Airline Pilot Central Forums - Any "Latest & Greatest" about Delta?

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Quote:

Originally Posted by Timbo (Post 1584204)

Yup. He decided we needed to lower our CASM to match Value Jet's. Hmm...I wonder where Value Jet got the cheap DC9's to start up in the first place?

Oh, that's right, from Mo'Ron. (actually from the leasing co. Mo'Ron sold them to, he should have kept them like NW did, or made beer cans out of them so no new start up could use them against us)

I skipped over the whole 7.5 thing when typing last night (sorry sir, I was watching Jimmy Fallon!).

By 1993, it was obvious Mo'Ron couldn't figure out -how- to run the airline, even though he'd worked at Delta since College. So he brought in a consulting group to investigate the operation, and give recommendations. The name of that group was McKinsey Associates.

About Us | McKinsey & Company

After a 90 day review, McKinsey's people told him to fire everyone except the pilots and F/A's. A Chief Pilot riding on our jumpseat was coming from the "Big Meeting" with Ron and the rest of flight ops, where he laid out his 7.5 plan. He was very depressed when he told us what was about to go down.

At that meeting, Ron said McK Ass. told him, "You have rampers and cabin cleaners working for you, making $40,000yr, and you are giving them retirement and health care benefits?! (a lot of money in 1993 dollars) Those are Minimum Wage Jobs! Get RID of EVERYONE you can, and hire contractors to do those menial, minimum wage jobs!"

Back then, just about everybody you met on a Delta airplane, worked for Delta. Cabin cleaners, baggage loaders, certainly all the mechanics. If you wanted to work for Delta (other than Pilots and F/A's), you had to start on the ramp or cleaning cabins, and work your way up. BUT...Delta had never laid anyone off. Once you were hired, you were in the Delta Family, for life. You may remember the Delta Employees took up a collection to pay for the first 767? The Spirit of Delta. The reason they did was because in 1981, when the Air Traffic Controllers went on strike, all the other Majors laid of thousands of workers. Delta didn't. As a Thank You, the employees voluntarily contributed money to buy the Spirit of Delta in 1983.

Anyone remember the day Ron walked through the Delta General Offices and fired 20% of the life long, loyal Delta people? After he did this, the AJC did an interview with him about employee moral, in light of the firings. That's when Ron made the infamous quip: "If moral suffers, So Be It!"

McK was a huge fan of, and on the cutting edge of a new business model called;

Outsourcing. :eek:

Guess who worked for McK at the time? Leo Mullen. During McK's investigation of Delta's operations, and subsequent report to the BOD is where Jerry met Leo.

That's why Jerry picked Leo to replace Ron in 1997, when Ron's 10yr. contract was up, and that's when Leo started outsourcing...everything!

Thank you for typing that up.

Weak managers let costs get out of hand, then want to fire everybody to re set the cost structure. Then the weak managers repeat that performance, destroying careers and middle class jobs.

I believe current Delta management has broken that cycle.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Bucking Bar (Post 1584297)

Someone already mentioned the book "Airline Without A Pilot" by Harry Nolan. It goes into detail about all of this. One thing the book omits is the Consultant groups name which is referred to as Consultant X.

The book really slams Leo - It actually says hiring Leo was worse for DAL than 9-11.

I highly recommend this book - especially for guys on this forum who are curious about the history of DAL.

Airline Without A Pilot - Leadership Lessons/Inside Story of Delta's Success, Decline and Bankruptcy: Harry L. Nolan: 9780977207602: Amazon.com: Books

Scoop

Quote:

Originally Posted by tsquare (Post 1584280)

And then we have guys here that are in high warble over the downsizing of that same NRT hub...

Guess you have all the numbers and insight into NRT. Good to know

Quote:

Originally Posted by n9810f (Post 1584183)

Absolutely perfect plane to overfly Japan from the US. United is way ahead of us on this.

Northwest had the foresight went it ordered the 787 to do much the same. Building A was looking at SEA-SYD and similar routes.

The flaw in Richard's no new modern widebody aka the 787 is the 767-300ER's can't do much of the over-Japan flying, right? That's why we ordered the 10 333's I believe. But that's still not enough. It's a major disadvantage.

That was idiot Steinland that placed the 787 order. Thank goodness Anderson had the foresight to delay delivery.

Hi Guys,
I have a question about 'shadow bidding'. I THINK I understand it, but not certain. We have an unexpected expense we're incurring this month, that'll take up just a bit more than the profit sharing check we received last week. Our home's new heat pump, (builder's grade---sheesh) we're having to replace it.
OK, so I get out of G/S training Feb. 7th, then my shadow period goes from Feb. 8-17th. I received two trips during regular PBS bidding that, at the end of the bid award, gets my month up to 65.8 hours of credit. OK, now, I get two trips awarded for TOE that are worth 26.5 and 36.5 hours of credit.
Do I get paid for the trips awarded--but not flown--during the shadow period, PLUS the trips I actually FLY during TOE? Greater of the two? Or some combination? Or, where on DAL net do I make the pay inquiry?
I'm wondering if the mid-month paycheck on 15March will help offset some of this un-expected expense. Thanks!

Quote:

Originally Posted by chuck416 (Post 1584329)

Generally, you'll be paid the higher of the two, IF they trips overlap.

For example, if the TOE trips were in the first 10 days of the month and your trips that were awarded in PBS were at the end of the month [ie, they don't overlap] then you'd just get paid for all the flying.

If the trips overlap, so that you can only fly some of them or aren't done with OE by the time you fly them, you'll get paid for the larger trip.

There isn't a way really to put in pay enquiry until the month ends - you can look at your Time Card in iCrew, and it will detail what you're month will be. The Pay Statement (which is where you get paid from) come out on the 15th of the next month. (ie, Feb 15th had the Jan flying on it). It's complicated to read, and you can double-click on some lines in it to drill down for more details. It's in iCrew too.

Quote:

Originally Posted by 80ktsClamp (Post 1584324)

That was idiot Steinland that placed the 787 order. Thank goodness Anderson had the foresight to delay delivery.

Just saw this post---most would agree that it's a good thing we didn't get the "A" model of the 787. However, Boeing had to pay us big bucks for the cancellation of the order that they never filled. I asked S.D. in a management-pilot meeting in MEM a two fold question about this:
>Do you know what the $ penalty hit Boeing owes us (Delta) for not fulfilling the 787 order, and
>Can you share that info with us?
His reply was (close paraphrase) 'Yes, we have that number. It is substantial, and No, I can't tell you what it is'.
I suspect that the 787 order cancellation gave us some premium pricing on the 737-900 order, as well as greased the skids WRT the 717s we wrested away from SWA/Air-Tran. Of course, I don't have intimate knowledge of that suspicion, but it seems to stand to reason. Yeah, the 787 would've been a unmitigated mess here for our airline, but it worked out pretty well--it would appear. Not arguing with you, but simply trying to provide context.

Quote:

Originally Posted by boog123 (Post 1584313)

Guess you have all the numbers and insight into NRT. Good to know

Not saying that I do,but some things are pretty obvious even to the most casual observer.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Scoop (Post 1584306)

Harry Nolan and I shared a table at an alumni dinner in mid 2007. You should have heard his opinion of NWA. He told me I should quit Delta, immediately, nothing good could come of being an employee of NWA management.

He was right about the merger, management structure and consolidation. He was wrong about the treatment of employees. Delta is still a good place to work and improving .....