Nah, they're too busy on here pontificating about a Global Scope AIP that they haven't even seen the language for .....

 

Bingo. Everyone needs to breath… wait for language.

 

Yes.

A majority of the current language is based on capturing Delta pilots' share of the company's commercial agreements with partners. Each separate Joint Venture has our share, based on the amount of flying the company expected to perform. Sections 1 E 2., and 8. act as major "catch-alls" in case the company fails to negotiate a JV scope section with ALPA. AeroMexico serves as an example of 1 E. 2. coming into play. 1 E. 2. requires that if more than 40% of the seats in a market are sold as (in this example) DL seats then the flight must be flown by a Delta pilot.

Our current scope ties the pilots to the company's cash flows and commercial agreements. The result is easy to explain on an excel spreadsheet, but more difficult to write in plain language.

The PROBLEM our current Scope Section has is that the company's commercial agreements are not functioning normally as a result of COVID. The international route network, partner flying and our flying, are a mess. The company has asserted "force majure" allowing them to escape compliance for now.

As things are rebuilt we could take several paths. One would be to modify the existing language to capture the new agreements the company builds with partners around the world. The complexity of this task requires a highly functional team of managers and ALPA negotiators, experienced and trained on what currently exists, to fix it. Today's ALPA Reps are several generations removed from that work.

So a new generation of managers and ALPA reps have set out to make a much simpler scope section. The genesis of this new language was >>MANAGEMENT's DEFENSE<< to prior scope violations (which were settled in our favor for $30,000,000.00). This is confusing because ALPA's new Reps have bought into management's idea and now proclaim it as their own product. The sides were as follows back in 2012-15:

• ALPA: Section 1 P. 4. required DL fly 50% (with a 1.5% variance so the real limit was 48.5%) of the trans-Atlantic capacity on widebody jets. Management failed to do this. Pay us the difference!
• MANAGEMENT: Yes, we violated your contract, but we flew those airplanes to other places and you were not really harmed. Give the pilots $0
• Result: $30,000,000.00 to the pilots (we "won" in negotiations)

A year later we went through a rapid period of 5 scope chairmen in less than two years. The new, new, new, new Chairmen and the reps didn't really get why we had such complexity in our contract and concluded our protections have "too many words." The easy answer was to just make a global balance; we get half of whatever (the questions of block hours or capacity, crew augmentation or not, were not fully formed) Management literally heard a chorus of pilots now singing harmony on the very defense management offered to escape scope and reduce its obligation to perform European flying. So yeah, now they're talking.

The hang-up on giving management what management wanted was that management really did not want a penalty that cost them anything for noncompliance and pilots rightfully figured the RLA is stacked against us. This was resolved with some sort of staffing formula. Here we are.

The thing everyone has to remember is these are a balance. Half of 10 is 5. Half of 2 is one. When the entire planet shuts down for COVID (SARS, speculative home buying, speculative oil contract purchases, whatever ****-show Goldman Sachs or Deutchesbank thinks up to **** us; whatever) that balance swings to a number that does not help us.

Absolutely nothing in our current scope prevents the company from growing. In fact our scope requires it. But, the main point of sope is JOB PROTECTION when things go badly. It is to protect our junior pilots and all of us in a merger.

 

There’s the carrot talking point for the junior folks, always nice to establish that. Given your history with these scope agreements and your love of previous MEC’s, it begs a question….Why is this agreement better than the ones you and your friends negotiated?

 

Did you ever look at the balance sheet when Anderson was voted off the island? I think we were down to $7B in debt and would have been at zero by 2019 with probably $15B in cash. And hostile takeover? BS.

The pricing of pilots will be at market, its basically a fixed cost as there is a shortage. We have chosen to prolong negotiations and that means we are likely up to bat last. So UAL offers, >16%, AAL +, SWA goes ++ and the LCC follow suit. What I refuse to do is offer Ed a discount on my rate so he can pay down debt AND resume early burn backs, of which contribute nothing of value to the company going forward. Trust me, Ed wants to be first to the buy backs.

Back on thread target, we don't have JV CS agreements for any of the new entrants (Korean, Latam, Aero Mexico). Delta can put code on 40% of the seats on a city pair of a foreign carrier's flight. If they need more we have an insane amount of 330 and 350s coming that I am constantly reminded by Trip7 are growth.

Or are they?


PWA SEC 1 E.2

Without the consent of the Delta MEC, neither the Company nor any Company affiliate
will enter into or maintain an agreement or arrangement with any foreign air carrier
performing international partner flying that permits the Company or any Company
affiliate to book or ticket under the Company’s or Company affiliate’s designator code,
reserve, block, and/or purchase for resale:
a. more than 40% of the passenger seats in any month on any pair of flight segments in
a city pair (e.g., CDG-ATL-CDG) of such foreign air carrier,

I understand the issues in the Pacific and acknowledge war is inevitable with time. However, global production balance will have to be better than ^^

 

The narrative is:

ER's will be around another decade with new LCDs, with 2017 captains to EU

400s (not the old big 400s) are going back to international, with newhires

Record deliveries of 330s and used Latam 350s

Because this narrative has been beat into my head I think we are best served doing greater than half of all our flying on our own metal.

The global production balance will need to stand out as a solid win or nothing of which I have been told to believe is true. To me that means no tricks, cure periods, etc.

 

This is a worthwhile read, thanks for the history.

I’d be very interested in a scope comparison document that dives deep into the scope agreements we have and are proposing, with those in place at AA and UAL. Folks forget that it’s possible to fly to more than a handful of destinations in Europe…you just have to invest in your own capital instead of someone else’s.

I’m not thrilled with the jobs cure proposal for scope violations because I think that will honestly be exploited, and I’m not thrilled with global flexibility for the exact scenario you spell out above. I was against voting for this scope deal outside of a broader TA, but maybe killing it early could be a better idea!

 

The problem, Bucking Bar, is that according to my reps, the companys position is that the transatlantic protections in 1P and the Virgin protections in 1R were both superseded due to the JVs being combined in a new agreement called Blue Skies. So apparently everything you just said is OBE.

With the recent track record in arbitration, if we were forced to grieve the company’s disregard of old JV deals that no longer exist, in 3 years time an arbitrator would find a way to screw us again.

It seems you may be working with rather stale facts. I’ll withhold judgement until I actually see details. But so far, as advertised, there seems to be quite a few new protections, which currently have none. The devil will be in the details.

 

I think the other problem is that there is this assumption that there is zero institutional knowledge or experience in DALPA when that simply isn't true.

 

I’m pretty sure Bucking Bars replacement on the scope committee is part of the NC that negotiated this.

Again, I’m skeptical but also pragmatic enough to realize what we have in Section 1 hasn’t been working for a long time. Pointing to the glory days of the Moak era for scope wisdom is like asking Edison what his opinion is on LED ballast circuitry design.