Adlerdriver

Definitely grieve it. The application of the OIM has been very inconsistent. We had one captain on reserve who opted out of China have his whole month dropped. An FO who did the same kept his R days.
it seems like the only solution in the short term is for reserve pilots to not opt out of China. When they call you for a China trip tell them you’re not going. At least then you know you actually had a trip that you’re losing your R days over.

Dakota

If you choose not to fly China (China Travel link), is there a way to opt back in? I didn’t see an option to “change your mind.”

pinseeker

As Kronan stated, the OIM says that if you decline China flying, the block of R days shall be dropped. If you want to be paid, you could use sick or vacation.

As far as knowing the assignment goes, if you have R days and call in sick, there is no requirement for the company to tell you which trip they assigned you if they charge your sick bank that I can find in the contract. So why should they have to tell you what trip they assigned you here?

In previous posts, you chastised people for complaining about China flying, calling them whiners and stated that this COVID19 thing was overblown and not a big deal. Now, you are opting out of flying to China. So, which is it? Is it fine to fly to China and people should stop whining, or should we be able to opt out of flying because we feel it is a health risk, knowing that we have the choice of using RSA, VAC, or dropping the hours into make-up?

If you feel the company is doing something wrong, contact the union and file a grievance.

golfandfly

For a company that has 500,000 people relying on us, they sure are taking advantage of this crappy Agreement we’ve made. They are only removing pilots in overmanned seats, such as the MD11. We’ve been short on reserves for 3 years now, and since they’ve taken flying from this airplane, we now have a lot of reserves. So as a cost savings measure, they are now able to remove R days from our lines.
As a reasonable solution, maybe we should alter the agreement to have removal take place only if they would have assigned you a China trip (much like being assigned a trip while on sick).
As I understand it, each party has a 7 day opt out clause. I suggest we use it. Things have vastly changed since the original agreement.

golfandfly

You obviously haven’t been on reserve much here. They do in fact assign you a trip based on leveling, remove you, and charge that specific trip to your sick bank.

pinseeker

What I said was that I can't find it anywhere in the contract that says the company has to tell you which trip they tried to assign you while on reserve and on sick.

If they actually tell you the pairing number they attempted to assign you and then remove you from, great. That doesn't change the fact that the OIM says if you opt out of China flying while on a block of reserve days, those days shall be dropped. There is no mention of keeping the R days and waiting to be assigned a trip. Not saying that is the right thing to do, only that this is what we have right now.

golfandfly

I guess a reasonable solution is to treat a China trip much like a sick trip on reserve. If you are sick and not assigned a trip on reserve, your sick bank isn’t hit (unless you are sick for all of your reserve that month). If they are removing R days just because they don’t want to pay you, it’s bs. But that is exactly what the OIM allows. It’s really crazy we gave this away. Let’s tear up the OIM and renegotiate.

iHateAMR

You want the same negotiating team to try it again? What do you think will change this time? My guess is we’ll lose something we didn’t expect, like first officer arm rests.

golfandfly

Good point...

Nightflyer

Once again, it is clearly evident that the union got played. (AGAIN!)

When will we learn?