Just wanted to make sure I'm reading the contract correctly....

Assuming you have vacation that sits solely in the last week of a bid month and you want the flexibility to expand that vacation in either direction, you must first slide it to the "right" into the subsequent bid month at least one day?

Correct?

I believe the key verbiage is Section 7.E.3.c. "A pilot may not expand his vacation period to conflict with a trip(s) that begin outside the bid period of his vacation as award or slid...."

...I take this to mean, if you don't slide it at least one day into the next bid period, you can't expand it at all in that bid period.

Note: All of this is assuming you are not operating in Nov, Dec or Jan and you do not touch any of the Thanksgiving, Xmas or New Years related holidays.

Thanks

Can any vacation gurus out there confirm the interpretation above?

Where's the love???

I know they don't like to take out carryover trips with vacation. But that was with sliding vacation to the left for carryover assigned in the previous month.

Best bet, call the vacation guru. She might be out so you may have to talk with Marynelle. Make sure you call before the bid closes as she will be very busy.

Call your "Futures" scheduler ... they are the ones that work with this every month. If you can, email them. If you get the answer you want then you are golden. They're not going to contradict something they put in writing.

Your assumption is correct by my experience, but Mark is most correct: confirm what you ass-u-me with your futures person. Caveat: you are only allowed one (1) slide per vacation period (i.e. you can't slide again next month)

I always try to bid the first or last week of a bid month. The last week gives you more flexibility if you don't stand reserve because you can slide it after you get your line award. What I would due is after I got my award and saw how many hours I wanted to knock out in that month, I would slide my vacation forward into the next month by the remaining days plus 1. ie. I had seven days and wanted to knock out 3 six hour trips in mar, I would slide my vacation so that 2 days were left in Mar and 5 days in Apr. I would expand my Mar vacation to knock out the three trips and then when I get my Apr award, I have up to 30 hours to play with to expand and knock out trips. There are many ways to skin the cat, but once you slide your vacation, you can't slide it again. Also, you can only expand your vacation by total hours in that bid month +6 not to exceed total vacation period hours +6. So sliding one day into April will only give you a maximum of 12 hours to use in Apr regardless of how many hours you use in Mar unless you get a trip that starts on the first day of the Apr bid month. My main point is, since you have vacation the last week of the bid month, you don't have to do anything until you get your line.

How much of a buffer is there between the end of a trip and the beginning of vacation or from the end of vacation until the beginning of a trip. (domestic) If there is a buffer, can it be waived? I was confused about this from the contract.

Vacation has a 48 hr buffer on either end (unless it goes into another month) for VTO or reserve lines only.

Can't recall if you can waive it or not but it's in the vacation worksheet..

Past..

Carry-over trips with vacation. Failed Bidding. Been there, done that (last year). They will take the carry-over trip and if you REALLY failed bidding and had a conflict, well, not all is lost...that at least goes into make-up.

Talk to futures. They generally try to help.

I spoke with futures ---- thanks for all the advice.

Hopefully, it works out as planned.