get away with what? United’s not allowed to have a business plan? I get that losing jobs sucks, but it’s not always an evil conspiracy to screw pilots. If United thought they’d make money with xjt and commutair, they’d both still be here. Like, oh say, six months ago, when both we’re planning to grow.

This is correct. I don't think the RLA allows all of us to actually be under one union. The word "Association" is not in the name by accident.

what should ALPA have done, in your opinion?

he doesn’t have an answer for that.

At the end of the day ALPA is a labor union that is going to bargain for the Interests or mainline pilots and only mainline jobs. Years ago working EMS,I was the member of a large international union which represented firefighters. My agency did transports only and had no fire suppression capabilities. While it was nice having the resources of a large international labor group, they were also very open about putting us in our place and pushing to bring EMS transport under the umbrella of fire suppression duties and thus putting us out of work.


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Hard to blame them its basically impossible to make things better at the regionals due to the nature of bidding for business far better to try and shrink them so mainline and the LLC can grow in their place

If ALPA had the interest of regional pilots, they'd hold the line and regional airlines wouldn't exist.

It’s not the same union. The pilots who are on the XJT MEC are not the same pilots who are on the UAL mec. ALPA is an association of several unions. That’s what the second A in ALPA stands for. But I’m pretty sure you already knew that and your line of questions has a specific agenda. Why not just come out and say it? It’s okay.

Only an airline pilot’s respective MEC can negotiate their own contract. They are not able to negotiate another pilot group’s contract. They have no say in it. So of course each MEC is going to negotiate what is solely in their own interest. So yes, mainline pilots will always negotiate in their own interest and regional pilots will negotiate their own interest. Neither has a say in the other.

must be a Skywest guy.

“ItsMYtime” a screen name perfect for you and 2020.

With the new TA at United, anyone know what the changes are in regard to Express flying?

UAX is reduced from 120% to 100% of mainline narrowbody block, plus shorter look back period if I remember right. Point being is that there are changes

Does the shorter look back help the company fly more RJs by eliminating the peak lockdown period from the look-back?

It could be that 100% of a larger number still lets them fly more RJs than 120% of a smaller number.

If UAX is scheduled to fly less than 40% of their same month 2019 level, nothing changes. It’s still 120% United NB block with the 12 month look back. If they are scheduled to fly 40% or greater than the same month 2019, then they are restricted to less United NB block on a same month for month basis. Basically, when things start to recover, UAX block hours will be reduced from 120% to <100% for the duration of the TA (up to 2 years).

Thing is, from what I’ve heard UAX is already above 40%.

The summary for the agreement said that it would have forced UAX changes to comply with scope of it was in effect during July, aug, September

The union put out a slide in one of their video Q&A sessions discussing the scope deal. Pre-COVID, UAX usually ran around 80-90% mainline block hours. That is because they were scoped out on 70/76 seaters and United only wanted so many 50 seaters. With United flying a full schedule, the allowable big rj’s and 50 seaters didn’t ring the bell. Since all of this hit, the regionals have ripped the bell off of the wall. In the last few months UAX flying has far exceeded United, and had the plan been in effect, the scope restrictions would have kicked in. Now that the TA has passed (providing that UAX is at 40% 2019 levels), UAX can’t exceed mainline block hours. Going forward UAX hours will have to be reduced, United hours increased to a level above UAX, or a combination of the two so that UAX levels don’t exceed that of United.

I think a big impact on the yes votes was the fact that this TA broke the historical model of "UAX hires while mainline fires".

Who’s hiring!! (Laugh)

UAX hiring historically tended to start up much sooner after the "trigger event" and would occur while UA was furloughing.

Looks like that's getting pre-empted this time, good on UA-ALPA.

or not

furlough 2000 in June 2021 while I could see SKYW to start hiring again at that time.

Time will tell.

The future for UAX or United is far from set in stone. COVID will have a long lasting impact on how the airlines operate, and on how big they are. There is a good chance that the 756 gets phased out as the max comes back, and there is also a good chance that the 50 seat fleet and the number of regionals flying them see a further reduction. Both fleets are getting older and are to the point of aging out. United could be serious about the 50 seaters being all but gone by the end of this, they could end up buying something like the A220 later on and freeing up a few more big rj’s, or a judge could alter the current scope language in bankruptcy. Time will tell.

The super senior, super ANGRY folks on the OTHER United forum are suggesting selling scope for pay raises. Let’s hope that goes NOWHERE.

