I had heard Express got the United contract for essentially a loss (less than what Mesa was getting). I might be wrong though. Anyway, perhaps that is why a lot of those perks are being left out compared to what services are rendered by CAL.

You pretty much nailed it. UAX flying is embarassing. It's pathetic to make our passengers walk 1000 ft to the F1 gates in pouring rain or snow through all the deice fluid and urea and then track all that stuff on our acft. The aisle on our plane looks like a white runway on a good snow day. I'm amazed they keep coming back the way they are treated. As a former XJT and now SKW, the acft were kept in much better shape with Continental. It the best you can do with no jetways and the new culture at UAL.

Eventually, we are supposed to start in-range info thru acars soon. I miss that with XJT. Too many radio calls to ops at the busiest times, especially when clearing runway 10 at M3 and the gate is right there. Surprised there aren't more taxi incidents.

So you guys getting paid to deice at ORD?????

Sad that ExpressJet's excellent reputation is going to be subjected to the UAX way of life. However, if our customers (United) wants that level of service then I don't think Express should pay for cleaning or anything above and beyond on their own dime. Just stinks that their DOT stats will suffer from IA's shennanigans.

We are currently profitable. XJT has the lowest cost per hour for any 50 seat operator in the industry. Source? Our VP on the last conference call. United has asked us how they can improve the express operation.

Bwahahahaha!

If that were true then XJT wouldn't be taking a loss to for flying at the same rate skywest could have done it for a profit.

Also let's all please drop the "Quality product" crap, everyone here flys rjs for a major airline, that is the product. No regional is any better than the rest just cheaper. An erj flown by XJT in united colors is no different than a erj flown by transtates in united colors, the only difference is the profit margin.

Which brings me to my next point which is mesa. Everyone that thinks mesa is going go away is in for a rude awakening. Mesa will come out meaner and leaner than they were before chpt. 11. With lower costs they will be able to bid on flying even cheaper than before. That is the cycle of the regional world, so the people who think their airline is better becuase of a "Quality product" are laughable.

The only airline that "gets it" is republic and one day we all may wish we had gone to work for them 4 years ago.

So true

Back in the day I'd frequently fly from SAT to OAK via LAS on a certain airline and their feeder service

The SAT to LAS leg was operated by their feeder, and I don't think it ever took off or landed on time, and a half hour wait (often much longer) on the ground as LAS for a gate was standard. Granted, the second leg (on the mainline carrier) wasn't much better, but to this day, if there is any other option, I refuse to fly on that carrier any more.

How do you know this? I doubt xjt could even afford to take this as a loss.

That didn't take long. Welcome to Yonited.