Something I realized I like with SS pay, holiday pay; there is no trigger.

I don’t GS sometimes cause I’m not at/not gonna hit the trigger.

ss and holiday pay has no trigger. 😁

All this talk of PB days and rolling thunder coming to an end. How many pilots benefit from it?

I looked at my category, NB, it has 302 pilots total. 43 are reserve and the others, line. That's 14% on reserve. Out of that 14%, how many will get to do their rolling thunder and PB days? I know it's not the junior reserves. Just flew with one, all he's getting is his butt rolled across this country and burned out.

In my example I'm guessing the top 10 reserve pilots get to work the system pretty well (As I have done in the past) , the other 33 not so much. That is 4% in my category that get to do rolling thunder and get PB days. So all this "no rolling thunder and PB days",, Me thinks the majority don't care. I can't blame them.

Every pilot benefits directly or indirectly.

Anyone can do rolling thunder. Tell your junior FO to bid the end of the month off on reserve. I think a lot of pilots don’t know how you use one of the best deals in our current contract for pay and time off with PB days.

Honestly the talk of rolling thunder is a bit overblown. Last year I truly rolled thunder 1 full month, and about the first half of another month. However, I ended up with about 16 banked PB days mostly by keeping the end of months off and snagging 1, occasionally 2 GS during that last week where all days went into the bank. This is more the true power of PB days. That and more strategically getting a GS where the PB days take out LC days that were forced coverage on your schedule over days you'd prefer to have off.

That's not rolling thunder. Rolling thunder is getting PB days over LC days, then getting more GS over those PB days, rolling those PB days on the next stretch, etc. Rolling Thunder requires probably at least 3 GS in a month, usually 4 or more. The end-of-month single-GS stuff, like I said in my post above, is not rolling thunder but rather just strategic use of GS and PB days.

I know. The best perk is get the PB days. Point I was making, a junior pilot can bid the end of the month off on reserve and will get some PB days. Then go make extra money with them or take a month off with them on reserve. Sad we will be getting rid of one of the best items in our current contract.

Actually that is not rolling thunder either. Back in the days there was no GS 1, 2 , 3 thing. You just got a gs, get home and get a call for another gs. And keep going knocking out all your reserve days. Flew with a captain that had banked 54 PB days in a matter of months. That was rolling thunder how it got coined. I asked him if his wife missed him. He said "yes", but her BMW is paid for.

Or just fly one trip and the end of the month. Get paid over 100 hours for the month and get PB days in your bank.
Next month took off June and July with PB days on reserve. So fly 1 trip and take 2 months off. QOL.
New contract, this will be hard to do.

Would like to know if the company or union negotiated SS and VAS? My gut says the company.

So the bidding parameters allow every pilot in base to bid reserve and all the pilots can bid the end of the month off? Shazamm...let's all do it! Easy peasy.