Those guys are just a vocal very small group who don’t have the votes or influence to change a thing. Kind of like the extremes in politics who think that they are going to abolish the 2nd amendment or outlaw abortion.

yeah....I started paying attention to the actual NUMBERS on that forum....and it’s never more than 15-20 people. And it’s the SAME people. Must be exhausting.

Scope starting to bite...
 

It won’t be just United though. All three of the Big Three have cut back mainline fleets. Initially decreasing the number of seats in their regional feed aircraft will will take care of the scope implications of that, albeit at a significant hit to their CASM, but that may not be sustainable as the second year of decreased seat-miles and all around revenue continues.


https://thepointsguy.com/news/united...ats-from-e175/


The big winners, however, threaten to be SWA and the LCCs leading the recovery domestically.

Well, don’t forget that over 2,000 UAX pilots between ExpressJet and Trans States shutdowns were sent to the streets.

Only airline in the UAX system with furloughed pilots is Air Wisconsin with 130 pilots waiting recall. AW’s days may be numbered with the old 200 fleet they possess.

Point I’m making, on the UAX side there are no furloughs to recall, so the only solution would be to hire.

Retiring 50 seaters, with no specifics, was mentioned several times on yesterday’s earnings call.

The 50 seaters are getting pretty tired and definitely closer to the end than anything else in the fleet, but United is really good at kicking the can down the road. Saying that the 50 seaters are going to be retired without providing a plan and a date is like telling a 75 year old man that he’s going to die. Could be soon, could be years from now, but still the truth.

Yeah that’s true, but with the whole EV movement and Biden’s Master’s doing everything they can to raise the price of fuel, I see the 50 seater dying much sooner than later. The keystone pipeline is just the beginning. UA has a history of pulling the plug in an instant. So when/if it happens, I doubt there’ll be any warning.

Ahhhhh yes, Biden's master plan. Get elected president of the United States just to raise your gas prices! How devious

I don’t think of it in such a devious tone, but spending will eventually have to be repaid. There are ways other than taxes to do it, however that tends to be the quickest and easiest route, plus one that has been used in the past.

I think Ronald Reagan said it best. “Government’s view of the economy could be summed up in a few short phrases: If it moves, tax it. If it keeps moving, regulate it. And if it stops moving, subsidize it.”

This administration will pass more environmental regulations than would have happened if the election had gone the other way. Policies have compliance cost and consequences. Raise the cost of compliance or restrict the supply, prices go up. Politicians only tell one side of a story to get votes. They will talk about the jobs that were created due to a policy, but they don’t talk about the jobs that were destroyed or the net loss of employment that results. If fuel prices were to get back to where they were back in 2008, the 50 seat fleet could be quickly retired. Just parking the 200 would shut down Air Wisconsin and hit SkyWest hard since they make up a large part of their fleet and the 70/76 seaters are scoped out. That could have a major impact on the future of UAX.

Easier to use inflation. Hard to point fingers with taxes, much easier for the politicians to blame banks for inflation. Not to mention the rich don't mind inflation because they hold assets which keep their real world value vs taxation which tends to be politically expedient to raise on the rich.

Except the last bonds that AA sold they had to pay 12% for the loan of the money. ForUnited it was 11%

https://i.ibb.co/k0MwvbV/EA6-D4865-1...F794-CB1-F.jpg

and their financial situation is more precarious now. Except for Alaska, I think all the majors are junk-rated now. And they don’t have the money to pay off their junk rated bonds, instead they must refinance them by selling new bonds collateralized by older airplanes in the face if their own declining credit ratings. That’s bad enough - akin to refinancing credit card debt by repeatedly charging it on a new credit card at higher and higher rates.

Add inflation to that, and the yields will skyrocket. How can ANY company make enough profit to pay off $40 billion (which certainly at least AA will reach before this is over) while paying 15-20% interest on that debt?

Inflating your way out of debt might work for the government which after all prints money, but it will put every major airline (and most regionals) in bankruptcy if it happens.

The CRJ200 is 30% (closer to 20% a year from now) of the SkyWest fleet. 200’s are all paid off, they have more 175’s coming on property, and own all the future orders of ERJ175’s with the CRJ program shut down. I’d assume some 200’s would be moved to SkyWest leasing, and the rest to the dessert.

A scenario of the 50 seater going away would hurt the pilot group and with no scope changes would most likely lead to SkyWest furloughs, but SkyWest Inc. would be just fine.

Yup, Inc will be fine it's not like they didn't know this was coming someday.