ASA's summer flying
 

I'm surprised to have not seen anything posted yet regarding the recent email about ASA's summer flying. Being furloughed I wouldn't have wanted to be called back to be furloughed again in the fall. But it seems to me a bit extreme what they are doing to get through the summer while they have 80 furloughed. In my opinion they could have atleast brought a few back and not had to take such extreme measures. Let me know what those of you at ASA think about it.

I agree and don't think we needed to furlough in the first place.

That said, the conventional wisdom in the GO seems to be that the furloughs were necessary, and if they brought you all back for the summer, they'd have to re-furlough you for the fall. They are anticipating this fall to be worse than last year.

Same deal happening at Comair, welcome to the club gentlemen.

"Delta is currently finalizing the Summer schedule and indications are they will be cranking the block hours up in June - August. We will approach close to 1000 flights per day during some days in July. ASA has not experienced block hours or departures like this in our recent past.

Average line block hours will reach into the mid 80s during the Summer months. Credit line values will be very high and there will be a return of more CDO lines. Reserve pilot staffing will still run around the 18-20% level overall putting us in the current staffing position of covering unplanned absences (ie sick calls, pilots invoking the commuter clause) and irregular operations (ie ground delay programs, weather).

Personal leave of absences will be almost non existent and COMA lines will not be offered until later this Fall. The Chief PIlots will assist with "must have trip drops" but even those will be hard to approve. If you have any "must have time off requests" (ie I am the groom in a wedding) not accounted for already via a vacation week award or probably not senior enough to hold any line other then Reserve, stop by and talk to a Chief Pilot ASAP. Give the CP office a heads up now even though you think you will be able to bid the time off.
There is no plan to cancel vacation awards during the Summer. We should have the staffing to meet the peak Summer schedule month which is July.
This Summer will be challenging but we can do it. Your continued professionalism and attention to our D-O program, fuel initiatives and safety programs is appreciated."

Straight from the horses mouth. Or the other end in his case. Doesnt sound too confident that summer will be a cake walk. Might our performance numbers drop and possibly affect us in a long term sense?

When are fall schedules finalized?

and while I'm at it, if the company is so serious about cutting all the fat they can and wanting to show DL they are truly making cost a priority, why doesn't BH, SH and the other @$&*#$!% in the Atech take a pay cut and freeze their bonuses.

If this is true and has already happened, then I stand corrected

Gunga thanks for quoting the email. I was so upset when I read it that I deleted it right away. It was bad enough that march and april showed insufficient staffing, but this is taking it a bit too far.

I agree. Good luck trying to trade/pick up trips or change days off in summer if most were upset about it for March/April.

Compaired to others I feel that our execs compensation packages are average at best. Most of our competitors pay their Exec more than we pay ours and many of them are either much smaller or not as profitable.

2008:.............Base...........Total

CEO SKW Inc
Jerry:............$362K...........$1.27M

COO SKW
Chip:.............$230K...........$719K

COO ASA
Brad:.............$200K...........$614K

Skywest Inc (SKYW.O) Officers and Directors| Stocks | Reuters.com

I feel that these guys deserve these bases and TC's. They are among the best in the industry (Kool-Aid aside).

Compare with above:

Republic's Bedford: Base $1.01M ????????(What Tha ...:confused:..?) His TC is $2.03M???
Mesa's Ornstein: Base $555K
Pinnacle's Trenary: Base $689K
XJet's Beam: Base $345K (after a 15% pay cut)

I see where you are coming from, but in my opinion, comparing their pay to other airline execs pay is like putting a bench players guarantee to Arods. Doesnt mean he still isnt overpaid, its just the other extreme makes you nauseous.

600K-1.3 mil still in my book deserves a pay cut when there are front line employees losing their jobs to save the company money

Wow and Brad started out as a pilot too. Now he's making 3x as much as a senior legacy captain at a regional. Looks like management is where the money's at:D

No..........Comparing a bench player’s income to Arods would be like comparing a pilot’s to your CEO's. Not a CEO to other CEO's, that would be like comparing Peyton Manning's guarantee to Tom Brady's.

I do agree that Inc pulled the plug way to quick on the "ASA 80." They could have done a lot more when it came to retaining them, much like what they are doing here at SKW. I won't and can't explain why?

point taken. Depends on who you are comparing it to, I guess. Now, if you want to start comparing their wives, that could be a more interesting debate...

That's true!!!! Ornstein's wife is HOTTTT!!!! ??????????????? TW_....does she see in him? Oh yeah............$$!

ill explain for you then. i believe you are referring to the fact that skywest inc. was able to fork over the cash to pay for COBRA (or medical benefits) for the people who accepted VLA's at skywest. for some reason ASA employees (union pilots) are not worthy of such a benefit. im sure our voluntary programs would have been more successful if they would have covered medical benefits. this could have reduced or eliminated our furloughs.

For what these guys have done with SkyWest Inc., I would say their compensation is more than earned and deserved.

Why hasn't anyone commented on this...

'currently no plans to cancel vacation awards...'

After planning my vacation with my wife and kid for the last 6 months. If they were to take away my vacation, I think I would lose all control. I'm a pretty passive guy, but having that as even an option makes my blood boil. Is that valid per the contract?

Further more do they/ have they (ASA) done this. I have only been with the company for a few years and never really heard any one that had a problem with this sort of thing.

Ok guys.......that MBA is better and better if that's what you want.;)



atp

Looking better and better that is. Oops.....my bad!

Gunga, you may want to think twice before posting internal company emails on a public site. Not only can such get you in trouble, but it may also force them to stop sending out email updates for fear of such.

Read the contract, guys. They can do it as long as they meet certain requirements for compensation.

In my 8 years I've seen them do it a couple of times. I've also seen them offer to buy back vacations voluntarily several times.

Yes it is valid, it's in the contract that you've been working under for the last year and half. Here are the relevant sections...


The Company may not cancel a pilot’s vacation. If Company
operations necessitate the postponement of vacations, the
Company will first solicit volunteers for such postponement. If
there are insufficient volunteers for such postponement, the
Company may make such postponements mandatory. The
Company will give at least fifteen (15) days notice of vacation
postponement.
2. Voluntary postponements will be awarded in seniority order.
Involuntary postpone-ments will be awarded in inverse
seniority order.
3. A pilot whose vacation is postponed pursuant to paragraph
C.1., above, may select a non-postponable vacation from
open vacation for the current year or may add such vacation
as non-postponable vacation to the ensuing year’s usable
vacation. After such vacation has been awarded, a pilot will
designate which period(s) will be non-postponable. A pilot will
have the option of receiving vacation pay in lieu of reschedul-
ing a postponed vacation period.
4. When scheduled vacation dates are involuntarily postponed
by the Company, the Company will reimburse the pilot for all
non-refundable deposits made by the pilot in reliance upon
the originally scheduled dates. The Company must be
expeditiously advised by the pilot that postponement of a
scheduled vacation will result in a forfeiture of a deposit. The
pilot will be reimbursed within thirty (30) days of submitting
appropriate documentation of the forfeited deposits. The pilot
will use his best efforts to assist the Company in the recovery
of the deposit.