Ramprat

Um no. Our insurance does not change. It does go up in cost...mine went up a whopping $5 a paycheck this year. Easily make that up by overblocking a leg or two.

BrewCity

Paying more for the same insurance is a massive concession. You paid 27% of your premiums before voting in concessions. By 1/1/17 you'll pay 35%. Justify it however you'd like, but paying 30% more for the same insurance is a large concession.

Is offline

I don't know where you got this information, but it is not even close to being true. They will do interviews at job fairs but you still have to do a full interview.

Systemized

That's a fine assessment, I'm not justifying the concessions. Even with 35% cost sharing, the health insurance at PSA is still much better than Trans States.

Ramprat

I applaud you for being educated on the contract, and your math is correct. All said and done, negating any changes in the group plan cost over the years, I'd be paying ~$65 a paycheck by 2017. Granted this is with the single B plan option. The monetary gains I received by the growth of the company far outweigh the cost. And again, that extra $30 a month is about 25 min of overblock. I can knock that out in one leg on the ramp in CLT.

Darant

The healthcare cost for the employee only is manageable for sure. The reason for this and the ONLY reason is they are required by law to do so. They must meet the "minimum value standard" on the employee only option they provide. What companies are now doing (not just Mesa but across the country) are, by in large, subsidizing their required employee only option with the family options. I am a big fan of the Affordable Care Act but this is one of the places in the law that has created a loophole for companies to wiggle out of this. Without getting too political, the base of the problem to start with is that the well being of our citizens and by in large the overall access to health care in the US is based on a person obtaining insurance through an employer. A company shouldn't really have to worry about that additional cost, which is why, we should have single payer like just about everywhere else in the world. (Ok , im getting off topic)

The problem at Mesa is, and its a huge problem, is the cost of adding in additional family members. When an organization wants to offer benefits as a way to attract potential employees (which was the idea behind benefits in the first place) then the value must be there as a whole. As of now, this is not a problem for Mesa since the growth in the company is the largest attraction. When that subsides, then and only then will Mesa address the issue. The only way we are able to make it work in my family is for Me to get Mesa insurance for myself, my wife to get insurance through her work and to get my son's insurance off the exchange. Overall this was the best option with cost and benefits.

24/48

That's all well and good, and I truly believe what you say about your pilot group. However, it's time to get off the sidelines and organize. Skywest Inc. is having a field day with XJT/ASA whipsaw which will most likely result in further deterioration of those 2 entities. This will either lead to one, or both, becoming the next Comair, or the signing of another concessionary CBA.

I know ALPA is not the end-all be-all union that lives up to everyone's expectations, and it's service to the regional pilots has been weak. But it's by far the best union for the profession, and by getting ALPA on your property you would force management's hands on the ASA/XJT mess. It's been almost a decade since Skywest purchased ASA, and if you really want to improve the industry then it's time to unionize.

TheFly

How has ALPA benefited any regional airline?

24/48

As I stated earlier, ALPA hasn't done the regionals a solid, but my take from your post was a desire to stand together and build up the profession. For one, ALPA merger policy requires the merger of ASA/XJT and the only thing getting in the way of that is management. They have 2 union carriers to whipsaw with the non-union carrier. By joining ALPA you would be forcing a 3-way merger thus removing the whipsaw. You would also have an enforceable document in the form of a Collective Bargaining Agreement that gives you many more protections than you have now. Combined you guys would be 5,000-6,000 pilots strong. There are also a number of other benefits to being ALPA, not perfect I know, but it would go a long way to improving the industry as you suggested in your original post.

24/48

Ok, but what exactly do you expect from ALPA as a regional pilot? If I had to guess, most regional pilots have a gripe with ALPA because they are still regional pilots working under regional contracts. Sorry, but you took the job knowing you were flying as a contractor on someone else's code. And if anything, I'm pretty sure most at the mainline would like that flying back that you guys are doing. Unfortunately, that flying is in the hands of management to decide how the outsourcing works. With so many regionals, and the largest one being non-union thus no threat of ever having a legal job action, there will always be a cheap bidder.

So all this talk about raising the bar on pay, benefits, work rules, etc by Skywest pilots is nothing but fluff on top of the "me, me, me" sense of entitlement.