The world after TA's
 

Just an honest question but where do we think this is heading for the regionals after a TA is voted down.. Eagle, Republic, Xjet have all passed on these.
Congrats on that for sure but what is the next step? Does anyone see a proper resolution coming out anytime soon? From my perspective if these companies want to pay their pilots less why not then just drag out all of these "discussions" too the unforseeable future. For them it would be better than having to pay say 30k a year to an FO ( just for example ) and just leave everything as is.
I have to apply to some regional sometime soon (sigh) and I'm curious about how things might shape up..
Cheers.

* please real answers need only apply

The world after TA's
 

Here is 1 scenario already being done at Endeavor Air. Management will pull aircraft out of service parallel with attrition. Eventually the airline will:

A) liquidate. In which flying would be returned to mainline if the "shortage" continues. The majors in the future will try to create regionals again when the day comes again when they are all going bankrupt.

B) get flow to attract pilots to work for these wages.

C) get better pay to attract pilots.

My answer would be different if it was 2012, but 2014 and beyond, things have changed. The 1500 hr rule, Far 117, did not exist in 2012. In the short term 50 seater's will be parked. That as well as consolidation might help the staffing shortage. In the long term however, mainline operators are growing. Forecast to make huge profits in 2014. They need the lift. Next time you taxi into DTW or MSP look at the huge number of RJs. Bigger RJs will replace 50 seater's and with the dwindling supply of pilots, mainline hiring and retirements, those regionals that can attract and retain pilots will survive. Many analysts believe instead of an actual pilot shortage, there are qualified pilots out there, especially flying overseas, who are not willing to work for poverty level wages. Airlines that shrink do not give a return on investment to shareholders, I don't care how much unrestricted cash you have. Its like having money under your mattress. Some think mainline will take back the regional flying. It might, but that is years away if ever. Even if you increase the pay and benefits significantly at the regionals, its still cheaper than mainline. That's my take. Management that understands this new normal will grow and prosper, those that don't won't.

RAH CEO's letter stated that he is looking forward to re-engaging the IBT Local and find a contract that works for both sides, how long and how motivated will the company be remains to be seen.

EXJ, I believe they are due to re-engage with their management in the coming week(s).

Silver, I am not sure where they stand in the talks, but it is my understanding that the attrition is mainly coming from the FO ranks as they bail for PSA and Mesa. Right now their management has decided to seek a higher bonus for new hires.

Eagle, management did a whole lot of talking before the vote and during, but have gone silent since. We were threatened with airplanes going to other carriers immediately and that the deals were basically done. AE CEO satiated that the process was almost complete but he got AAG to not award the flying until AE completed the vote on the TA that was built upon the AIP that failed at the MEC level. Almost two weeks have gone and they haven't awarded the flying. Some say that they don't have anyone to take on the flying on their terms (cheap) and other say that they are just waiting to make the announcement. Time will tell.

CommutAir, they enhanced the contract to attract new hires and contrail attrition, we shall see how this all works out.

***Time will tell, I think right now there is not just a waiting game between regional management and their pilot groups, but also between mainline;s management and what move they will make next. Will AAG return to AE, will Delta do something about Endeavor's contract and attrition problem or will United do something with SKW inc. There are many things in flux and is hard to predict how things will turn out, for the mean time I expect management teams to continue trying to grow the lower cost regionals.

I should have also said in my original post but what is an acceptable TA for these companies? Is 30K a year for a 1st yr FO a good start instead of say 24k.. Thats a 25% increase in pay and is livable if your single. I know each company would be different but I'm just trying to figure out if there is a general consensus of an idea about what should happen to the regional s and what can be worked out.
** again real answers non baiting flaming whatever need only apply please.
Cheers again.

Everything is relative, you say that 30k is livable... The same can be said for 24k. It's all relative. An FO with no debt, and living in a smaller city or a city that has a lower cost of living will be able to live on 24k easier than a FO who has a $300 a month loan payment ($3600 a year) and live in a larger city that has a higher cost of living.

Yes, 24k is better than 30k. But for the task we are required to accomplish is not enough. I understand what you are trying to say but it's all subjective. We all agree pay on the FO side is low.

I personally think the starting FO rate should be $40 and FO's should top out at $60. Captains should start at $100 per hour and top around $150.

It's still not ideal, but I just don't see the regional flying being completely absorbed back into mainline. This would at least provide a much better financial package for what is left of the regional world after the impending shakedown. I'd be willing to bet 70% or more would vote in favor of these rates and additional QOL enhancements.

