I understand that, but what I'm saying here is that we got a side letter extension from the 175 over hour projection. I will email my guru ER buddy right now and ask him how it went down. Look for an update.

No Furlough Clauses I must add that I was a bit miffed when ALPA did this autonomously without our blessings.

THIS IS IMPORTANT STUFF FOR FUTURE NEGOTIATIONS!!!!!!
No Furlough Clauses are very deceptive and a complex issue to say the least. I could probably write a dissertation on the subject, but I will refrain and give the Reader’s Digest version instead. As a young 727 engineer, I had many discussions and enlightenments from Captains much wiser than I. I will attempt in a short span to relay their wisdom in a few short blurbs. I must admit, that this is short notice and I haven’t spent much time on this development. If I had, it would make much more sense. I will also add that as a new guy hanging on the bottom of the seniority list, their insights were not immediately and happily accepted. It was throughout the years, that I began to realize the wisdom of their guidance. ALPA cannot accept this view as it would appear to abandon the bottom dwellers. Nothing could be further from the truth.
1) Furlough clauses are very expensive clauses for which the pilot group as a whole pays dearly.
2) Airlines have always desperately needed the flexibility of varying the work force with demand. This is not a good thing for the junior people; nevertheless, it is generally mandatory for survival.
3) Secretly, management loves “No Furlough Clauses” because in general, they aren’t worth the paper they are written on, yet they are hugely concessionary to the pilot group.
4) Although Pilot politically correct, furlough clauses are many times renegotiated or simply changed under duress when times get rough, making them an unrecoverable cost/loss to the pilot group.
5) End result is generally a huge concession to attain a no furlough clause, but in the end, if the situation dictates, furloughs will be accepted by all parties regardless of previous agreements.
6) Bottom line: Don’t be lured into and let future negotiations be driven by worthless “No furlough clauses.” ALPA must be politically correct with this issue, but don’t be fooled into spending a large amount of your negotiating power on this issue. You will be wasting your hard earned cash which will never be redeemed.
These are just thoughts I’d like to share with you from former Captains before us. These thoughts are most likely going to be viewed negatively by many. I would expect nothing less. I, myself viewed these ideas with disdain for many years, but I eventually settled on their realistic values. The fact is that “No furlough clauses” are extremely expensive with no intrinsic value. They only protect pilots in the good times. In the bad times, these “written in stone” agreements are shattered into rubble only to reflect a costly yet worthless agreement. Our brethren at the bottom are just as important as our brethren at the top, but these costly agreements are not the answer. I know this isn’t a topic of the hour, but it is just food for future thought. I'm just saying..............

I have not heard of that. Now if you are taking about the ones associated with the 76 seat scope grievance/settlement, I am aware of those.

Waves,

If you are talking no furloughs due to the economy - I would tend to agree, but even this is simplistic. Conversely if you bring scope, code-shares and JVs into the picture it gets a little muddled.

FWIW 250 FM-2 guys got recalled with back pay due to our No Furlough clause in 2003. This was after the arbitrator ruled DAL could not furlough any more FM-1 guys. Who knows if it was worth what it cost in bargaining - but I bet the guys recalled due to the no-furlough clause think it was worth it.

Finally I will say the issue is too complex to adequately discuss on a web-board. For example - if we had an ironclad no-furlough clause many people think this would often deter the company from hiring until it was way understaffed and keep the operation continuously running lean. Great for senior guys wanting green-slips - terrible for guys on reserve getting beat up.

You could probably argue point counter-point on the no furlough clause for days, and then throw in the second and third order affects from Scope and JVs and pretty soon you are looking at a doctoral thesis.

Scoop

Really Scoop? Being intimately familiar with the plight of the 250, I know quite a few that never saw one cent of back pay. Where are you gettting your facts? I would definitely say that a no furlough clause is not worth any negotiating capital as it is not worth anything.

As the flight ops managers said at the recall meeting, the furlough was "just business." If it makes good business sense to them to do it again, they will regardless of what a contract says. It will be done and they will force the issue into the grievance process. Hey, they might even get lucky and have the MEC Chairman settle it on his own for less than their projected outcome making it a win for them.

That's exactly the extension I'm talking about. I can't remember the details. Can you elaborate on it? Thanks

I was in the very last group of Furloughees prior to the 250. I missed being in that group by about 25 numbers. I have friends in the 250 who in hindsight (after the uncertainity) made out quite well.

But read my post again - you are misinterpreting it. I think a no-furlough clause may be useful at times and at other times may be worthless. My main point was that it is a very complicated issue, and unless it is seriously studied in detail by guys with big brains we won't really know one way or another. Even then it will always be subject to the whims of lawyers and arbitration panels which is my point - extremely complicated and hard to know for sure.

Finally using your logic you can say that anything we bargain for can be worthless if the company files BK and assualts our contract. Guys lost pensions, payrates, sickleave etc, all of which we used negotiating capitol on - should we not use negotiating capitol for improvements in these areas because the company previously did not honor our contract?

Scoop

Waves,

I don't have the exact language right now but I think this rough draft is fairly accurate. Basically, if anyone is furloughed then every 76 seater above the cap is converted to 70 seats, & if a certain 2001 DAL-S hire is furloughed then all 76 seater will be converted to 70 seats.

I'm sure somebody will post the correct language. I'm on my iPhone so I can do it now.

This is good language to have in a contract. There should be defined consequences in the contract for every little thing. Why there's not just amazes me. The contract should read like this. The company shall do....If the company fails to, this happens. This could be something as simple as the pilot gets 10 hours of pay to the pilot gets 20 dollars, but consequences need defined in our contract.

DALPA went away from a strategy of getting a no furlough clause. As pointed out there are times when a company has to furlough. The new strategy which was a brain child of Lee Moak is to layer in many levels of economic penalties to the company in the event of a furlough. I think its a much smarter way to do business. The company can furlough but with all the costs now built into the contract to furlough you know the company is only going to do it if its a last resort. Those financial penalties kept pilots on the payroll the last two years because in the end it would have cost the company money to furlough the surplus. Its also much harder for the company to challenge a multi layered economic penalty system to furloughs.
Overall this is a much better approach then a straight no furlough clause.

What's with all the furlough talk recently?