Sennant

And I'm guessing your one of the guys that claims to understand PBS that he has to spend so much time fixing their "helpful" bids for the junior guys. I've been here since PBS came on so seniority now vs then doesn't play into it as I've consistently had better schedules. And quite frankly while my global may be higher I've help way better base seniority numbers then I do now.

And how is it excuse? He was asked for what the process is. And explained it.

wt932051

LOL that would be why the people I help thank me then after they get a sweet schedule compared to what they were getting? LOL Keep trying dude. Lame excuses so far. I have been here a long time too. Your clueless with the dynamics involved. The fact you said you have been here since PBS came until now with consistently better schedules and seniority had nothing to do with it says it all. Clueless. With bid packets senior pilots to you took the best lines, now, a lot of senior pilots don't bid right/don't know how to bid, so you being junior get a better schedule because of that. Hence why we need people like MAGPBS to educate how to bid unlike the old days. By the way, the bases are much bigger then they use to be. Like MAGPBS pointed out, we use to have a bunch so yes you did not have the choice you did back then like you do now. You were getting worse lines because of the senior people to you taking the better ones, in a smaller base... I don't even know how I can educate you on this one... I guess that is why you needed help from MAGPBS...

wt932051

It is called an excuse by me because it is presented like there are no ways to improve it. There are many in my opinion. Just keep drinking your kool aid Sennant

wt932051

PBS is a much better system then bid packets. I just don't like the process of them coming out on the 23rd when they should be out on the 18th at the latest. As a matter of fact, this PBS system is incredible at what it can do and all the tools it has. I program computers. This thing blows away any other airline PBS systems. So I am not against PBS in any way, just how it is processed. That is my major beef. Education is the second beef I have, but again, you need to know what you are doing and many older people are not technology inclined leading to junior people getting better schedules. That is the downfall, as well as the company being able to unstack (coverage awards). Those should be banned. Period.

BeatNavy

Here's something that would speed up schedules coming out and make life better...don't hold trips for IOE! Drop assigned trips for IOE when needed like other airlines. Isn't that how Mesa used to be? I didn't see that previous concession in the last TA that the union tried to shove down our throat, which should have been negotiated back.

Here's another thought, other airlines, to include airlines that are much bigger than Mesa, use the same software and publish schedules 24 hours later. This isn't a dig on MAGPBS, but the reasons cited for the length of time it takes can be remedied if someone really wanted to fix it. But therein lies the problem. It is status quo and the company is fine with it, the union is fine with it, and so it will remain like that forever.

Same with the asinine amount of time it takes the company to process SAP requests, and schedule changes on the 28th. The contract says they have 24 hours or the union has to be notified (but there are no ramifications). Every month It happens, and the union says ok cool. What's being done to fix it? Not a lot. Have any new schedulers been hired since we started growing? I've heard from a CP that schedule changes are all manual because 117 rules aren't taken into account with split trips. Why don't they let automatic drops and pickups happen for the non-split trips, using manual intervention for the split trips? That would alleviate the backlog for a lot of requests and free up the schedulers to focus on the split trips during the 28-3rd when the requests are piled up. My understanding is Kevin W is the one who is saying no to that. What is the union's position and what is the union doing to fix it?

Sennant

Tell me how the #1 guy in Ord taking line 98 when we had paper bids is him take a better line? All the lines were the same on paper. There was no seniority with paper. And while you got the result of you if back quicker you forget you still had to wait 3 days for them to integrate you or jack you schedule way up by putting your vacation or training in after the fact.

wt932051

Agree 100 percent with everything you said! It is good knowing somebody gets it. So thanks BeatNavy.

