Pinnacle cancelling classes
 

I just got a call from a former student, He was to start at Pinnacle on Monday. He got a call today stating the class was cancelled due to this Delta stuff. I feel sorry for the guy. Spent over 25 years at Delta (non-flying position) and took the retirement package to start a new career. Guess only folks hiring now are Comair and ASA? Bad all over.

And SkyWest

well tell your friend if he doesn't get hired somwhere else to not worry about it. this isn't the first time this company has cancelled a class/upgrade only to turn around and try to catch up. i think this is all a ploy to get us to sign a contract. i wouldn't even be suprised if pinnacle filed for bankruptcy and forced a contract on us. i wouldn't put it past management. we dont have enough pilots on the nwa side. and there is still plenty of room for the few pilots we have in atlanta to come back to their original bases.

Really!?!? A company would really go that far??? Oh well, I guess anything can happen. A friend of mine recently interviewed there and said that they were going to hire quite a few people... Goes to show how things can turn around overnight, even if it is just a ploy by the company...

This reminds me of winter of 06-07, upgrade and new hire class was canceled for whatever reason. I'm sure the hiring will pick up soon.

oh yes, they would.

this is exactly what i was refering to. they were telling us we were going under, upgrades were stopped, new hire classes were cancelled and we were supposedly losing planes and nwa wasn't going to sign a new contract with us till the pilots agreed to one. same thing, just a year and a half later. and oh they paid for that one. there were about 7 months straight were if anyone picked up open time it would be at 150% and they couldn't upgrade fast enough. they cant even do it now. we still had a captain slot go unfilled.

Agreed. They have a habit of canceling classes, realizing they are short 100 pilots and immediately commence hiring Captains off the street. This will be short lived.

ASA still hiring????

former student, friend of a friend of a friend
 

Nice source....but from what I heard, it's not true. They still are looking for pilots.

...just talked to a friend in Pinnacle H/R, Christina, and they plan to continue hiring through 2008.

I wouldn't take this post seriously.

yep. pinnacle is not stopping new hire classes. bad rumor/source.

Yes and no. There will be more June classes -- the ones scheduled for the 16th and 30th will not be held. However it seems more of a "postponed" than "cancelled". And as Airsupport indicates, don't be surprised if classes are hastily started up again in July.

yeah i called a buddy of mine that just finished his ground upgrade class. he said that they are still interviewing and hiring. there are 2 classes going on right now and another on the way. he obviously doesn't have the exact class dates, but they are not stopping the process, just "maybe" slowing it down.

The CA I'm flying with now is on the interview team, and the guys that interviewed Wednesday went into a pool, for what its worth.

Maybe the confusion here is about 900 differences training. I do know a couple of guys whose diff training slots were cancelled.

Call crew sched and ask how much reserve coverage we have in Memphis...ask reserve FOs in DTW how many hours they are assigned each month. You'll soon see we are nowhere near fully staffed.

The reason they might be slowing hiring is because we have like 30-40 FOs in the pipeline, and b/c there are about 30ish FOs in ATL who will have to go somewhere. It would make sense to slow the incoming new hires while the ATL guys are allowed time to go through a displacement bid. Otherwise, we'd have to bump new hires from whatever base they bid out of new hire class. It saves a lot of frustration and complications by just hitting the pause button on new hires, re-assigning the displaced ATL guys, then see what the needs of the company are.

Maybe it's also contract stuff.

So do you think delta will be able to actually end the contract with pinnacle?

Also with the 900's since Pinnacle owns them will Delta buy them and use them with another DCI partner or do you think Pinnacle will get to use them with NWA?

Just curious what the thoughts are on this because I am sure a lot of people are wondering this right now.

Best case sceneario with DL we keep the 9 airplanes we already have with no inmediate option for more. That's still bad news, only 9 airplanes for a whole new base? humm...... also I think PNCL is going to take DL to court, but the actual settlement will be outside court.

If we actually stop flying for DL at all, I think there's a very good chance for PNCL taking the 900s to the NW side, but off course, NW won't accept them on top of the existing fleet, but they'll exchange 1 to 1 (1 200 for 1 900). For the pilot group that won't make a difference, still no gain in fleet.

