Gary et al

Biffle, sounds like you should send in a DART and post the response. It is not that just that you don't have to answer your phone, you only have to give the company 1 phone number. That number could be a home phone. Doesn't matter if you drop your phone down an elevator shaft, you aren't require to have it, period. So say they call your house to reassign you while away on a trip. What would you be expected to do? Sounds like you should probably show up to your assigned flying. When you learn that is cancelled, I'd imagine any neutral party would expect you to reach out to the company at that time. At that point the reassignment notification language would apply.

Also, above is mostly correct, they can not adjust your report time once you are in a rest period...unless you agree to it, and if you're agreeing to it I'd say having the 10 hours between the call and the start of the adjusted duty period would be smart. All 117 really requires is 8 hrs of uninterrupted sleep opportunity, so it's up to a pilot what that is. About 99% sure there is a provision in either 117 or contract in that allows the company 1 opportunity to reach out to the pilot, might even say first or last hour of the rest period. But the pilot might consider that call an interruption of their rest period and then need to have the rest period reset, the call could easily be interrupting your 8 hour sleep window. They can definitely push your report time back verbally, but leave the original report time alone for 117.

Either way, where ever you are, don't answer the phone. Let it go to voicemail. Listen. Look at legalities. Then call back if you should. If you are on hold for an hour (don't hang up) and miss the deadhead they booked for you, it's not your fault the hold times were that long.

fcoolaiddrinker

You never have to answer. As a line holder or reserve. Then it’s 25.A.3.b.i and ii. Also reference 25.A.3.c and d.

note in 25.A.3.b.i. “while a message may be left for a pilot, the message shall not be considered received, and the pilot is therefore not considered notified of an assignment, until positive telephone contact with the pilot has been made or the pilot has acknowledged the schedule change via the company electronic notification system”.

The takeaway is nothing is official until positive telephone contact. In part due to the fact electronic notification is at pilots discretion once it’s available.

it seems that your scenario is a 117 issue which always supersedes any contract language.

dracir1

Yes, this.

As far as reassignment mid trip, usually this is common sense. If you’re at the hotel waiting for the van that never shows, you’ll call CS. Once you do, they will verbally notify you of any change. If the van wasn’t rescheduled, I would get on and report on time. Sure, it’d be nice to know in advance about a delay to be able to stay at the hotel a little longer but calling you in the 10 hours prior to your report IS an interruption of crew rest (there really is no way around that).

In domicile, all reassignments must be within the original footprint. If not, I believe it SHOULD follow junior assignment rules (although it’s hard to prove JS rules were followed).

fcoolaiddrinker

They can call you and leave a message. That does not interrupt rest. If you answer the phone it does.

When you call them it does not interrupt rest.

dracir1

Yes they can call during a known rest period but it's a HUGE risk that they don't take often (in fact, the few times I've heard about it were new schedulers who didn't know better). In fact, if you are on your rest period and the DO call, that would one of the VERY FEW times that I would recommend people answer.

Pay protection is quite nice...

Xdashdriver

The FAA has a one phone call policy that does not consider rest interrupted if the air carrier attempts to contact the crewmember one time during a required rest period (even if the crewmember answers of his/her own volition). Multiple letters of interpretation on that one. Our CBA however does restrict crew scheduling from calling during a required rest period. 25.A.3.e.

fcoolaiddrinker

Right. Depending on the timing of the call. You could be rolling the dice where they just put you back to rest and push back your show when you’re trying to go home.

fcoolaiddrinker

That’s good info and I thought that was true. If they were to call you and wake you up in the middle of sleep (and now I can’t fall back asleep) with that call then it would just end up turning into a no brainer fatigue event and/or contract violation.

brocklee9000

Yeah, unfortunately. This was one of the “unofficial unwritten” rules that was actually official (but nowhere to be found) and you’d be on the hook for not knowing (even though it wasn’t officially written down anywhere).

that’s why they made an unofficial guide. To the tune of like, if you are on short call you don’t *have* to answer but must call back (or notify online) of the call; long call, you had something like 1 hour? Same on a trip. Lineholders didn’t *have* to answer or agree to anything, but if you did your damndest to ignore them and go to the layover or whatever, they’d eventually find a way to force you to do it. Or on reserve, only required to answer your phone/electronic notify in certain windows. I think it was you were not obligated during the 45min report before leg 1, and the 15min release at the end. 1 hr sit and they want to reassign you on reserve, yeah you’re on the hook.

it was all spelled out one way or another (except that pesky rule about calling once in your rest), but obfuscated in our contract. Thankfully I essentially had no time on reserve, and flew with a lot of reserve captains before I upgraded so by the time I was on perpetual CA reserve, I had figured a lot of it out.

dracir1

That's an interesting example - let's play that one out...

Let's say they're contacting you 5 hours into your 10 hour rest for the purposes you described. You have 3 options. Answer and be put back into rest. Don't answer but listen to the message and after the rest is over call them to acknowledge. Or, don't call them at all and act like you never got the message.

Regardless of what you pick, the result is almost the same. Acting like you never got the message will result in you wondering where the van is at van time - which prompts a call to scheduling. If the van IS there, you could report on time but arrival at the gate (and realizing the delay and subsequent lack of time to finish your trip) would prompt a call to scheduling. As 117 would determine if you could operate the rest of your trip legally and make it home, the Best case scenario is you fly it out and possibly are deadheaded back to base at the end if you're out of duty day (which you would most likely be as there was a reason to call you in the first place). The MOST LIKELY scenario, from my experience, is that you'll fly all the legs that 117 will allow and wherever you happen to be, they'll end your day. It'll take them hours to get you a hotel and transportation (of which you can wait the obligatory 90 minutes then obtain your own - section 5.B.7) but you will have to go through the hassle of that, then they'll find you a DH the next day. You could, of course, deviate, but again, more hassle.

Let's say you DO answer the phone call. In this case, you stay in your hotel a couple hours longer then report and fly the trip - you get home later but you were going to get home later anyway.

Honestly, I actually kind of prefer answering the phone mid trip because usually at that point just having the information sooner rather than later allows me to plan. And, if by chance the scheduler mentions something that violates 117 or the contract, I find it much easier to point that out with them while they're on the phone rather than having to listen to their voicemail, noticing the violation then calling them back and wait on hold for an hour just to discuss There have been more than a couple of times where I had the discussion w/ the scheduler, told them where the contract was violated and they agreed (after putting me on hold, consulting with a supervisor, etc.). This requires just a basic familiarity with the contract as they will hold w/ you as you look things up.

Of course, you don't EVER have to answer a call from scheduling during your entire career. However, I've noticed times where it's beneficial to me to do so (almost always mid-trip).