Dude, EVERY Airline has jerks. At least most have a CBA and industry std benefits!

Enjoy making friends.


JJ

 

 

I haven't flown with any or met any yet at JB. I have heard of a few. I am not arguing the CBA. We need one. But your argument about the pay being below industry standard is just wrong. Just because it is below what you value yourself at doesn't mean it is not industry standard. You and your seven like minded buddies on hear make JB seem like a life sentence, wake up call it is actually a good place to work. Yeah it is no FedEx or DAL. However, Look at the peer seet evaluation for this year, or do the math yourself. Our pay as a stand alone issue is at or above industry standard on the 320, as for the 190 we are industry leading by far. As you and your seven other buddies keep saying "those are the facts" and in your world you can't argue the facts. You guys are a broken record and you need to keep the focus where we need it. Medical, LTD, retirement, merger and some other areas are why we need a CBA. Lets wait to see if they still follow their "peer set" group before we pass judgement on them in regards to pay. I believe in leading with facts over leading with assumptions.

 

If you believe in leading with facts, are your current pay rates based upon a pay review THIS YEAR and have no peer Airlines had raises since??????





JJ

 

Our problem is that the established Peerset process does not allow unsigned TA in the comparison. That is TAs/pay rates that are legally binding as of the Aug review period. (I believe they can use the 1Jan pay scale, but only current/existing contracts). Thus any CBA that is signed after Aug is ignored till the next years. That puts us upwards of 12-16 months behind on pay till we can get the next peer review. We are ALWAYS playing catchup and thus losing money when compaired to our peers.

Second is that JetBLue wants to change the peer set to exclude additional major airline. They already exclude cargo carriers who are major airlines. They double count USAir (east and west) helping drag our pay lower. Now they want to exclude "long haul carriers" and include not majors who we compete against like spirit, virgin america, and allegeant (who we do not compete against in any significant way at all).

Third is that JetBlue wants to change the process to the crap they sent out that lets management determine the peer set and run the new process with its established timeline so they can have 1Jan pay raises inplace for 1Jan. The problem with this is that it takes away the PVC power and approval authority of the peer set. It ignores the current process agreed to by management and the PVC. It makes the PVC advisory only. This is the same way they rammed FSM 2010 down our throats by making the PVC advisory only. However, the PVC charter has it in writing and the company can not just change it without the PVC approval.

Thus we are always behind and playing catch up. we have no catch up provision for new TAs signed mid year. JetBlue ignores some of the highest paid peers/major airlines (UPS and Fedex). So we are constantly paid below the average. You also try to include premium pay as a factor that catches us up or makes us higher paid. The problem is that you ignore similar premium pay/overrides/special pay that many other majors gets for extra flying. Every carriers is different and has different triggers, but you ignore thier contribituons to their total pay. Thus we are always behind. Losing millions of $$$$ over a career!

Just my opinion......

FNG

 

Edited....

 

And if you look at the bid divisors for January, a busy month, has most pilots credit schedules BELOW the premium trigger of 78 hours. Big bad ALPA, or so the company said, would do this to us but the company never would.

Free pizza.

 

I'd love to have FedEx or UPS in the peer group, but they don't fly any of the equipment (or even comparable equipment) to what we fly. If we have the right to ask for them, then management might as well say they want regional carriers operating E170 and -900s in the peer set. Let's just stick to keeping it realistic and make sure Delta, Uni-Cal, etc are in the peer set. They fly A320s. We fly A320s. The 717/MD-88/MD-90 isn't THAT different as far as seats/routes go than the E190. We're not flying to Tokyo or the middle east, so I think asking for UPS and FedEx to be in the peer set is a little over reaching.

 

Except that regional carriers are are not major airlines and are not considered "destination carriers" per the agreed to peer set definition. Thus they don't count. As for like aircraft at UPS and FedEx. FedEx has a small vs large aircraft pay scale (use the small one) and UPS pays on pay rate regardless of type (use that one). As to the idea of where they fly should make no difference. To me, a major airline is a major airline.

Now, I have no problem keeping the current peer set, but that means no Virgin America, no Spirit, no Allegient till they become major airlines per DOT. But you still have to ask are they a Destination Airline? In addition, USAir needs to become a single entry (aveage east and west together), vs two entries in the average (both driving the average down).

By the way. Something that everyone forgets about peer set averages is that we then base our pay on how well other companies run their airlines. Do you really want to base your pay on how well other airlines Execs run their airlines? Do you want to base your pay on how well other pilot group negotiate, especially a pilot group that is unwilling to honor an arbitrated SLI (like USAir) and get a JCBA, thus bringing down the average (and thus our pay too)?

Just my opinion.......

FNG

 

You bring up great, well articulated points about the peer set issue. Once again great post!!