Haha! I thought that was you, counselor. It's all good man. I've been lucky enough to stay away from NYC since about the last time I saw you there at the burrito stand months ago. Glad to see you haven't forgotten about us little narrowbody guys.

 

You don't need me. Your recollection is exactly correct. It is our biggest point of leverage right now. Management desperately needs scope relief from us. THAT'S why they're in such a hurry. But under the RLA, they're powerless to force any change through a lockout or any other means. They can only use fear and hope we relinquish it voluntarily. Like the AirTran guys voluntarily gave up their legal rights because SWA management scared them.

Carl

 

I got you. But, I think the biggest heartache will occur from the note in part 4.

Prediction: Because of that note and the way I think the company will use it, you will have a lot more pilots showing up to work sick during and around the holidays.

But, like you said, the 100 hours/15 days provision is a biggie, too. I think it will effectively limit some of the widebody categories to one sick call a year before they are required to produce a note. Look at the 747-400 trips. Even a lot of the 777 trips are worth more than 50 hours.

Neither is good in my book.

I'm not one to advocate calling in sick when you are not sick. But, it's worse to have a pilot group that is worried about having to produce a doctors note, if they are legitimately sick.

 

All true. And don't overlook the 'fit to fly' requirement we all have. It's not always a sickness that prevents one from being fit to fly- being able to make that call has always been a cornerstone of safety. Now you will have to consider that the company will require you to disclose to an M.D. and to Flight Ops what exactly is preventing you from being fit to fly. Ever had a bad day at home where you don't belong in the cockpit?

Thanks DALPA, for eliminating the SLMP and replacing it with this one, then lying to us about it. I can see now why we need to rush this agreement through.


No talk of this on the DALPA forum either, everyone is too busy trying to decide whether 12 percent is a raise or not. I'll wait for the retro check, thanks.

 

The 7 day provision has always been there and almost never used by the company. Any company has a right to find out why a employee is absent. This agreement actually changes 7 to 15 days and forces the company to pay for the medical visit if required.

 

Ha! I still laugh about that everything I think about it. I'm still a narrow-body guy. I rarely get to fly the big jet. How's that French jet treating you?

 

Sailing, please read this repost- 7 has not been changed to 15. It's a subtle but important change.

It's tricky, and you are missing the stricken sections such as "verification of sick leave will not normally be required for absences less than 7 days". That is gone for a reason!

This new policy creates two sick "buckets". VERIFIED and UNVERIFIED. If you get sick under the TA, you must consider that if you don't go to the Doctor and get a note for the company, it will now count against your 100 hours of UNVERIFIED sick leave. So you'll want to go get that note because if you don't get it while you're sick, there is no way to recapture that UNVERIFIED leave. And since you will be going on your own initiative, the company doesn't have to pay for the visit.

In addition to and inclusive of the above, if you are out more than 15 days, or 100 hours, or for any "good faith" reason the company wants to invent--(over a holiday, after vacation week, etc...) the company now REQUIRES a doctors certificate... For EVERY OCCURRANCE from a Medical Doctor, and in that case, you'd be reimbursed.

But it also begs the question about other reasons you aren't fit to fly, which I won't get into here, but as we all know we must self certify fit to fly. This new scheme would force you to disclose those reasons, whatever they may be.

To me this is a big change, and this used to be the sort of thing ALPA used to look out for us on. But now the NC claims the SLMP is gone when in fact it's been strengthened. This is not good for the pilots of DL.

 

I did see that language written over in the TA, sailing. I understand that part. But, more significantly, I think what's in the note was put there for a reason and has legal significance. I won't get into the specifics, but that's what I was trying to point out to fly.

Either way, the more obvious sick leave usage tightening is the requirement for a doctors note for sick time used over 100 hours.

At first glance (and the second one, too), it looks like we are ushering in a more restrictive sick leave/doctors note policy for the former NWA pilots who fly the 747-400 than they had before.

Do you agree that if you were on the 747-000, that that provision would limit you to one sick call per year before before you would have to provide a doctors certificate? Or, is there somewhere else in the TA that mitigates this?

 

Sorry if this has been asked and answered, but can this TA be quantified in how much it's going to cost the company in actual dollars each year? Wasn't that part of the whole process--determine/agree that the company could afford $XXX million more in pilot compensation each year? If so, what's that number? And if we have a figure, did our NC do right by the pilot group agreeing to that number, or would some argue the NC can't argue that number as stated by the company's negotiators, and just have to work with that they got?

 

I think you mean savings to the company in actual dollars each year.