DALMD88FO

What base if you don't mind telling?

Big E 757

This right here!!! They’re trying to plus up earnings by “optimizing” rotations so they can avoid hiring hundreds more. Now we are so short, at least on the A320 in most bases, they’ve turned to further intimidation, to keep the operation running. As far as I’m concerned, if I have “none” on my schedule for verification requirement, there is no basis for a good faith health check. It was his/her first time in two years to call in sick, and they think there is a basis for requesting further information? I don’t.

FL370esq

Lots of studies out there that establish fatigue can make you physically sick. 😴🤢

MaxPowerSet

Be sure to file an ASAP as well if there are no underlying reasons for a good faith verification. Not only does ALPA need to track this but the FAA might be interested in knowing that we're being intimidated from calling out sick. Pretty obvious safety issue, not to mention what has often mentioned no one wants someone sick crammed into a tiny space with them coughing and sneezing all over the cockpit.

Also, be sure to submit your dr visit expense for reimbursement, I'm no contract guru but pretty sure if they require a doctor's note for good faith verification they have to pay for the doctor's visit for it.

FL370esq

Yup...14.F.5 permits that.

Rooster435

What was their good faith basis? Did they say? Without that they aren’t getting anything from me. PWA says they can inquire about the medical reasons for the use of sick leave and after that “discussion” they can then ask for a DRs certificate.

Under the premise that the best defense is a good offense I’d call them directly and inquire about their “good faith” basis.

RonRicco

Either the person from the CP office has gone rouge, or there is more to the story. Whether the OP believed there were no underlying circumstances, as an example, something could have been relayed to the CP office from a scheduler that gave them concern. (“I heard the spouse saying they were late for a party”)

Short staffing is not a good faith basis. A call from his or her rep should be able to clarify what their reasoning for the call was and if there was truly justification. If there was none, then they are playing a very dangerous game.. not so much with status quo, but with the pilot group as a whole.

And FWIW, the ability to ask a pilot to verify a sickness in a situation like this (a legitimate basis) has been in the contract since at least 1996, so it is not new.

mispoken

I’d say that’s a real possibility since mine is second hand info. However, we have first hand info in this thread about similar things happening. This has not been my experience with sick leave usage, but I haven’t used any recently to press to test.

NeverFlexTO

They did not say, and I'm not going to go into detail here other than to say, it was a scripted message that the CPO read. I know this because I made a phone call and asked someone who went through something similar a while back. The PWA specifies there will be a discussion as to why there was a sick call, there wasn't, a VM was left (because I don't answer the phone from numbers I don't know), I called back to explain the situation, but it fell on deaf ears...I had no problem giving them a note, because I was at that time, legitimately sick, but I did have a problem with them asking for this after 2 years of being a good employee with no sick call and no other issues I know of...to me it sets a precedent, and an undesirable one to say the least.

If I had to guess it's a directive from someone either on 4th floor or the RD, no way to know...

ERflyer

What is your base?

I am biased so I’m going to guess ATL.