And that's my point. In an emergency, you work for an airline that doesn't even fly you to where you need to go, just authorizes really good standby seats.

 

oh I totally agree. I don’t understand the “delta family” that many pilots seem to think exists. We don’t even get the same emergency/bereavement benefits as other airlines, let alone any kind of “family” treatment.

 

As much as DL loves to do "DL family" rah rah speak, while they got me off the trip, other than S1A authorized, that was it for help getting to dads bedside.

I and another DL CA did more when a friend got hurt bad in a motorcycle crash far from home (like ICU and multiple emergency surgeries bad, he's better now) , I bought his wife a ticket, and by pure dumb luck the CA on the flight was a guy whose name I recognized from the memes page of all places, and I called him and told him what the deal was (last flight of night, she was going to be tight on making it if TSA was backed up) and he made sure she got on the flight and was taken care of. That's far more than the "we will PD the rest of your trip without pay, DH you back to your base, and S1A is authorized" that I got from DL.

 

I mean, that's what comes with being in a union. The "delta family" likely does exist for the non-cons. Do we go "above and beyond" the PWA when the company asks us to? Generally, No. Should they go "above and beyond" the PWA when we ask them to? Yes would be nice. But to expect them to is just being hypocritical.

And no, I'm not shilling for the company. The PWA is paramount. I would like the company to do even more, but the environment we operate in does not make me hate the company for not doing more than the PWA decrees, just as I would not suffer indignation for honoring the PWA when the company asks me for more.

 

They absolutely do not. Take some time and talk to the FAs. The way they are treated is absolutely horrifying

 

I was doing a flight with an FA who's Dad took a sudden turn for the worse. Delta held the flight to where her Dad was for her and an in-flight manager of some kind stood in for her for deplaning so she could go. This was 2-3 years ago, I don't recall precisely.

 

Just like the GS counter. #1 doesn't get to go back after accepting the offer. Yes, the real fix is proper staffing and trip coverage.

 

A 23m7 counter is a bad idea. We all agree that having the top 1-2 pilots in a category vacuuming up all the 23m7 payments, including multiple in a day, is a bad system. Counters work for GS because the pilot in is complete control of what they are choosing. If a senior pilot takes a 1 day as G#1 early in the month, he is knowingly passing up on the shot at a juicy 4 day unless it drops to him again as #2. With m7 many times a pilot doesn’t even know they were skipped until the pay shows up on their time card. And you can’t argue that the senior guys should only put in for the exact trips they really want because it’s nearly impossible to create a slip for every possible rotation contingency. Plus guys who clear their schedule still need to keep rolling WS in because that’s how they fill their schedule every week. A counter is not a fair system when #1 gets m7 #1 as a 1 day trip then probably won’t ever get m7 #2 in any decent sized category.

Let’s not forget that the purpose of m7 is to make whole the pilot who got skipped who theoretically was going to be awarded the rotation. That’s why the footprint system is much more reasonable and fair as it assumes the skipped pilot actually flew the rotation and is then ineligible for any further m7 payments for any rotation that reports during the footprint of the first rotation +10 hours. So that pilot is truly made whole while still being eligible for future skips without waiting for the entire category to get m7 payments. This system would still keep m7 payments as a fairly senior item (except for when they IA a trip in the middle of a coverage step) but would definitely spread the love much more than it is today.

 

And that is exactly why a counter is a bad idea for this problem. This is the company choosing NOT the pilot.

 

How much of the "proper staffing" is us needing to actually hire more pilots VS a few top guys dropping their whole schedules and leaving the rest of us with a month full of black days?

Mind you, I don't doubt we have to hire more pilots, I just don't think that paints the full picture of the staffing problem.