Stan446

There’s always someone with a reason to justify working extra. I’ve heard it every contract. We are NOW in negotiations. NOW is the time to stop working extra.

Jamo

I would disagree. We “agreed” to a 6 year contract, not a 5.5 year contract. Creating a grey area on negotiation won’t be conducive to creating a unified pilot group. The least we can do is live up to our end of the the contract. November isn’t that far away and I hope the NC has some great news by then.

Adlerdriver

I've never understood this attitude. I'll just speak hypothetically so no one takes my comments the wrong way. If Airline X exchanges openers with their company before the amendable date of their existing contract, they are in fact, officially in section 6 negotiations IAW the RLA. In my opinion, this date on the calendar and this action of exchanging openers isn't some line in the sand requiring immediate action (or lack of action as Stan is saying).
Both sides begin this process "in good faith" and the hope is that continues throughout the entire negotiation period up to a TA. There is also an expectation (i.e. RLA requirement) to maintain the status quo. If reports from the negotiation committee are positive and the meetings are progressing well, why is there a need for a response by the labor side? In fact, that makes absolutely no sense and could actually sour the negotiations while possibly bringing legal action against labor for a violation of status quo.
Why would labor immediately do anything different simply based on a date on a calendar? If an individual pilot makes a choice to stop flying extra, wouldn't that decision make a lot more sense if it was done in reaction to reports from the negotiation committee that they were being stonewalled and not just because negotiations have begun?

Freighthumper

I can think of a lot of reasons to justify working extra as well. I definitely hope having a unified pilot group is a position we can come from but I am concerned that ALPA isn’t negotiating on behalf of the FedEx pilot group as much as they are for ALPA national. I hope I’m wrong. I don’t want to send ALPA the message that I’m all in for them if they aren’t paying attention to what would benefit us most. Especially when sending that message means turning down easy $. Hopefully I’m just being overly skeptical. I’m one for the cause, but I just want to know it’s for our cause not ALPAs cause in general over our own specifically.

PurpleToolBox

Reading these comments of people justifying what they shouldn't be doing and the stupid excuses is why we as a pilot group are screwed. We aren't unified. This wouldn't happen at previous airline ... it just wouldn't. You would be officially called out.

I still can't believe we don't have scab lists here for jumpseaters etc.etc. And any Fedex pilot who has blocked a FedEx pilot from jumpseating should be on a list and banned from jumpseating.

When are we going to grow a pair?

busdriver12

I’m not sure what you mean by FedEx pilots blocking other FedEx pilots from jumpseating. I know back in the day there were definitely some tools, but is this an issue any more?

I hope you’re not conflating this list you’re talking about with a scab list, as being a scab is very serious and not something I would want to mix up with any different behavior.

PurpleToolBox

I meant FedEx Captains not letting some people on the airplane ... not just the cockpit jumpseat.

I've heard of it happening twice recently from FOs. Two different incidents.

busdriver12

Thats odd, do you know what their reasoning is? I have never denied a jumpseater, nor seen a captain I flew with do so, in over 25 years. I wonder what is going on.

FedEx Pilot

Covid-19?.

Adlerdriver

Instances I've heard of are in Asia. Company has limits in the travel MOU on # of operational JSers they can schedule on bidpack trips. They also revise pairings constantly, resulting in operational JSers that exceed the FOM JS matrix on one flight while another flight between the same cities is empty - pure laziness on the part of CRS to take the easy road without any consideration for spreading JSers out. End result is a 767 packed with 4 extra bodies on the flight deck unnecessarily.
So, it ends up falling on the Captains over there to enforce the rules, limit potential Covid exposures and keep the company's use of the JS within the accepted boundaries.
These are not commuting or deviating pilots trying to get to work. These are operational jumpseats being used by the company to move pilots on deadheads - many times when they are commercial alternatives or other FedEx aircraft with empty seats.
I'm not saying there aren't outliers out there doing something else, but the majority of the events I've heard about fall into the above situation.