The dropped for IOE part you mentioned was also a huge mistake on the unions part. It use to be as you described, but then commuters were complaining that they would commute in to find out that their 4 day trip was dropped and have to commute back home. Poor thing. The home based pilots didn't care. So what the union did was create a letter of agreement for a new system. It was a 3 month test. At the end was to be voted on. The new system would allow the commuters to find out 24-48 hours in advance if their trip was dropped, but they had to call in, and could be reassigned another trip. They had to do this at least twice on a 4 day trip if I remember right. Once before the first two days of it, and again 24-48 hours before the last two days. Sounds good for the commuters right? Worse for the home based. Now they had to stay close to home instead of take off to Hawaii for the week. What ended up happening is the company started reassigning junk to both the commuters and the home based pilots. Like standups, day turns, causing hotels for commuters now, and was just worse because now you had to work instead of being off. So the union dropped the ball. It went on for 2 years like this before it was voted on. At that point the people like me who knew the old way was better were now captains not getting dropped anymore. Now the replacement FO's only knew the new system and didn't know the old way was so much better. So the vote came and guess what? It passed by a slim margin. How? The union sent an email recommending to vote yes to all these clueless pilots. So now we are stuck with a worse system then we had. That is how it came to be today. There is your history lesson and you can thank the union once again for dropping the ball and letting Mesa once again run over us.

wt932051

Clueless. All the lines were not the same on paper. Some had weekends off, some had more days off, others were better for commuters, they needed certain days off and that was the best line for that, etc. Just because you were number 1 in ord doesn't mean you are going to bid the number 1 line... The number one guy did use his seniority to get the line he wanted so you are incorrect once again when you said "There was no seniority with paper."

Paper wasn't as good for senior people as PBS is if you know how to use it. Duh. Now they can get both the max days off, highest credit, and those specific days off, if, they know how to use PBS. Or the junior guys will take it that know how to really work PBS. That didn't happen with paper.

Integration was awesome if you knew how to use it you could score more days off, but again apparently you did not know what you were doing.

I can't keep talking to someone who just won't get it. Peace.

MagPBS

Point 1. There is no way that this system can kick out an entire airline schedule by the 18th. And for that matter you wouldn't want it to. Attached is a copy of the open time from the first run at PHX CA in February as case in point. It also goes to

Point 2. Unstacking/coverage is nothing new. It existed in paper bids just wasn't as transparent. Because the Navtech product is pilot centric vs global solution it tries to honor every pilots (regardless of seniority) request. This gets dealt with via the coverage section whereby junior people can't have weekend as much as they would like them. It has in the past been used to correct shortages in staffing but it's also used to deal with changes in marketing (like February) and vacations issues (think X-Mas) and quite frankly I have numerous examples of pilots being unstacked a trip they specifically requested, but complain because it has the word unstacked on it.

wt932051

I disagree with point 1. They can spit it out within 24 hours if they had the right pilot staffing in the first place, are limited to a certain percentage of unstacking/coverage awards, and have the PBS staffing in place to get it done.

There will always be open time. So if no unstacking/coverage awards could be negotiated, then a percentage should be included. Like 5 percent max unstacking. This way it would help eliminate some of that stacked open time during that same week, and also require a bit more reserve coverage to manage it. There is a good in between that we should have. Right now Mesa has all the control. As for the old paper packets they built the lines so the open time was as even as they could get, but then we bid on it knowing if they were short pilots, vs number of lines, they would have to JA the rest at premium pay. Right now they get to unstack it and destroy our schedules at will and at straight time at our expense of good schedules. When it unstacks it accommodates Mesa before looking at our preferences so the more limits on unstacking we can get the better. I remember when they unstacked the entire Dash FO roster in Denver due to pilot shortage. Nobody got what they wanted and most of the bottom half of the FO's were flying almost 100 hours all at straight time. If it was a paper bid packet award, all that open time would have been JA'ed to those more junior and at least they would have made bank unlike with PBS with the unlimited unstacking. This all because Mesa didn't plan the staffing correctly. This should never be allowed to get like that. If it does though, Mesa will pay for it. That is the only way they learn to prevent it.