Furlough Protection
 

Do we have furlough protection from the bailout? I’ve heard different things.

Well considering they are withholding most of the text from the bill, we won't know for sure until it gets fully passed.

Please post when you find out.


Thanks

It isn’t explicitly titled as “furlough protection,” but the CARES Act as passed by the Senate states that airlines receiving aid “must agree to refrain from conducting involuntary furloughs and reducing rates and benefits until Sept. 30, 2020.” I would assume that this language will be substantially the same in the House version, as well as in the merged bill.

Source: https://www.kramerlevin.com/en/persp...by-senate.html

Full text of the legislation: https://www.npr.org/2020/03/25/82075...us-relief-bill

Although this is good news why would the company take bailout money when its just a loan which will further their debt. Havent read the bill yet but theres likely grants in there which will help the company.

The grants are payroll protections.

The legislation provides for both grants (designed to pay worker salaries) and loans. You can find summaries of the key points in multiple sources, to include “New York Times,” “Washington Post,” “Wall Street Journal,” etc.

NY Post link here;

http://nypost.com/2020/03/24/nyc-dec...partment-memo/

Classy. Here’s a sample write up on the airline portion of the stimulus from the “Wall Street Journal:”

“ U.S. to Take Stakes in Airlines in Exchange for Grants, Mnuchin Says”

So the big question is whether Envoy or any other WO falls under the same protections as their mainline owners with these bailouts and grants.

Might be hard for AAG to argue with epays showing where your pay checks come from. Something ALPA should be looking into at a DC level for sure.

wish everyone the best through this.

My understanding is the wording of the bill(s) is specific to "air carrier" when it comes to furlough and wage guarantees. Given we have a separate air carrier certificate to AA's, I'm curiously waiting to see just 'how' everyone applies for the aid.

Im not even sure, we are “Envoy Air Inc” not even “Envoy Airlines”.. as some would say, we’re a staffing agency and ground handling service.

My epays shows my paystub comes from Envoy Air Inc. in the top left corner, not American.

Although I do hope we are covered under this.

I’m not sure how specifically the law will be interpreted on this case, but PR risk for AAG is probably larger than its worth. The cost savings of furloughing a few hundred or even a thousand or two regional pilots is minimal compared to the risk of coming under fire for taking government money and then furloughing under some loophole corporate structure.

Obviously, this is just my opinion, but I doubt this is the last help AAG will need from Congress before this nightmare is over. I don’t think they want to bite the hand that feeds them right now.

If the grant money is going to pay all the employees until October 1, why would they even want to furlough until after that date?

^^ This 1000%. Couldnt have said it better

to pocket the money instead of blowing it out on tens of thousands of employees who aren’t doing much because there’s no demand for the seats

If the company was smart they would offer low paying leave time. If they offered something like AA’s 40-50 hour lines people would bid them I for one can’t afford to have no income though.

I don't think they could do that.

Their options are:

#1: Take the grants, use the money to keep employees mostly intact (minus voluntary cutbacks, VLOA's, etc).
Advantage: Free money to preserve capacity in case they need it later this year. Good PR.
Disadvantage: What if the grant $ is not enough to cover payroll costs for idle employees? That get's to #2...



#2: Pass on the grants, and manage their own way out it. If the grants don't cover payroll, they would be financially better off in the short-term taking no grants, and immediately taking a weed-whacker to rank-and-file labor. It still might be worth it to take the grants and pay the delta out of pocket to preserve capacity IF they think they're going to need it soon...

But if they're concerned about near-term cash bleed-out and BK, they may not be able to afford to pay ANYTHING above the grants to preserve capacity that might or might not be needed soon.

Also it's possible that the answer could be different for AA vs. the WO's... I think they are sufficiently arms-length that each operating company could make their own decision without affecting the others.

For AA, I'm sure they'll take the grant... if they're still bleeding from the arteries and about to bleed out in a few months, they'll just ask for more aid, AA is too big to liquidate. WO's don't qualify in that regard.

I don't think anyone read the question, they just read my answer. The question was why would they want to furlough still, and the answer is free money. I don't know if they can. Maybe, probably not. If they test it by furloughing WO regional employees to save a couple bucks (we're basically free anyway and they only have to wait until October) it'll get litigated. However unlikely it is, it wouldn't surprise me, AA likes to chase small money.

I think banking on a second bailout just for American because they are the only airline that can't make money even when times are good is pretty far out.

