Another limitation is we cannot bid more than 6 days of reserve in a row. My understanding is this is allowed at delta. Not sure how you handle duty time limits, but apparently you have figured it out while we have not.

 

For the most part, We can bid as many days in a row as our seniority allows. If we exceed a 30/7 limit we are placed into rest by CS. Honestly this is a great deal if you don’t mind longer stretches of work. The company gets extra flexibility and we get another day or 2 off for rest if we bid that way.

 

So you end having rest days on what were reserve days? And they don’t add more reserve days? That’s a good set up. Can they roll days off like they can for us?

 

Nope no extra days added. Nope we have "gold" days off that they technically can't touch us on. We can place them on our schedule as we please

 

yes, if our reserve bid causes us to be put into rest we just get those days off.

im not sure of the specifics of how being worked into a day off works, but when we get our reserve schedule, we are awarded regular days off (X days) and then bid for 6 golden days. If I understand right, they can fly us into an Xday (with some pay implications that I’m not sure about) but they cannot fly us into a golden day.

 

Sometimes our ‘rest’ day is a 30-hour layover in an undesirable location

 

Essentially as a commuter, having every day be SC or an assignment. From what I hear from UA, if you commute your strategy is to avoid reserve at all costs. Thats why CA went so Jr, and thats why WB FO did as well (reserve for years).

If you commute but can do Long Call from home, life is pretty nice here. Could it be better? Of course. But I bid reserve by choice most months with my commute. My category/seat last month had everyone 70% or greater holding lines, involuntarily. Most months don't look like that, but just shows reserve doesn't have to be this avoid at all costs thing. Lots of people prefer it.

 

Just for clarity, you CAN be rerouted into the 6 “Golden” X-days (days off), but it’s way down the coverage ladder, and the company must make every reasonable attempt to find someone else for that reroute. But it’s not inviolable.

The true value in Golden X-days come from automatic release at noon if not already used on last day of reserve going into a Golden day. It also makes Short Call on said day very short in duration, if not unusable for SC.

 

Minor note, and I only post it because many don't know this. We can ALMOST place them on our schedules as we please. You can only put them in 3 different off day blocks, which is supposedly a "system limitation." As someone who usually has more than 3 off day blocks, I find this a bit ridiculous. Also, golden days have to start on a off day immediately following a reserve day. Thats ok, if you're happy with your schedule, but not great if you plan on moving reserve days. Since we can't move golden days, if you move reserve days over one, it's simply lost.

But really golden days are kind of silly. Every off day should be a golden day, and we should never have to worry about being worked into an off day. That said, I've never really been worked into an off day, though I know it occasionally happens. As Fangs mentioned, the true value is the automatic noon release on the last day of a reserve block.

 

Impressed that the new hires at United understand that they might be a captain in 6 months, but they'll be on the bottom of the reserve pool for a decade as the senior pilots continually bid above them.

Wonder if they're hiring mostly civilian track pilots who've already lived this?