Its May of 2013. The contract was amendable Dec 31, 2012. Your contract is almost a year old. We got a contract early. Perfect? Nope. What I wanted in a full section 6? Nope, but the majority said yes. Respect what your fellow pilots decided. I do and for the process to work, you have to respect the results.

The blame game and Monday Morning Quarterbacking serves no purpose. Its broad based, and goes after anyone and anything. Seek to be specific in the changes you desire, because saying "ALPA Sucks" "They sold us down the river etc," is not a reason nor a solution.

All of us are 12 year.. (for pay purposes) When are you guys gonna get it? The only raises we get are contractually negotiated raises each year. (3% next year and 3% after that).. OR.. if one moves up to a bigger airplane. The problem with that is that our fleet is a triangle. We have fewer and fewer airplanes as they get larger. That's why when you average it all out over a 30 year (or so) career, you are gonna average 767 pay. The problem with that is that in order to average that based on fleet size you are going to a) sacrifice QOL, and b) sacrifice TVM.

Carry on.

Critiquing past failures "serves no purpose?" Are you for real? How else are we going to learn from our missteps and improve for next time?

It's simply beyond debate that we left money on the table. Again.

Rest assured management is "Monday morning quarterbacking" the snot out of the last round of negotiations. For ALPA to stick its head in the sand by suggesting such soul-searching is harmful, and refuse to accept accountability, is the pinnacle of arrogance (and stupidity).

I want ALPA to come out and say "We messed up. We left money on the table. We got caught up in the company's desire to speed things up, and it was a mistake. We accept responsibility. We are taking (X, Y, and Z) steps to make sure it doesn't happen again. Oh, and here are the survey results."

disregard.......

I still disagree for the most part. First of all, Leo had us on a direct course for BK practically the moment he arrived. His appointment of MB just confirmed that. His buy back was for no other reason than to pump up the stock price on a temporary basis in order to fill his parachute. As far as HE was concerned, it paid off nicely. There is a HUGE difference between him and Mr Anderson. Investment grade is the goal. When that happens, money becomes available at better interest rates which is really good for DAL. If you don't believe that, compare Alaska's balance sheets with Delta's. The biggest difference is interest payments. While it is true that paying out money to shareholders reduces cash to plow back into the enterprise, it is a calculated risk. At the LCP meeting, Mr Anderson talked about the amount of capital needed to sustain operations, and this doesn't affect that number. Like I said, I believe that institutional investors will start investing in DAL and that is a good thing that will eventually work it's way to us. (and please spare me the inevitable thuggery and chest beating) Yes we are labor, but IMO that is not what this discussion is about. I am talking about the direction of DAL the corporation. Carl chooses to live in the world of a ****ed off member of labor, and that is fine, but I choose to move on. I am excited about where this company is going.

1) Money is always left on the table. We work under the RLA. Even in C2K we left money on the table.

2) My comments on Monday Morning Quarter backing was directed to the tirades on here. I am sure DALPA looks at every event tactically.

3) DALPA looked at the opportunity and weighed the Pro and the Cons. It was far from a perfect deal but the pilots overwhelmingly approved it for a short term deal.

4) We are in a period of consolidation and liberalization. Those survey results are still valid, esp if you think they were not met.

How about you volunteer some time and work towards the ends that you desire. If DALPA is so backwards, it needs more people willing to fight, people like you. Give it a try. :rolleyes:

None, probably. But I'm at the 12 year point and would rather be an FO at DAL then a CA on a narrow body at Jet Blue. I'm not a Kool aide drinker but I am really excited about where DAL is headed. After 20 years in the left seat in the USAF, I don't need that right now to be a happy camper.

Some day, hopefully.

Me too Buzz.

I got distracted a couple of days ago, but thanks for the response with regard to pay banding. I've only been in the 121 game for a couple of years and have tons to learn (which is a big part of why I'm always hanging around this thread), and have not considered the pros and cons of different pay scenarios.

Don't blame you there, and I'll bet there are more than a few JetBlue Captains with apps in right now. That's why I shake my head at some of the regional FOs that seem to think the turbine PIC no longer matters - it's going to be a loooooong time before Delta clears the pool of people with thousands of hours of time spent in the left seat of a kerosene burner. Most pilots at an LCC under the age of 45, regardless of seat, is at least thinking about taking the leap.

While I tend to agree with this, just to play devil's advocate (I've heard this arguement and wasn't 100% sure how to refute it):

Getting to "investment grade" status (whatever that means, let's assume we are somewhat successful in doing that because of this buyback/dividend, etc) will get us better financing terms and other deals and save us as much or more than we "spend" on it. It will also enable DL to buy all or part of another airline(s) much cheaper relatively speaking. Basically, what T said above. I'm not discounting all of it, but I am highly skeptical that we will get 1B+ hopefull return from the guaranteed 1B outlay.

Again, I can't really wrap my head around that, because can we ever really save more in better financing rates because of this than we would simply paying down that much more debt in the first place? Are we leaving revenue on the table with our inferior/inadequate widebody fleet that we could bolster with this money instead, generating revenue?

From where I see it, best case this is a per merger paper shuffle if it plays out exactly as scripted. Worst case we will be down a billion bucks permanantly from where we could have been if we didn't do this. Woudn't an extra billion in reduced debt (6 instead of 7B?) and/or a more competitive widebody fleet and/or a superior product do more to make us "investment grade" than a scheme to lump in individual investors with pre programmed sector ETF's linked to other airlines, oil, the DOW, etc and throw money at all of them?

Also, as improved as our product has gotten, we need to do more work than we are doing or even have imminent plans for. I can see us succeeding in spite of this plan, but not because of it in any real way. What am I missing?

10B was supposed to be some magic debt number that triggered epic deals on financing and whatnot. OK, we are headed there, and supposedly down to 7. So lower is better, isn't 6B better than 7B?

Then it gets into the insane realm of LBO schenanagans, which I really don't even see how that junk is even legal. In any case, does buying back shares reduce our exposure to hostile takeovers and all that boiler room tomfoolery?