Last night when we arrived in HOU I was doing the postflight and I was approached by an Envoy ramper. Conversation went like this.

Ramper: "Hey, why don't you come to work for us?"
Me: "Who is "us"?"
Ramper: "American Airlines."
Me: "doing what?"
Ramper: "Pilot."
At that point he attempted to hand me an Envoy business card with a telephone number hand written on it.
Me: "you're not American. You're Envoy. I'd love to fly for AA but I don't think you can help me."

I told him to keep his card. Now I wish I would've taken it.

 

The only way substantial changes to YV are going to happen is if the pilots vote with their feet. As long as JO can staff the flights then he is happy. If the money is worth it then got to any of the other regionals/LCCs

 

Fly "safe" brother

I'm all for being professional and using the appointed channels (ALPA) to implement change on our behalf, but this is getting way out of hand. I say it's past due to shove the union out of the way and handle the two things we can directly control...fuel consumption and on time performance.

I make every effort to taxi and fly safely if it means overblocking. Nobody else is going to see to our well being except you and me. Minutes matter to me at Mesa.

 

MX definitely saw an increase in pilot write ups this morning. I guess by delaying/canceling flights costing Mesa money, is the way to get Mesa to pay you all more money.

 

It is a way to catch management's attention. People aren't happy here and the union is clearly either afraid of or in bed with the company. If on-time performance takes a steep drop then they can't stay in business from what they have told us. It forces their hand to get more serious about either A)giving us a better contract, or B) shutting the doors. Either way most of us will be better off. All of our FOs would net more and some of our junior CAs would nearly break even at select other regionals on first year pay. The senior guys/gals that have been here forever, well that's their own prerogative. Most of them understand that this day is coming.

 

Cmon guys they just announced 4 more EJET CAs... woohooo!!! -_-

 

Bingo! Let's face it, our union is weak. Seems they are supposed to be protecting the pilot group, but seems they are protecting the company more. If there is 'no more money' then the company should stop playing the game. It is unacceptable that other regionals are that far ahead in pay/benefits than us. Why not take note out of Delta, Southwest's playbook. Info picketing, no open time pickups etc....

 

I do my best to stay out of the politics of all of this, but have to chime in on this one. Before you all go off half cocked with ideas of sick outs, and slowdown, and declarations of open time pickups stopping. You need to do some research on what unions can and cannot due legally. There is plenty of case law where unions have been sued by the company and lost with regards to these issues.

Unions CAN NOT: instigate, condone, participate in, etc etc etc anything that would appear to be a work slowdown event or a change in status. As such you will never see a union back any kind of of organized sickout. Nor can we come out and tell pilots to stop picking up time as that's a change in current status quo.

Finally, if any of these events do appear to happen. The union will be required to send out some pretty solid statements to stop doing it or a judge will slap us silly.

As far as what we can do legally. The Fall MEC meeting is in a few weeks. Expect all of that to be covered. Nothing in a union (any union) happens overnight.

 

...so were the new hire iPad payments, crashpad payments, ontime performance bonus plans, and hotel buyback program--all of which were unilaterally implemented with zero LOA from this "ALPA" chapter.

Why hasn't our association addressed those glaring violations of the status quo and sought an injunction in Federal District court, MagPBS? What condescending answers/sidesteps do you have for THAT one?

Methinks the answer is this "ALPA" chapter turns a blind eye to anything the company needs to do to keep the new hire train moving, thus wasting any potential leverage they would've had over management.

An ALPA chapter that turns a blind eye to status quo violations is no ALPA chapter at all, IMHO. Might want to step down off that high horse bud.

 

Unfortunately he is correct. The last line is probably the most true, especially with our union. So sit back relax, work for peanuts, get JO his new Ferrari, it'll only be another five years.