I agree with you. I wasn't advocating for changes to the current system, just trying to add clarity to a post I thought was perhaps misunderstood.

I try to bid the smallest schedule I can. Then fill up via much better stuff I can get off swap board [but cannot hold on initial bid].

 

My point concerning the swap board was not about people having the flexibility to drop. I can’t tell you how many CAs I flew with that explained how they used the 2 loopholes to consistently get 90-100 hour months, without GS. The PSB may not help the Company much, but guys bidding 2 day trips with the explicit purpose of swapping with the pot into 4 or 5 day trips with the only limit the FAR does help quite a bit. It is the contract, so have at it. I just find it funny that guys will rail on pilots flying GSs but the loopholes are not to touched or discussed.

 

It's not a swap, he drops them via the swap board. How many 4 day trips have you picked up on top of your PBS assigned line?

 

What's wrong with this? The pilot picking up his trip is happy, the pilot dropping the trip is happy.
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You're saying ​​that the company would have to hire more pilots to cover the broken trips if that senior guy couldn't clear his schedule? By this logic NO ONE should pick up open time at all if the ultimate goal of all of us is to increase staffing and jobs...

 

Maybe not on a NB, but certainly can be on a WB. 6 day trips with 2 legs of flying go super senior so guys can either pick up GS or pick up over ALV+15. I've flown with numerous guys who do everything they can to swap up to 100 hours/month at straight time. In vacation months they try to get closer to 120. It's amazing to see how much open time gets gobbled up on the 20th. As a reserve bidder, it's kinda of nice. Then again, if we stopped the ALV+15, I may be more senior. Double-edged sword this is...

 

Why do we have an ALV + 15 pickup limit in the 1st place, if you can just go around it on the swap board?

 

That is an excellent question. I've always contended that in the interest of consistency we either need to get rid of it, or have it apply to all transactions, including Swapboard and swap with the pot. Seems silly to have a restriction here, just to get around it over there. I personally think we should just get rid of the restriction, even though I tend to drop more than pickup. But I would be happy with either approach. I think the current setup is a bit of a head-scratcher. I realize others have a different perspective.

 

Agree.

All you need is a friend to pick up open time that you want and then swap. It's really easy to work around the limit. The PU limit is protect us from ourselves but for some reason people get all butthurt when you mention it should apply to the swap board. Probably people who know they wouldn't pick up bid package garbage from open time but find it self serving to pick up "better" trips from senior pilots from the swap board OR drop their entire schedule so as to pick up broken trips later in the month.

We should either enforce the pickup limit for all situations or just get rid of it and suffer the manning consequences with open eyes, and hopefully get some sort of trade in negotiations.

 

More flexibility is better than less. I say get rid of the limit for regular line pilots and keep it to protect reserves. I don’t think it makes much difference in manning because FARS are all you can fly. I’ve done multiple swaps during a month to massage my schedule, some were even above the limit and then after an additional trade I was back below with a much better schedule. The temporary exceedance was the only way to ensure the min pay and time off I wanted at the time. Sure there are trip gobblers but if your making $1200/day that’s a pretty good side gig. It doubles with a GS but if they fill up that next GS goes more junior. I just turned down a $3600 1 day GS because the family’s weekend event was worth more to me. Allow each their own choices and maximum flexibility. There are plenty of us doing the min to compensate for those doing the max. As for staffing, we have a formula and management gets to make the choice about how close they want to be to the formula. If you want real change TLV and staffing formula are where the change should happen. BTW your welcome, you know who you are. 😜

 

Because one is open time and the other is personal time. Entirely different.