I think it wil take more than 30K it should be between 40-50K. Home based and better quality of life language. Regional management need to figure this out.

cheers

The only other way to get a yes vote out of me would be a seniority list staple at a major. Not a flow, not a guaranteed interview; those aren't worth much. I'd need a seniority number at a major and when my number comes up, I go to class. No interview, no ratio shenanigans. Just a cold, hard number.

Regional pay needs to be a direct extrapolation down from the smallest mainline equipment (A319/320, 737, 717, etc). Right now the graph would look like falling off a cliff. Instead it needs to be a diagonal line.

Yes. Enough with this untermensch stuff. :mad:

I know when that topic is brought up, our management's response was about like this, "that kind of pay negates the reason for having a regional, mainline might as well do the flying.".

Uhhhhh...EXACTLY!!! :rolleyes:

One myth that needs to be put to bed is that mainline will get flying back. If attrition stays on the same pace and shrinking occurs at the regional level the effects will be the smaller communities served will lose service. This will come in the form of less frequency or the spoke being connected to less hubs. Right now DAL is the only one adding back mainline service to places it used to fly, but they only have about 50 more 717s to come online. Current costs at UAL are going to prevent them from bringing on line 100 seaters. To early to tell what AA is going to do, but they do have a full plate for the next few years.

Do not miss understand this to mean I do not support what is going on. I think its great to see the sector banding together.

I agree, but this won't happen in the near term. More likely the pay and benefits will have to go up significantly, but not as much as you think. This is the first time in the history of the regionals that its tough finding qualified pilots. Regional management is dim witted and not visionary for the most part and don't realize this yet. That's why their regional managers. Mainline CEO's aren't much better, but they should get the message first.

Yep, there has been talk of DAL getting rid of regional flying and using 717's. Not gonna happen. UAL and AA will be using large RJs into the future. DAL has to also. PX like the EMB 175 and 76 seats is a lot different than 120.

Sadly all they have to do is pass out some mainline seniority numbers then get rid of it is some shady bankruptcy filing in a few years

If you dig through the math a little, this is not quite that simple. And the brunt of the differences are also not an even burden between CA/FO rates. FOs at regionals are far worse off than FOs at majors using any math. The pay in dollars drops off a cliff, but the pay per aircraft size (pay rate divided by seat) is more messed up than drawing a straight line to make things better. Equivalent longevity XJT captains make more per seat than UAL captains, believe it or not. And don't forget that someone who makes 100K at a major is far better compensated than the same 100K if paid at a regional. The retirement alone increases major compensation 13-17% in B funds and superior 401k matching schemes. Better respect through flight benefits etc...

And newhire pay at UAL is $60/hr. Average narrowbody has say 140 seats there. That's $0.42/seat first year.

50 seat RJ at $0.42 per seat newhire pay is about $21.40. XJT pays $22.

So your linear math is already in place today on current pay scales.

My point is, the solution isn't drawing a straight line if the line goes below an acceptable salary. Regionals must pay MORE per seat to crews if they want to operate RJs. Add fuel consumption per seat plus increased crew costs per seat, and you see why RJs are going away.

err:confused:

Fuzzy math aside:p, I agree with your premise, it's all relative.

I think it'd be too much, too soon for mainline to immediately take over all 70+ seat flying...in terms of acquiring the aircraft, pilots, training, amending contracts, etc. Don't get me wrong, I REALLY WISH/HOPE they do. I'd much rather lose my current seat/plane, get furloughed, and fly a 50 seater for 2-3 years at higher pay rates than now, and fly the 70+ seaters at mainline in 3-4 years, than to fly a 70+ seater now for 6-7+ years at regional (even improved regional pay), before moving on.

IMO, it's more likely that the legacies understand the dire circumstances the future of the regional lift is and loosen the rope on these CPA's, allowing regionals to significantly increasing pay and benefits, because that will probably still be cheaper than bringing the flying completely in-house, at least all at once. The regional players will shrink slightly as the ones without the ability to increase pay and benefits fall by the way aside; the ones that remain will have to do just that.

Hopefully whatever happens, regional pilots keep standing strong and demand SIGNIFICANT gains, even to the point of pricing ourselves out of the regional game...keep your eyes out for the forest, not the trees, my friends.

WOW, I disagree WHOLEHEARTEDLY with that disparity. 2.5 times as much for CA top out pay? It should never be that much in any flight deck, IMO.

