My bad, I was trying to figure out where the hell that info was in an email

 

I get that, I'm just saying the coding on the software was crap.

As far as work rules, we won't get any. The union will get some little nugget, then say we need to take this now and fix rules later, only to never get good rules.

 

It's already the best in OKC. If you're on a long layover there, you can go to the house with all the cars covered in tarps, and 50 inch rims. Our van driver there, says that house can get you anything you need.

 

...PBS, who cares! we
now have clif bars in the galley!

 

I like Sam, but I think he is no longer effective. The union has been at its least effective I have ever seen. Grieve it and fly it. As for PBS, it's only as good as what the company puts in it.

Currently, trips and schedules suck. Most of us agree with that. Pairings are wasteful, low time, often uncommutable, and have few days off between.

The benefits the pilots have with these current schedules are: we know what we're getting. We can bid transition, training, and vacation conflicts. The training and vacation conflicts are essentially frozen, so we parlay that in to some extra time off or extra pay. Transition conflicts can mean extra pay. We have these things even on crappy lines.

The company doesn't like paying extra. The company doesn't like paying for staffing to cover the conflicts. They don't like the inability to control our schedules. They don't want to cover a skillfully bid line that nets a pilot 2 + weeks off over a holiday. They can manipulate numbers of days off as they see fit (within contract).

So what exactly would the benefit be to the pilot group to get PBS? We lose all of the above benefits. Some senior folks will get the days off they want. The company probably won't improve the trips, so the pairings will still stink.

So in reality, we lose more than a few gain with PBS. Crappy trips in = crappy schedules out and no conflicts, no DTS, loss of pay and days off.

Lose-lose.

 

Any word on reserve arbitration? Seems that topic has gone cold.


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Both sides closed their cases, waiting for the arbitrator to come say we lost for no reason.

 

I lol'd at your comment, then cried.

 

It's tough to say where I would go if I was starting out right now. But I'll tell you about how I ended up staying here and hope my hind sight helps in some way.

I hired on at Envoy back in 2013, the first and only interview I did at the regionals. Skywest called when I was in training, and it turns out it would have been a good move to go there. They've continued to hire since then, so I'd have lived in base as an FO, and upgraded by now. It was a tough call to stay at Envoy (American Eagle, back in those days) when Skywest called, but I was in the middle of training and decided to stay put. I didn't think leaving after such a short time would look good on my resume.

Mesa was another option since I live in one of their bases, but after asking a few Mesa pilots about how they liked working there, I decided it was not worth the lateral move. Again, I missed another opportunity at a faster upgrade, but overall I think I am happier at Envoy than I would have been at Mesa

Compass was another option that came up in 2014. I know a handful of guys around my seniority at Envoy that went there and caught the quick upgrade. By the time I'd considered it, we had a flow at Envoy, and AA being my top choice, I decided to wait it out. Like Skywest, Compass probably would have been better for me in the short term. Longer term, there's just no way to know if it would have gotten me to a major (or specifically AA) any faster or slower.

I'm a pretty risk averse guy. I always felt a lateral move was a bit on the risky side. It's working out of a lot of guys. But I'm sure some people regret it, too.

The moral of the story is you won't know what the right move was until years later. Things change fast at the airlines, and doubly fast at the regionals. You just have to gather as much information as possible, consider what's important to you, make your decision, and have a good attitude regardless of if it was the best choice or not. At the end of the day, we all have a pretty great career ahead. If you can't see that, you probably won't be happy anywhere.

I'm still not sure if I'd have had a better career at Skywest, Compass, or Envoy. Right now I'm projecting flow in 2020 to AA, my top choice. If DAL, UAL, or a couple of others call first, I'll go. Would I have gotten to my career airline faster at another regional? Will my career airline be around until I retire? Ask me in about 30 years.

If any new guys want a sounding board for deciding where to go, shoot me a PM. I'd be happy to help.


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Oh lord. The guy that's unhappy about everything only 3 years into asking to PM about advice.