CAL Reduction Bid
 

Spoke to Gary W. from manpower planning today. This month's reduction bid, posted 28 APR '08, has been cancelled. No reductions planned as of now, though possible on the AUG '08 bid. Think this is good news to most.

Sweet. That is good news. Did he say anything about the VRF or COLA offerings, or are they going to be postponed for now too?

What was true 5 days ago may not be true today given the status quo.
At least its a shred of good news for "now".

A little bird in the Training Department says it's unlikely we will furlough, but if we do MIL leaves and COLAs will negate the need to furlough. Take it for what it's worth.

COLA's will probably be offerred in the fall, due to PBS. The company is negotiating with Boeing to procure 4 757-300 that were previously ATA's. They are trying to get Boeing to pay to reconfigure the cabins/galleys to CAL spec's. ATA was a great airline with great peop's. Their aircraft are actually configured better than CAL's; all Etops. The cost of galley reconfiguration is expensive and they only put the etops 300's in direct competition with Jetblue in our hubs, which CAL has covered right now. Even with the accelerated parking of the "classic" 737's, we still have net aircraft growth. The surplus of pilots that management has is mainly due to PBS and that group of pilots that routinely flies in excess of 90 hour/month; the selfish group that were hired during the strike. Based on Gary's statements, there shouldn't be furloughs anytime soon, unless there is a merger. He said that the merger contingency plans called for approximently 700 furloughs.

Exactly. That's what we need to change. Those greedy pilots can ruin it for the junior guys. They just don't get it.

320...

Help me a little becuase I am confused and new to this stuff. I heard that we cannot merge if we have furloughs and I have also hears that we "junior" guys were furlough protected for at least 2 years after a merger. I was under the impression that United would have been cut and not us.

Can't help out much in that regard. But having been thrown to the wolves by ALPA several times, I don't think they'd side with us vs. United on any deal like that. United pays significantly more dues than we, ALPA's main concern, and would certainly take litigation that the aforementioned would violate ALPA merger policy. And United is very "united", whereas most of our senior guys, pre-Bethune, have historically thrown each other under the bus for some time now. They wouldn't hesitate for a moment to sacrifice their young, you and I. In short, don't look for any new-hire consideration, protection or representation from our pilot group. If a merger occurs @ CAL, the bottom 1,500 guys are going to have to get some representation. We have the numbers. Just IMHO.

There is no protection unless it's part of an agreement. We have no agreement with anyone, but we are not merging with anyone at this time. For example: I think there is a two-year no furlough agreement between DAL/NWA. Who cares? It takes that long to start integrating the companies, then the furloughs will really kick in. How about a 10 year no-furlough. Two years is a joke, but it will give us time to get our resumes up to date. :D

Cal Guys,

I am one of you...been with the company nearly 1.5 years. I never fly less than 90 hrs/month (exception: Vacation or calling in sick)...I try every month to bid low with PBS....it never gives me it. If you are on reserve (especially A) this summer 90 hrs will be a low number. Just my 2 cents!