I notice a very few posters are extremely vocal and persistent that the new reserve system is unfair to junior guys. A few thoughts:

1. Too soon to know on way or another. To get a good feel we will have to run through a full 12 months including times when we are short on reserve pilots and times when we are fat on reserve pilots.

2. Every time I looked at RAW vs seniority - I saw no pattern. In fact last month I posted a few snapshots that showed the senior guys had higher raw scores.

3. When DALPA and the company revisit this they will have all the data from all categories. No amount of complaining will matter if an analysis of the data does not show a problem.

4. Even in a totally "fair" system there will be "Winners" and "Losers" each month.

5. Guys have also said that the new reserve systems weighs seniority much more than for line-holders and used the example of a senior line-holder getting a green-slip and then going to the back of the green-slip list, spreading the wealth. True, just as a reserve pilot getting a green-slip goes to the back of the list.

6. When bidding for his schedule the senior most pilot picks whatever trips he wants. Even the number two guys cannot pick his very first trip until the number one pilot has picked his last trip. Is this also unfair? Should the senior guy pick a single trip and then the number two pilot his first trip, and the the number three pilot pick his first trip etc, etc...

Finally -If it can be shown, via a thorough and extensive analysis that the new reserve system is unfair to the junior pilots then lets fix it. But I am not in favor of any change based on the perceptions or even the experience of a few guys who had a rough month.

Scoop

 

I'm sorry if I offended you. That was not my intention.
#1. It is not a "family business". My wife started AngryPilotWife.blog for laughs and then decided it would be a great way to raise money for Friends of Mel, the cancer charity set up to honor one of our Flight Attandants, who lost her battle with breast cancer. That's where the proceeds are going.
#2. I only posted the link because this thread is getting SOOOO effing depressing, that I thought we could all use a laugh. Lighten up, brother. Smile more, and try to do some good in the universe.
#3 As it stands, 400+ people have followed her link to the charity to help support it, and we're up to $65.00 in page view revenue for donation.
Again, it was NOT my intention to be "tasteless". I thought I could share a laugh with my Delta Brothers, and help support a very worthy cause.

 

Well put Scoop! I agree with your post above and this is from a guy who bid reserve this month (I didn't have to) and has already did 3 SC and one three day. I went all in and bid 18 on and the last 12 days off.

Next month doing it the other way for 12 off and 18 on.

 

Sounds like Donald Sutherland - woof woof.

 

CGI, that's not real...

I like how they suggest we would break D-0 to get a guy with a cast on the jet ;-)

Cheers
George

 

and

OK. I don't actually know how they're chosing the number. Seems like they're making it 80 when there isn't much flying. 80 is about 40 hours, or a four-day trip and three SC. 80 is about as far as I would stretch it, and 80 means senior probably doesn't fly in a very low month, but since junior is 40 hours ahead max... I can live with it. Then again I would probably say that if you've done 2 3-day trips and one SC, senior should go out. So... 70 max?

I agree. Aren't we getting predictable SC, starting in May?

OK, it's not a winner take all, so we agree mostly. When we had a pure seniority-based system, we also had ~30% Reserves. Nowadays, Reserves in the summer merely become unscheduled lineholders, at which point the RAW buckets are really mostly about letting senior step up and volunteer early, to pick the flying he's going to fly, because he sure is going to fly. I'm all for distributing the flying according to seniority, but I'm not trying to create a privileged elite.

Which is why I sometimes don't understand how you look at senior and junior as if they are two distinct groups. It's a graduated scale. It's not "the senior" that benefit, and "the junior" that lose, it's always a question of letting the more senior of two pilots get the first shot at picking first out of two assigned trips in the summer, and about letting the senior pilot have more opportunities to sit out the winter. More, not all.

 

But what would constitute a problem?

I said that if seniority should be honored everywhere like the reserve RUO, why is it not honored as it once was* with green slips?

*according to the pilot who returned to a pure seniority based GS system. No limits, no spreading the wealth. In his view, being in the top 3% of the category, he gets screwed. Seniority is absolutely honored all over the place, but where do you draw the line? Because a line is being drawn.

For instance, with reserve a relatively senior pilot in comparison to other reserve pilots (but probably still junior to the most senior pilots) will be paid 70 hours but can easily fly 0 hours if they know when to and not to ask for SC and how to bid their days. Multiple pilots did this in my category.

If that's okay, why don't we have a system where senior pilots can bid a line, drop their flying and get paid ALV? That's why I say this system should not be so arbitrary, come up with a mathematical equation that on the last day of the month publishes the raw thresholds based off available to required ratios, block hours to be flown, open time snapshots, average length of trips in category, longest trip in category, average short calls per pilot for a given period, etc.

I do not like arbitrary.

 

According to ALPA, the idea was that 80 points represented something around 5 or 6 days of flying plus a short call.


On my category a day is 10-11 points. Usually 11. So basically 8 days i.e. two 4-days. A 4 day and a 3 day would not do it without a SC. And 5 to 6 days plus a short call falls very short.



But maybe in the other categories, which are a separate group anyways, a day is worth more. Which is my thing, take the longest trip in category plus a short call maybe two and I think that's a fair threshold. Of course international needs to be adjusted downwards with some of the lengths of those trips.


I believe so. The thing about reserve, three things needed to be cleaned up bad. Short Call assignments, short call counting for something and Yellow Slips. They got those in LOA 29 which is great.

I understand your point and I agree with you. And don't see a junior vs senior separate classes here, I guess what I'm arguing for is the group that is 10-50% in reserve category. They're the ones most affected. So they're not junior, just junior to the top 10%.

 

The video (Don Sutherland) says" The map shows where we go but not how we get there". We get there by Alaska, Hawaiian, AF, KLm etc..

TEN

 

[QUOTE=forgot to bid;1147465]

But what would constitute a problem?


That is the million dollar question - what is a fair amount to weigh seniority? I have no idea, but I certainly wouldn't change the system based on the data from the months of February and March flying, no matter how skewed it was.

Scoop