I don’t believe it, if they made more to scale why unions would protect scope
10 year captain Delta Airbus 319 $200 Typical seat 134 = $1.49 per seat PLUS 16 %
10 year captain ASA captain CRJ 9 $84 Typical seat 88 = $.95 per seat
Also what really happens is the local union divides up the pay amongst the group, I doubt SkyWest mgmt would object to taking 10% from senior captains and giving it to junior FO’S. Net some zero for them and free recruiting. Also to your point about the 50 seat jets, they are going away so that linier extrapolation is going away, the vote tanked because of what’s above. The overall payroll deduction, by needing less pilots due to larger planes, should be enough to justify bringing in new planes why should the pilot group buy them with concessions.

This is incorrect. It would be correct if regional airlines still only served small communities.

In other words, all small towns are served by regional airlines, but not all regional airline service is between small towns. How many RJ-700's and -900's do 2.5 hour or greater flights? I work for a turboprop operator who does happen to do mostly short flights, but the "regional" nature of RJ's has long since been outgrown.

ORD-ABQ is served by SKW on a 700. What "region" is that? North America? Those are the two largest cities in their respective states. RAH does this one in an E175.
Buy a ticket on Delta for ATL-YYZ? RJ-700.
EWR-OKC on an E145...
ORD-MIA on a 700.
PIT-DEN.... E145.
IAD-IAH.... E145.
ATL-EWR.... E145.
YYZ-IAH.... E145.


These are all major cities, and these are all long flights. If the regionals can't stay on top of their staffing, the Legacy carriers have two options:
- Cut capacity across the board, not just between small towns.
- Add mainline flights in order to maintain capacity. Not grow, just maintain.

There are even short flights between major cities that should go to mainline. SEA-GEG, PHX-ABQ... Sure, a Q400 usually goes between Seattle and Spokane, but Alaska has a 737 do it three times a day. If Southwest can do PHX-ABQ in a Boeing, so can everyone else.

Ha ha, good catch

O boy, can I play
msy-ord, I wonder what the longest route is served by an “RJ”? I think there’s a xna-lax of course I am sure that’s really just “Air-mart”. Whoa kind of scary thought.
I think that’s what they’re doing already though 2 for 1 200-7/900 and pick up the slack with mainline. Less overall pilots needed to help with the “shortage”, but more mainline blocks hours which is good. I don’t however think mainline will ever operate the “RJ’s”.

US Air already operates RJ's. 190's.

Those are large RJs you're referring to, not 50 seaters. At $89.31/hr I make $1.78 per seat at XJT flying 50 seat ERJs. Does that mean I am 20% overpaid compared to a Delta captain? Or is the Delta captain underpaid? The math gets better with more seats. That was my point.

Most of the regional model has been built on whipsaw and either churning companies out of business or keeping pilot groups junior, so majority of pilots are at (or rehired at) low longevity continuously. This model has gone off the rails recently, so that's why the pay per seat is so messed up if you look at a company like XJT. No one was ever supposed to be a 14 year RJ pilot.

They can't easily churn 7000 to 10000 pilots, so the strategy has been to seek long term concessions. They are trying to fix their broken model by essentially getting the pilots to churn ourselves to lesser contracts without them having to actually rip their operations apart and rebuild them to do this. This is what has failed with all of these TAs/AIP rejections. The churn model is dead.

I think that was before they merged with American and had a drastically reduced pay scale than currently, and when they were contemplating becoming an LCC to compete with jet blue.

Whatever the reason, they do still fly them. Haha.

Do you think you fly 20% more legs? I am not being facetious, but those jets are going away.
Delta heavy captain would have to get $687-$979 per hour on your scale, probably on the over paid side, if not while hes flying certainly under some soft pay circumstances. I do think a crj900 captain could get paid Delta rates $1.49 per seat * 88= $131.12-10% mgmt profit $117 per hour for a 900 driver @ 10 years. I don't think that would fail in a vote.

HA, 190 is not an RJ as no RJ operator has them in feed service.

Edited: Disregard.

Any chance we could get back on topic...?

Unlikely...

Yes
Fact: Delta is currently absorbing some rj feed into their mainline operation.
Fact: No sign of other carriers following suit, but Delta has lead the industry by about 2 years in the past. ie: Delta NW merger, pension removal for healthy fixed% contribution, and Delta was first with major union gains which allowed United to follow suit.