I def would!

I was denied last week a swap from open time - 4 days of highspeeds I wanted to swap for a 4-day trip that would have gotten me 3x as many hours. It was denied due to staffing since 4 days of highspeeds requires 5 days of reserves versus the 4-day in open time. Obviously, we are still hurting.

Alright, as a new DTW FO who is still on reserve, I will respond to those of you suggesting we are overworked. I have sat a few nights without being used and have only flown 18 hours all month. I have called to get open time and been denied because they "need" me on reserve. As I understand it, we had three ready reserve fo's at the airport last night and not one got a call. With even more people coming out of training soon, it could get worse for those of us who may want to fly more than the monthly minimum.

That being said, I could be in a minority here. Maybe I am sitting on days that are running smoothly. I have heard of people getting used a lot, just haven't seen it first hand.

If all you do, or the majority of your reserve periods are ready or airport reserve, you'll rarely fly. I suggest you to bid for either a high speed line or bid for a reserve line with no ready reserve. In Detroit life is easy compared to MEM or MSP. A coulple of FO friends in MEM told me that they got bumped back to a high speed line. They've been on the line since late '07. Also, is not like we are understaffed right now, is just that they keep increasing those dam** high speed lines. Each crew member only covers 40-50 hrs a month with a high speed line, so crew utilization is minimal. At least in MEM there are 22 high speed lines for this month.

I've tried that before as well. We're short enough on reserves that it's almost impossible for them to let you pick up a trip for hispeeds. I'm pretty sure than can easily assign a resreve to a 3/4 day trip, but I don't think they can just block out a reserve on 4 hispeeds in a row like we do.

i flew with a guy on the interview team on friday. he said they have gone from 20 guys at a time to 10. and they have gone from a class starting every monday, to every other monday. but they are still hiring, and still trying to get everyone they can. we still had 5 captain vacancies go unfilled on the last bid.

The official word that I got from recruitment on 06/12 is that we're placing everyone that gets hired this month into a pool. All interview dates/classes after June are postponed until they know what's going on with Delta; however, this can change on a day-to-day basis. You could just email them to get a legitimate update.

We aren't as short-staffed as we used to be. In fact, one of the board of directors came to my recurrent class last week and said we have more reserves now than we've ever had before. Who knows though... management can be a bunch of smoke and mirrors. I have a feeling this Delta thing is just that.

I think there we're short on captains because so many FO's make lateral moves and/or are hired with 200-400 hours and take a good 3 years to hit captain mins. Just a guess.

So let me get this straight: Pinnacle asked Delta to begin proceedings to cancel their agreement simply to shakedown the Pinnacle pilots? And you are proposing that Delta agreed to this?

No. Delta is working to eliminate available seats with minimum cost to their own operation. They are doing this by eradicating a couple of their (too many) connection carriers: Mesa and Pinnacle.

Any guesses as to which company spends more money keeping their lawyers on the sidelines on retainer for just this eventuality?

Hint: It's the one that's been through bankruptcy.

With Delta backing off on removing the contract, is there any word on new hire classes?

Don't know for sure, but I heard at the Corporate Education Center July classes are planned... As far as current training, there is the 6/2 class of 10 finishing up ground school this week. The other classes from May are in the CPTs and sims.

Too bad they are breaking a service agreement by doing so. Pinnacle was hosed by the A+14 arrival metric, but the service agreement said that the flight schedules would be something that BOTH Delta AND Pinnacle would agree mutually upon. That never happened.

So, Delta cancels Pinnacle flying in a heartbeat to backout. Like you said, to eradicate one of too many connection carriers.

I hate to say it, but from the airline services agreement point of view, it wasn't exactly legal. If it goes to court, Pinnacle would at the very least get an injunction, and Delta would have to pay Pinnacle $$$ (like they are paying off Mesa).

