That is a true statement. Our contract negotiating team said as much.

I can assure you there are no "Fred Smith suck ups" controlling our union. Grab your hat and join in the picketing next time - - it was a delight to see Mr. Smith confronted at his own Stockholders Meeting. Our guys know what they're up against, and they know what we want (extensive polling that's still ongoing) and they know what they're doing.



If the IPA negotiating team said that we undercut them (and I seriously doubt they did), then they would do well to read my post above, too. If they can be distracted by such a cheap shot by UPS, then I'd be concerned about their future success. I think they're better than that, too.




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Its easy to take a pot shot at ALPA, no matter what comes out of negotiations someone will feel we've been hosed. If IPA and ALPA-FDX are talking you can be assured it is very quite and informal. GWB and congress would just love to point to collusion to justify dropping the hammer on any renege pilot group daring to make more than the "approved" wage and benefit package (see UAL/NWA/JB soon DAL for details).
Both Fedex and UPS are tough companies to deal with. Both come at it in different ways and with a different history. It would be great if we could both draft each others efforts, pulling the other along to a industry standard contract. It may still happen, but I think any dreams of $300 Wide-body pay died with the fall of UAL/AA/USair/NWA and the recent DAL agreement.
Even under the best of conditions (all above didn't happen, everyone making money) it was going to be tough to beat a industry standard raise out of Fedex or (IMHO) UPS. Now that the bar has been lowered, it will be even tougher. Yes, I know, both are making record profits, but look at the mgt of both these companies. Different, but the same, both tough as nails to deal with. At some level (outside the scope of our issues) we should be thankful. The business is successful, others aren't so lucky.