The point of my posts is to explain that there is a certain level of career earning that is required to get people to be pilots. When you start tying that number to airplane seats (picture at an extreme a corporate jet with 2 pilots and 2 passngers... at that seat capacity my pay rate would be $44.65/hr per passenger... $6250/hr per passenger if you could sustain that pay per seat on a 140 seat plane... see how ridiculous the pay per seat idea gets on aircraft with less and less seats? But I would NEED to be paid that "seat rate" on that airplane to make my present living on a 2 passenger jet), particularly at the small jet level, the airlines cannot meet the minimum career expectations any longer with aircarft size/seat-based pay, and it would cost exorbitant money to pay new regional FOs $60 to fly a CJ200 or ERJ. If they want to keep a few of those for a handful of markets, fine, but the crews on that handful of remaining 50 seaters should be paid a premium per-seat to do it, just like more than half of RJ high seniority captains are today at comapanies like XJT and EGL.

So when regionals attempt to get pilots to bite on crap contracts with new planes or refleeting or whatever, it is stupid to think they would choose any other business option. They HAVE to get new larger fleets to deal with pilot staffing availability and to move the lift economically without paying a small jet per-seat premium to 50 seat pilots.

The point is the RJ pay system is more screwed up and unsustainable with current equipment than mainline pay. Because we have pilots earning a lesser living in pure dollars while being paid more (per unit... per seat... not total actual pay) to move less people. That is the definition of inefficiency. They're trying to make their mess less inefficient with concessionary contracts, and continue those concessions into large RJs where there should be NO CONCESSIONS, because they (management) recapture their desired efficiencies with more seats per aircraft to gain revenue and pay us.

You are right. I wonder though, if your per seat pay is closer if you use early 2000 mainline pay scales. I think their Quid pro quo contracts are younger due to BK. Also do you think it would work well if AAG offered Eagle the 12/4 caps with American seniority numbers, and offered any current pilot a 50 % seniority gain at American? That would help the balance the books over night.
I.e. a 16 year eagle captain could move to year 8 American FO pay scale.

I prefer to not reference 15 year old pay scales. Any number of solutions are possible at Eagle. Certainly better solutions than what was offered. I am not an expert on Eagle issues, just know that the root problems management has on their plate are the same everywhere, and the solutions should hopefully end up looking similar everywhere. They have to somehow get pilots to show up (good career expectations) and then pay them to keep showing up (career delivery). It's really simple.

And there should never be 4 year pay caps anywhere. Ever.

;) got ya. I did mean a compressed four year scale though.

That's close to what it is now. FO top pay at my company is $47 vs $108 for captains. Both scales have FO's at around 40% of captain pay.

Four year pay caps are not the problem, APC quotes mesa 7 year at 36$ an hour and 8 years at 37$ an hour. You could go to Endeavor and get 37$ at four years. What needs to change is the damn pay, year 1 40$ and year 4 cap at 50$ for FO. In fact it would be better to have a 4 year cap with decent pay in this situation, it wouldn't take as long to get there.

All true, I think the real problem with that way of doing things is that there is some percentage of pilots who will not ever come back. Either they won't or can't start over again. You lose some percentage of pilots forever. I would be curious to know what all the comair peeps ended up doing, how many actually came back to aviation.

The single most over looked detail is simple and often overlooked- Where does the money to pay properly come from?

It comes from mother DAL and father UAL and the mistress AAL. We love to hate regional management and they deserve 99% of it however, they bid their routes based on a specific labor cost. If we exceed that then our companies go TU. Along with our jobs. That is basic business.

This is the natural ebb and flow of capitalism. Once we understand the supply and demand curve we can see how the RJ operators are just the pool boys for their respective Legacies. At their mercy. Be smart enough to direct the "Pay hate" at it's source.

Don't misunderstand me, I dislike management as much as the next guy and feel like we are grossly underpaid but I am also well aware that there is too much competition in our industry. A few have become too expensive and they will fall by the way side. This might help to find the balance in this industry. Look how long it took to shut down Comair. Size doesn't matter. If the company is too expensive it will cease to exist.

The interesting thing is the 1500hr rule and 117. Today isn't as simple as it used to be due to these barriers to entry for new pilots. Predictions are pure speculation at this point but the companies that will survive the storm in my opinion, will be the Regionals without 50 seaters and a relatively junior (inexpensive) pilot group.

The industry needs re fleeted and that is one step in mitigating the "shortage" The situation may force mainline to accelerate the rate at which they park uneconomical aircraft such as the 135/145s/200s etc.

Hopefully, as we go through this "capitalistic valley" the legacy's will take back the flying (at a respectable pay rate for the pilots) or the remaining companies will bid more fat in their contracts. One way or another, it will get worse before it gets better. IMO

Sounds like Mesa. Spent 3 years there, hated it so bad I made a lateral move. Looked like the best plan at the time. Just like it does now. Hate that company.