Hope they take care of you better than my Scheduling Committee took care of me.

 

It doesn't work to my advantage and the great pay and great schedules I have been enjoying will go away, as it should. Seniority must be honored and that is to my disadvantage today, but it will not always be that way. I have the option of displacing or AEing if I so choose. The senior guys should get the better trips and the better schedules. It was that way pre ch11 and it is now going that way again. As as result, I will look at different seats and bases, but it is because I want a certain type of lifestyle, and now I will have to find it where my seniority will hold.

Should there be a tweak or two?, maybe, but lets see how it runs going forward for a few months before we all freak out.

 

I have been reading these posts about the new reserve rules, and yes, it is a large departure to a system that totally abrogates seniority. It will irk a lot of junior guys because they have been getting good schedules and great trips that they previously had not been able to touch. It may in fact put some seniority back in to the WB seats. It effects me greatly, but as I have said, honoring seniority is a must.

Also remember that we will not always be junior on the equipment that we are on, and our perspectives will change wrt to these changes.

 

Jabberwock,

I agree it is extremely frustrating for most of us -everyone except for the WB Captains can consider themselves stagnating. Everything is relative, If a guy he thought he might be flying a 777 or 747 by now he might consider himself stagnating as a NB captain.

A little perspective:

1991 DAL hires were paired with 1995 or 1996 NW guys.
DAL furloughed about 500 guys in 1992.
5 year 1991 hires would have killed for a 737 or even a 88 - they were flying sideways.
Oh yeah B scale.

DAL furloughed over 1000 guys after 911. Guys were just getting recalled at the 5 year point.

I would hope the DAL bottomed out as a career in the last decade and things will get better. And as soon as we start hiring exactly what you said about USAIR new Hires will also be true at DAL. Remember a "snapshot" comparison in this career rarely paints an accurate long term picture.


Scoop

 

Both. Lost the -9 left seat due to parking and now those "other" guys are bidding the left seat in front of me. I know a handful North guys around the 50% level actually got a seniority increase. As for the rest of the list, I am not an expert. I only focused on what happened to me.

 

Nice try at class warfare. If John Wayne were alive he would reach across the console (think High and Mighty) and give you a couple of slaps. Fuel prices have risen dramatically in the last few years. Delta has two options: they can flood the market with seats lose tons of money and then go bankrupt or they can control capacity and make money.

Last year Delta faced a large spike in fuel costs, ice storms, earthquake, volcanoes, slow US economy, recession in Europe, growth slowdown in China, stagnant Japanese economy and I am sure I have left some out.

The result: You got a five percent compensation increase and a healthy profit sharing check coming in four days. Your response: self pity because you aren't moving up. Boo hoo for you. I made MD-88 f/o in year 2 and then was still there 7 years later. Boo hoo for me. My fourth year B-Scale pay rate on the 88 was less than our current probationary pay. Boo hoo for me.

So yes after 20+ years I am stagnated at a much higher level than you but certainly you have been around the industry long enough to understand the seniority system at Delta. When was the last time that Delta hired direct entry Captains? In the 40's maybe during the war, I really have no idea. If someone promised you never ending growth, it wasn't me, I have lived the up and down too much.

Back in 2005 and 2006 when everyone else thought I was crazy, I was clamoring for our MEC to think about merging. We had these wild boom and bust cycles from 85-91 (boom) 91-96 (bust) (96-2001) boom (01-06) the Mother of All Busts. What about that prospect seems enticing to you? I have got the bankruptcy T-Shirt and I don't need another.

In 2007 the MEC, as consolidation seemed inevitable, undertook a strategy to enhance and accelerate the merger and obtain contractual improvements as a result of the merger. Everyone saw the need for consolidation and the hope was that airlines would no longer ride the massive up and down roller coaster but rationally control capacity and pricing to produce significant profits, profits that could be used to fill back up our wallets. As yet, no one has been able to even imitate our success.

Well 2011 pretty much proved that hypothesis. Consolidation has brought solid results in a year when there was excuse after excuse for management to show losses. Along the way, Delta pilots have recaptured $2 billion in value from our JCBA, more if you include profit sharing. How many months had you been a Delta pilot when you got several thousand shares of Delta stock, not options, stock placed in your retirement account? That was a pretty nice welcome to Delta present.

Your situation is that you just got a bigger raise on Jan 1 than US Airways, American, Continental, and United have gotten combined over the last 4 years. Think about that, 16 years of contracts versus 1. The MEC is now running at max velocity aiming to have our second post bankruptcy contract done before all the rest of them get their first.

I would say I am sorry you are stagnated, but I'm not. Growth for growth's sake is moronic and whatever short term sugar high it gives you the downside crash always produces more pain than the growth did. Anyone that thinks they should leave Delta right now for some short term sugar high at another carrier would be making a huge mistake. Delta is now years ahead of their competitors. Look at our revenue momentum. We are now on solid financial footing and have all the pieces in place to act as a buyer and consolidator rather than a target for fragmentation.

So, please, play the class warfare card on me, I am immune to forum attacks now, they are all just a little childish and my kids are all grown now. You should thank your lucky stars that you are where you are right now. This is a long game and your time horizon should be measured in years and not weeks. All the rest of you too, quit feeling sorry for yourselves it is unbecoming.

 

Of course we're despondent the with sandbaggers and management hopefuls we have on our MEC.

Yet another chapter in the coordinated campaign by DALPA to lower expectations and lay the groundwork for a crap contract. Heaven forbid they bear down and get tough with the company.

It must have been slowplay's turn to collect FPL earlier this week, and now it's alfa's turn to take our money for posting here.

 

Good gawd it's hard to read your posts sometimes with all the wrong words you put in a paragraph.

Does the word "moderation" mean anything to you? "We got what we wanted"....ahhhhhh, No. More respect for seniority was desired: e.g. make a YS do what a YS should do-Good. Allow a pilot to list a trip he'd rather have if he had to fly, but didn't necessarily want to fly-Good. Put in place a SC system that awards some point to the RAW score-Good. All very good and praiseworthy changes. But there's respecting seniority and then there's using it to abuse your fellow pilots. I could see this as a bitter pill you have to swallow if it weren't for the stagnation that has been here and will be here for the foreseeable future. Unfortunately, the fact is stagnation is here and will be here.

Some say this is what the majority of pilots wanted. Well, I believe that you can get away with that statement to a point because the vast majority did want some changes; changes that came with the LOA. But it's a huge assumption that what we have now is what a vast majority wanted. The sentiment I'm seeing is that the majority think this bucket system with it's current values is not in line with what they envisioned. It still doesn't do anything to prevent a senior pilot with a one point lower RAW score to avoid getting a trip that a junior pilot would otherwise get (when the two are in separate buckets). A system that gave a pilot a consistent and continuous advantage in RAW points regardless of how much flying or SCs he's done would prevent this from happening. But giving a pilot 80 pts from the start is out of line with what I believe many think is right.

The voices you hear now are mostly speaking up for smaller buckets. Trying to quiet them with "This is what the majority wanted" will not work and avoids the concern many have. Furthermore, if you want to change it you have to speak up, so expect to keep hearing it.

 

Sounds like you (and our MEC in general) are pretty satisfied with what you've accomplished and where we are now. That actually explains a lot.

 

Then get off your fat *** and go make it better. Nothing would make me happier than watching you flounder around so I could throw tomatoes at you. I know, crying like a little girl on the forum is much easier. Boo hoo for you too.