Pretty cheap of Delta to pull this kinda move, IMO. They signed a contract for 10 years, and then terminate it in 6 months before the jets are even delivered. Reasoning the cancellation on poor performance, where really, Delta gave schedules that were physically impossible to meet. Exmplain to me how you can fly ATL to TLH in 15 minutes air time. Not even afterburners could do that.

we never stopped hiring and from what i have been told we haven't even stopped classes. infact there are interviews tomorrow. instead of running classes every monday they have switched to every other monday. we still need pilots though. they have upped the crews in ATL to cover the flying over there. they now want 9 crews per plane. on the nwa side we probably only have 5. so they really want to get this delta deal back and will overstaff ATL to do so.

ASA may still be interviewing, but everyone is going into a pool. I interviewed in early May and got a call less than two weeks ago confirming that I was in the pool. They have no idea when, if at all, the next class will be. Rumor has it they're fully staffed for the rest of the year..

I am new here, and would like to thank everyone for all the info you post (true or not). I was in the interview the day after the Delta contract was terminated. The first thing they said was that all classes as of today are canceled until further notice, but if we were hired it would be to a pool. The next week I received a call from Christina Sidewall, she said that I was in the pool and as of now the July classes were canceled, but if they started back up then I would be called because I am number 2 on the "Pool" list. She said it may be August before I start depending on the situation.

6/2 was the last class to start for June. There could have been a newhire class that started yesterday, but it wasn't on the schedule board when I was at the CEC on Saturday.

When I got hired in 06 this exact thing happened. Interviews were going and when the NWA threats started the company haulted upgrade/new hire. My class was pushed back 3-4 weeks, then hiring was going full bore. A few months later we got the ASA (service agreement) with NWA PLUS 15 airplanes back from the parking lot. That started this last wave and I think this delta thing is a hiccup in the process. I have my own views on DL but I don't think PNCL mgmt brought this on as a scare tactic, I think it was more DL showing who is in the driver's seat. We get 90 days to prove ourselves and I have every hope and personal belief that things will work out. Buying stock now...

Thanks, hopefully it is only a few weeks till I get a call.
On the stock sids I can not argee more. PNCL's stock price is down 81.2% in the last 12 months, down 62.3% in the past quarter and down
52.7% in the past month. This historical performance should lead to above average price performance in the next one to three months.

[quote=higney85;410811]I have my own views on DL but I don't think PNCL mgmt brought this on as a scare tactic, I think it was more DL showing who is in the driver's seat. quote]

I agree. Trenary has always been NWA's beotch, but now he knows how it feels to be a DAL max security prison beotch. A taste of his own medicine.

For the first time ever I am beginning to think our mgmt team is actually having to try and perform instead of just doing what pleases them. The good faith TOWARDS a contract (the rumors fly) and working to get the DL flying back (we have at least a second chance). There is still some things I want to see done but from my vantage point things (operations wise) are running smoother than I have ever seen in all hubs (indy is always good). I expect a contract, the DL flying, and some significant effort moves on the Colgan side to get things on a good path. I think the stock will rebound and I think even if it doesn't the value shouldn't drop much more.

I look at this cycle like a drug rehab... Guy gets caught at work, crap hits the fan, goes to rehab, comes out great.... then the cycle repeats. I plan on selling at the rehab welcome home party! Hope that analogy isn't offensive...

They were suposed to start every other Monday as of June . . . there were classes scheduled for 6/16 and 6/30 but they were cancelled. So, classes were clated to start going to every other week but were all axed before they started. Notible fact is that they "cancelled" these classes, not postponed them . . . for whatever thats worth.

5/12 class is up for checkrides by the end of the week
5/19 class is starting sims
5/28 class just finished orals and is starting gfs/cpt this week
6/2 class finished ground school this week
Just and update if you cared . . .

[quote=Rama04;411340]They were suposed to start every other Monday as of June . . . there were classes scheduled for 6/16 and 6/30 but they were cancelled. So, classes were clated to start going to every other week but were all axed before they started. Notible fact is that they "cancelled" these classes, not postponed them . . . for whatever thats worth.

Not realy what I want to hear. Do you all thank they will start up again soon?

Don't fret.

DL wants 9E to have a signed contract with their pilot group (which has already conducted a strike vote).

PNCL short-staffs as much as possible and their class dates have always been last minute--too little-too late. Hang in there and keep a bag packed. They'll call you at 4pm on a Friday for a Monday start.