Quote:
Originally Posted by dracir1
Wasting on premium?
Paying 6-7 crew members 150 or even 200% on a few flights a month is NOT all that expensive to the company. Sure, they’re paying more but let’s not act like 15-20 premium offerings per base per month is causing losses.
It’s far more expensive to cancel a flight than to pay a flight crew premium. How the company goes about “deciding” which strategy is best is a toss up. Using your reserves prior to premium risks not having adequate reserve coverage and no one to pick up premium (especially last minute).
Premium works well in advance - not so much when the flight is 2 hours late AND you want it to go in the next 2.
We are talking about a year ago when there were people dropping their whole schedule and flying all premium trips. Random number here but we are talking 15-20 per position per base AND you’re paying those reserves.
First hand example: One day I was sitting reserve along with 4 others and watched 6 premium trips come and go with out any of the reserves being used. That is a huge waste of cash.
No, it’s not a toss up. You can set alerts and watch the process. I see an open time trip, I go to Flica and see how many reserves, and see if it’s going to go to premium or not. If there are reserves it gets covered. If it doesn’t it goes to premium, which is rare because we have adequate reserves. It’s not magic. The risk associated with not having adequate reserves is a calculated one that bean counters can pretty quickly fine tune.