta probably uses). The results published to the group within one hour of bids closing.

One other point, the guy who started this thread asked a question. Then gets chastised. Valid question since this is not normal to not have A’s awarded by pay day. He may not have known that there were illegal rotations in ATL.

“What are you willing to trade for that?” This is a question that needs to stop being asked at every single turn. It’s a weak approach to negotiating, especially on small ticket items.

A’s are out

Edited- (some) A’s are out...

Expect all you want, but the deadline is still a deadline. To get angry at the PBS guys and expect the company guys to work over the weekend is a bit much imho.

Line of time or PBS? Also, how many different bid categories did your last job have? I'm not saying it can't be sped up, I'm sure it could if we got some more contractual language. I guess I don't think 6 days is unreasonable...especially when 2 of those days are weekends. The reality is that more often than not it's only about 3-4 days.

I'm guess the problem was the delivery of the question...statement?

The timeline doesn’t bother me much but knowing that the computer is capable of spitting it out within an hour (or a few hours, at worst) but they take 5 days is the troubling thing. It leads me to believe they are running the awards, modifying and tweaking, then running again. How often are the resulting bids better for me and how often are they better for the company?

The few times I got a glimpse of my schedule and then it changed, it was never better after the change.

I'm pretty used to every response here being a combative one. I'd say most people who come on this forum, do so either to lurk and learn, or because they're mad at something. Being chastised by people stating obvious things are, like line awards, a simple expectation.

Combinatorial problem solving leads to many possible outcomes. Why wouldn’t (or shouldn’t) the company seek to choose the outcome that best meets the goals of the company? Why assume that the first run is the ideally-optimized solution?

A’s are out.

The system we use loops back multiple times during the runs for 14,000 plus pilots. Once the runs are complete they are sent over to ALPA to audit. ALPA often asks for reruns before approval. If we give up are ability to audit the results I am sure the company will be quite happy to provide a earlier completion date.

I guess I don’t understand what the variables are then. What do they change before it is run again? The pairings are already decided so the only thing I can see them changing is the amount of open time allowed, hard lines vs reserve and maybe average line credit.

I have seen it where they try and give you more trips or more time. There are multiple outcomes to getting what you asked for.

They publish the ALV and the bid window. They can run a solution that has buffers at the high and low end as long as they don't exceed the window. They can limit the number of 'Min credit' and 'Max credit' bids. I'm assuming they can tweak the number of RLLs. And they can adjust the open time constraints as long as they don't exceed PWA limits.

Lots of things to get the "cost" of a run down. Run/evaluate/run/evaluate/run/evaluate/send to ALPA for review/PUBLISH.

Remember, the Company can move the threshold line value anywhere within the LCW and that will have varying outcomes. Take a look at the top of your category's Wide Report and see where the threshold line value ended up.

I see no reason 717 pilots should wait for 777 pilots' schedule completion, or vice versa? Why can't they be released as they are completed and reviewed by ALPA?

Exactly. If there were issues with the 717, they could run everything else first. Then do the 717 when the bid closed. Oh well, the As are out at least.

This is just for the curious.

There's a way you can see the trips it is assigning as it makes it's runs. I counted at least 5 runs on the B side. The final run occurring after the union looked it over I'm guessing. What I've seen is, sometimes the last trip or two in the month may change from run to run, but the first part of the month is usually pretty much the same each run. It gives you a very good idea of the exact days off you'll have.

Here is the bad grammar version for those who want to have at it::D

They is a way you's guys can see the trips it is assignen as it makes it's runs. I cownted at least 5 runs on the B side. The final run okurring after the union looked it over I'm gessing. What I done saw is, sometimes the last trip or too in the month may change from run two run, but the first part of the munth is usualie pritty much the same each run. It gives you very good eye-dea of the eggsact days off you'ns will have.

I'm certainly no expert, but what dobbs said. The threshold is also a big variable they can tweak and rerun. The thresholds are publish in the at big line of gobbledegook on the top line of every page in the wides...just look for the number after the T. The next few digits/numbers will also let you know what run was used, though the naming convention isn't readily apparent. The threshold is also published in the reasons report.

If you want to see how the process work, give the PBS guys or the company a call. They're probably willing to have you down for the bid run and see what all goes on in the background. Like many things in life, it's always informative and enlightening to take a peak under the hood, rather than just sit back and chuck spears.

They once released the schedules in batches of two or three runs. It was also much easier to backdoor your schedule early. They did however put out over and over again that schedules were never final until posted in DBMS. Despite the above they were inundated with phone calls and slammed on forums when a category was rerun and schedules changed prior to posting in DBMS. Seemed often to be someone claiming they ran out and spent 10 grand on a vacation they can’t change. They got tired of it. Frankly I am surprised they don’t just wait until 6 PM on the 17th to post them all.