For my part, I'm less afraid of being furloughed from the Voy and more afraid of APA giving up scope relief to keep the music going a little while longer. No business can operate at a loss forever. Management is going to want to focus on things where they know they can make money. Like regional seat miles.

edit: made it clearer

Agreed except that the regional feed is profitable because we are flying it. You stick captains and FO’s making three times as much plus all the other benefits and that margin goes down. Not to mention we are flying fuel efficient aircraft with a high first class to coach ratio, e175 that is.

That's exactly what I'm saying lol

Yeah sorry. Just re-read it and I totally misread what you said.

Flow-backs before this happens

Those who flowed may flowback to the street.

we would need some GOOD benefits for a flow back to happen

never gonna happen

Would you care to elaborate?

I will.

Envoy ALPA would have to agree to flowbacks. AA can't just do it because they want to. APA can't just do it because they want to. AA and APA together can't just do it because they want to. With the current situation what it is, it's hard to imagine Envoy ALPA giving in to flowbacks for anything given it could mean almost all of Envoy's pilot group furloughed in a few months as AA furloughs a few thousand pilots (not out of the relm of possibilities).

Be open minded? Anything is possible in a mutually beneficial deal. Sadly, Envoy has not shown any willingness or ability to engage in that and only DEMANDS things, and very rarely bestows things, with no openness to discussion.

We should be better than management and at least be open to hearing things in my opinion.

Allow me to correct one thing:
Everything you said is true IF the “flowbacks” were to go to the top of the list, or integrated into it, or had some special provision where they were guaranteed a CA seat regardless of seniority (this is what screwed up the last flow back clusterf*#k).

If ENY were to hire furloughed AA pilots as new hires with no special seniority provisions, this could be done without input from ALPA. It wouldn’t really hurt anyone here, so I don’t see any reason for us to object anyway. We (ALPA) don’t get a say in who ENY hires. The contract only governs their conditions once they’re on property.

There’s several issues here. There are three wholly owned regionals now. They would all have to take flow backs.

Would you only flow BACK if you had come from that regional? Technically that’s the only way it is an actual flow back. Other wise a flow DOWN, maybe.

AA is giving all sorts of things to the pilots it is displacing. Envoy isn’t even willing to TALK about anything.

I’m sure AA will try and use us as much as possible if they can get away with it. We cost less than mainline and with the current loads, there aren’t a lot of routes we couldn’t fly. But Envoy is having flying cut as well. Just how much we don’t know. Even with flying shifted our way, we will still ultimately need less staffing.

Envoy wouldn’t be the only accepting flow backs. PSA and Piedmont would have to be in the same boat for a flow back to happen.

Oh yeah, of course. But I don't think anyone really would call that "flowback" though. And I have NO problem with the idea of them having guaranteed jobs here, like that, if they furloughed. That said, if they're furloughing, so are we so I don't see the point.

Yes, true. There are three. But it's not really relevant. Each regional union mec would need to approve a flowback to their own outfit, but not really all three, which would be REALLY stupid to do in the current situation.

Keep in mind, if anyone approves flowback and AA furloughs, any regional that has flowback will have screwed over its own pilots. I can see an agreement being pulled off in the situation we were in a month ago when we thought hiring was going to go on like gangbusters for a decade plus and WO regionals would need a carrot to hang on to captains. Today though? It's suicide.

An agreement to hire them at the bottom of the list would be pointless. If AA is furloughing then envoy is overstaffed as well. Would an AA pilot really want to come sit airport standby every day with 7-8 days at home as a commuter? I'd rather get a job at Walmart if I were them. Or you know, save some of that pay for an emergency fund.

If I recall correctly (because I heard this from some 10 yr capt who I flew with as an FO), something like this happened to TWA guys. They did, indeed, sit standby for awhile. One was said to commute into LGA, go into the sleep room, and emerge several days later having never been used. So, whether all this is true or not, don't underestimate what guys will put up with to keep bread on the table.

I’d rather sit stby at Envoy than being furloughed.

speak for yourself.

Furlough Protection
 

Not even for a new flow agreement supported by APA, ALPA, AAG to include: WO pilots issued AA seniority # by WO DOH, then DOB for overlaps. Increased flow guarantees such as WO will now make up 75-80% of new AA classes when the music resumes.

I can see the bandwagon now for Flowbacks come Oct 1st. Plenty of time to marinate the idea, let it sink in. Will prevent vertical movement to LLCs/ULLCs with higher margins when the music resumes.


As it stands, the flow has weakened for years to come.