Timeoff2fish

Question:

If you choose to deviate and fly to your front-end city the day before to get in position early (i.e., arrive on Sunday evening for a front-end deadhead that is scheduled to arrive from MEM on Monday morning), is the cost of the the hotel room an allowable deviation expense?

Is the hotel obligated to give you a room early under our contract? I have heard a few stories about 12 hours prior to scheduled, etc. There is not a weekend crew staying at this hotel.

I have had varying answers from different hotels regarding whether or not your room is covered by FDX or if we are responsible for it.

I called the crew audit people but they never pick up the phone.

FDXLAG

FWIW:
Yes allowable expense.

No obligation, so:

You have to pick it up.

Send the crew audit people an email they usually respond.

Raptor

If you arrive early, hotel could be on you--depending. Hotel is under no obligation to let you check in early. But, they often will if you're within a total 24 hour period from checkout to your trip. Ask hotel is all you can do.

I've had no problem if scheduled checkin is, let's say, 7 PM and I get there at 4 PM. It's when you try to check in day prior or before noon that you often will need to book the additional day.

If they won't let you check in early, then hotel is on you. It's allowable as deviation expense and you are authorized domestically up to 24 hours early. It can not be direct billed. You must pay with credit card and submit hotel folio (not just charge receipt.) You must make early arrangements yourself--hotel desk won't do it.

Hotel is not obligated to give you contract rate. Max reimbursed will be contract rate via FOX though.

busdriver12

Something to consider, the max reimbursed is supposedly the highest contract hotel rate in that city. So not just the one that you're going to the next night, but the one with the highest rate in the city, if there's more than one.

Here's what I do. I call the contract hotel early, and talk to the front desk (NOT reservations). I tell them I'm a FedEx pilot, coming in a day early, can I have the contract rate. Sometimes they say no, sometimes they say yes. Recently, I booked a hotel early that had a contract rate of $75, but they said they could give it to me for $79 (online rate was $129). It's worth a try. Otherwise, I'll book nearby via Hotwire, and just stay close to bank and move over.

Raptor

Furthermore, it's not just the max contract rate in the city you are staying in, it's the max rate for the REVENUE city associated with your deviation. But, if your trip is a deadhead with a layover, you have the option of using the scheduled DH layover city rates too.

Example: you have a DH to ANC where your trip will fly one leg back to MEM. Your scheduled DH is MEM-ORD layover the ORD-ANC. You deviate. You fly to SEA and layover for 20 hours in a hotel, then continue onwards to ANC where you check in a day early.

You can expense your hotel in SEA AND the day early in ANC. The CBA allows one day early arrival AND delays enroute of 24 hours domestic and 48 hours internationally.

When you submit the hotel folios in FOX for SEA and ANC you would have a drop down box to select the city associated. In this case your options would be ORD and ANC. FOX will not give you the option of selecting SEA so don't simply base your hotel selection rate on the city you're staying in! Look at the hotel rates that are available on p.f.c.

Go to Flight Operations Support -> Crew Travel Services -> Hotel Layover Directory.

Then decide if the max hotel rate for ORD or ANC helps you the most for your SEA stay and select which choice you want. You can do the same for your ANC early arrival although the selection of the ANC rate would make more sense.

Note that FOX will give you drop down cities for all of them within 3 days, as that's the max deviation parameter. (So, you might see another 3 letter city code that has nothing to do with the current trip you are on.)

You can play around with FOX to check this out. Just enter a test OOPE, select deviation hotel and see how it works with any trip you have. You can submit any amount and FOX will reimburse you up to the max for the city code you select. Then just delete your test OOPE when finished.

Deviation is a great quality of life enhancer for us. Still disappointed in the HILO changes in the new CBA!

RogAir

I tried to check in early at 8pm instead of the 11pm scheduled. Front desk told me I would have to pay for an additional day for those 3 hours. I told them I would wait. So I went to the lobby in the front of the front desk, openned my suitcase, changed into sweats, hung some laundry up to dry, inventoried my box lunch, and got settled in for a nap. Miracuosly, my room became immediately available at no extra charge!!

VSTOLG4

clearly covered in CBA 8.C.3.d.iii