I would suggest to stay engaged on this issue, and communicate clearly and directly with your Block Rep.

IMO, if you think that the company will negotiate a new retirement plan for us, that is not completely in the company's favor, well, you haven't learned your lesson. There will be a winner and a loser in this outcome, and the company will not engage unless they have a guaranteed win.

This is a path to get rid of the A plan. Be wary of guys with 20+ YOS saying how this should be considered and how great it might be. This is about a select group (senior-ish to very senior) getting a better B plan, since they've already, or almost, maxed out their A plan benefit. Watch the "Retirment Path Evaluation" video, the verbiage of DB vs DC is already there. Stay engaged and don't let this door be opened, we will not be able to close it once it goes out to a vote.

 

Uhhh...I would argue that your "select group (senior-ish to very senior)" would be more concerned about getting a better A plan. You see, they don't have as much time left to make a better B plan work to their advantage. Say they have 5 years left, and the B plan is increased another 6%...That would only put another $80K+/- in their account. BFD!!

 

96? It was an "open book" survey!!

I'm glad that we're finally getting to the root of the problem though. I can't tell you how many times I've overheard erroneous information, about what we have and how it works, being passed around the crew room. Or, the lack of knowledge, when discussing our retirement benefits, of many of the folks I fly with.

 

Huck nailed it.

 

I hate to rehash but really this is what many of the disgruntled are mad about. Did we expect them to say "we can afford it, we just are not going to do it." Of course they said they cannot afford it. It's the fact that we "believed" what they said that makes me mad. That and after the fact when we got our retirement funding letters, we could see that the company had put 4 Billion over funding into the retirement accounts. Once we agreed "they could not afford it", the company completed a 4 Billion $ stock buy back. Guess where that money came from.

I guess my biggest problem is as an ALPA group we should listen to what the group wants and make it happen. Not listen to what the group wants and then ask the company what of that they will give us. Then we do stupid stuff to ourselves. Like changing the Hotel in lieu, the 18 hour va 12 hour international check in and of course a 6 year contract. All things the company never asked us to do, we proposed them all by ourselves.

That and the big numbers of yes voters that never really read the TA. I still see things that I get told "can't be right" every month. But that's what the contract actually says. My bank for Oct $4500, the actual ticket prices already bought $6600. No where in the contract do we get the actual fares we get a quote of what they think the fare will be. The established fares quoted after the tickets were bought still do not reflect a higher fare, but neither the baseline or established fares have to be real fares. Yep, that's what we agreed to, but many still think we get the higher of actual fare or established if we deviate early.

Sorry for the rant, but when I hear we are going to begin outside discussions the hair on the back of my neck stands on end. Until we get union guys calling a spade a spade on the last contract, it's tough to trust them with changes to the current deal.

 

Ok..don't talk. Cross your arms. Take what we got. Stay mad at everyone. We can try to "fix" whatever is broke in 6 years in Section 6. Its one or the other, and at least on APC the consensus is "don't talk..." If the trust is that broken, maybe just staying away for 6 years is right. Maybe we will leave money on the table, or maybe we will preserve hard won benefits...I dunno.

I never did HILO. I only fly to the states on the company dime every 9 months now. I don't retire under this contract. I will be just fine coasting along with status quo for some time. The guys who MIGHT benefit just a bit, however, from further discussions are the thousand or so pilots who might retire in the next few years with an A plan bump, and the hundreds of new hires who have 10 or more years to reap the rewards of a higher B plan working for them. I would think our senior pilots will want to open the discussion, and the 38 year old who is looking at a benefit eroded by 27 years of inflation would be equally interested.

And HILO was a pet peeve of your former CP. ALPA didn't ask to give it away, but negotiations are a two way street. Apparently that issue was an "emotional" issue for some of the other side of the table...

Again..not meaning to poke a bear here. A larger B plan won't help me that much over 10-12 more years. An A plan bump would be nice, but I've got one more bite at that apple on the next contract. When I say I can ride it out its not being snarky, and if the majority wants to sit on their hands until then I'll proudly support that course of action. I just think walking away and saying "don't even discuss it..." is the same kind of approach that left retirement lacking on this last round.

 

Yeah, I'm sure the company can't wait to give us a bunch of options that'll work out in our favor.

Specially since, at the height of leverage this pilot group has probably ever seen, we gave up on increasing the A plan (line in the sand), we gave up on properly fixing accepted fares (renamed them and created an extra column in VIPS, we still don't get the actual), we gave up on establishing real time trip trading (too complex), we gave away HILO (because they wanted it), etc., etc...

Now, let's go back to the table, with all the under-manning and retirement issues nicely resolved for the company, and ask for increased retirement benefits, now that modeshift seems to be a forgotten idea (brilliantly played by the corporation's negotiators). I see a win/win scenario as likely as those who voted Yes saw a chance of improving anything by turning down the TA.

 

As one of the thousand who doesn't get another bite of the apple, I'd like to thank you for your overwhelming support for the contract during the voting process. Your cheerleading for the current CBA may not have pushed the vote over the 50.1%, but it certainly helped get it closer to the 56% it wound up. Again thanks for your support.

 

Again...I wrote one post on why I thought taking the deal was better than waiting. Part of that was the concept of another look at retirement, which might yet benefit you.

Delta kicked theirs back, and got a new MEC. I am interested to see how it plays out, and if the next TA is significantly better.

There are certainly things I wanted that we didnt get. This was not an. "Oh golly look how great this is.." but rather a "which option is worse..."

FWIW...I would like to see YOUR retirement improved. The question now is doing nothing or discussing options.

 

Your one post was hardly a short, quick assessment of the pros and cons of the (than) TA. Your influence was, I believe, outsized due to your consulting business. I know few people who honestly believe we will get any love from the company outside of section 6. It was pie in the sky before the vote to believe so and just as much after.
I do agree, if you have time to wait for the next contract, maybe you younger guys can fix our retirement short fall during the next contract. Us graybeards saw it a year ago that we were being left behind.