SWA Day Trips?
 

Wondering if Southwest does day trips and if so are there more of them at certain bases? Are they long days or short? Pay difference? Can you get them all the time or is it just something you occasionally score by trading around?

Thanks

We call them turns. There used to be a few turn lines in the monthly bid packet but it seems there are fewer now. The turn lines go ultra-senior. On the F/O side it is usually a Lance who bids it to give them away and then pick up CA trips. There are also some monthly lines that have a turn day or two attached to a 2 or 3 day pairing.

The most common way to get a turn in my base is to pick one up from daily or monthly OT, TTGA, ELITT, VJA, etc. Sometimes these can be a great deal (lots of money for a day's work). For example, a lot of our supplemental flying is posted for bid as a turn. Of course the charter work goes real senior due to a higher pay rate. In the end as with most stuff, it's all based on seniority. The more senior you are, the more likely you will fly turns.

Turns are a little more rare now because our line values are higher (manning is a little bit thinner)

There's plenty of turns in the system and I do some every month even as a pretty junior guy. If you're quick it's easy to pick them up in give-away as the ultra senior guys bid for max turns and then give it all away to either work open/premium time or to Lance Captain.

HOWEVER, as a junior guy you can pick them up but there's none avail to TRADE for. So you can easily pick up turns to ADD to your schedule, but you still have your originally bid schedule.

Thanks for the help guys. I appreciate it. Just trying to figure out how possible it is to spend less nights in the hotel by living close to base and doing shorter trips.

Not to hijack the thread but could you shed some light on pay at SW. Are you paid block or better? Is there incentive pay for you guys to be early? I ask b/c everybody knows how quickly you guys taxi, get shortcuts, and park at gates without wing walkers. Thanks.

don't feed the troll

Air France just took first place in the taxi race. He spun out a competitor in the final turn to take the checker.

And all because the CRJ pilot refused to say, "I love crepes."