I think 60% CA pay is a good rate- although our CA pay needs to reflect industry average PLUS 2008 COLA and the fact that is it truly a 76er (86 for others). The difference is almost 2x the aircraft- treat it as such. I still believe anything over 50 seats need to be mainline but don't get me started on that...


I have this problem with a "fly safe" campaign...

You should have been flying safe from the beginning- all the way back to the C150 days. By coming on the boards saying "OK guys we all need to fly safe by taxiing slow, having the APU running, etc that shows how you feel about your own day-to-day flying habits. I am not a CA so I am not the one taxiing yet but nobody should be taxiing soo fast as to not be able to stop the plane if need-be while taxiing and not make the FA fall on her butt presenting the SAFETY features. Safety first here folks... The APU thing- everyone has their own views on this. I am personally a fan of always using the APU for takeoff and bring it on when you bring the first flaps in on the approach- here is MY reasoning. On Takeoff I would prefer to not be pulling air off the bleeds. If I encounter windshear on TO I want all the power possible. I also want the generator redundancy in case we lose an engine. TO is the most likely time to lose a motor- what will the QRH call for? APU on. To each their own but these are my opinions. Fuel- you need Burn/Alt/reserve at TO. You also need to use judgement for the rest. At least 15 mins of Contingency fuel is a personal preference. This is at a min. If there is weather, possible enroute delays, etc I want more. 30 Min of C fuel always seems to leave plenty of options. Do your job to the best of your ability. This means fly safe.

Just the other day we ended up about 1.5 hours delayed b/c dispatch could not get back to us for our reroute. We were filed on a "canned route" that brought us all through the severe line of weather. We ended up calling up using AIRINC because after over anhour and 5 ACARS messages we did not get a single reply. Our last ACARS was along the lines of "since we cannot get in touch with a vital part of our crew we are deeming this flight unsafe. We are not going airborne until we can establish that we have a dispatcher". We could have taken off and/or worked out something with clearance but that is not in accordance with company procedures, the FAA (being that we are not using the dispatcher at this point), or the fact that we cannot see everything moving down the way (weather). After using AIRINC (and costing the company something like $7/min) we were told to return to the gate and get a new release. We then spoke to dispatch to find out that the weather indeed had changed and our original routing would have had us in the heart of the weather and that our proposal (for 1.5 hours prior) was no longer good. Dispatch then did their job and helped us SAFELY get back to MEM. When asked why it took 1.5 hours and no ACARS response we were told that they knew we were not going to takeoff and that they were swamped with flights. The company uses the minimum amount of dispatchers. Thankfully we did not takeoff, but it did cost the company about 1000lbs of fuel and who knows what hourly MX costs for us to sit out on the ramp with the APU and an engine running.

This fight with mgmt will take a while still to resolve and we (the pilots) will win, but we still have a job that we are paid (minimally) to do. If you do not feel you can do that or feel you need to manipulate that system that is based on safety I do not want you next to me in the cockpit. Sorry for the long post but it is a point that sits big with me.

 

Good Post man! I learn so much from browsing on this site. I plan on applying to 9E during the summer and have been following the developments of the contract. I keep telling myself that there should be a TA by then. It is begining to look like that is still a ways off with the current cross lawsuits.

9E would be conveniant for mw since DTW is junior. Gotta love Michigan LOL. This is the place to find a cheap house as everyone here has been hurting for years now.

Keep fighting the good fight guys.

 

I'm sure this has been covered in other posts and helps display my lack of knowledge for the 121 world, but could everyone (or as many pilots as you could get to agree to) call in sick on one day? I imagine that would put them on their knees pretty quick to negotiate, especially if it happened just once a week.

 

Quoted from Bohicagain
"No matter how much you follow the FOM to the letter it is not going to help get a contract quicker. Management will drag their feet as long as possible. The only way I see 9E getting a contract real soon is if they accept the crap that the company has been offering."

I think this line of thinking is prevelent at 9E and is really part of the problem.
Action is what is required. The strike vote was a show of unity, but is still just talk.

As was mentioned the Union cannot organize, encourage, or be seen as encouraging anything other than status quo. So this has to be a grass roots effort.

As a Captain I do my part, and hopefully this board and our own board can spread the word.

Basically if we can't get enough people to slow things down,it will be clear to me that this pilot group is just not ****ed off enough, and is all talk and no action. I truly hope that will not be the case.

 

So now they are once again offering 150% for open time pick ups. If it was up to me, I would grow a spine and not pick up this flying until we have a contract.

I know 150% is very tempting to pad the bank account but it is a very short sighted solution. They are starting to feel the squeeze that is the inevitable result of treating their pilots like second class citizens. Please do not facilitate their attempts to undermine our efforts to achieve a fair contract.

Take care and remember our number one guiding principle: "Never Compromise Safety".

So fly safe guys.

 

I think we all know that our company message board is not much use for some subjects. Very few people are going to stick their neck out on the line posting under their own name knowing that the company trolls our message board. Having said that, they really should have nothing to fear since all we are doing is advocating safe operating practices.