Works for me now. They may have had to shut it down to clean up Jason's thread-title rant. I don't hold that against SAPA. I agree with Jason on a lot of stuff, but not his bedside manner.

 

Unfortunately, the regional industry is NOT a suitable baseline for compensation if someone has to actually live on said compensation.

FO's crashing in their parents basement and eating their food don't have to live on it. Same with career changers and folks with a sugar daddy/momma.

Guys with families who need to send kids to college and then retire someday not only have to live on it, they need enough left over to save.

Cold hard fact of life: Pay is limited in the regional business because that's what the business model exists for...to limit pay! Not much we can do about that.

But SKW could have done us and themselves a favor by aggressively implementing QOL/scheduling enhancements which could be accomplished without breaking the bank, ie go after stuff that costs little or nothing but provides tangible benefit to the pilots. That would benefit the company in that they could attract new hires and possibly retain old-hires.

 

I agree. When I was interviewing all over and everyone asked where I saw myself in 10 years, my answer was not with the company anymore. The regional system is not setup to be a place to work and retire. It is set up to pay you as little as possible, you get the time, and you get out. Either moving up to a major or other 135/Corporate gigs. The people that use this as a retirement gig, whether they are late career changers or just don't want to move on, well... are out of luck. Sorry its the harsh reality, but you made the choice knowing that these are Regionals, not Majors.

Now could SKW made better QOL in the vote? Absolutely. Is it a small step in the right direction? Yes. Is the Pay better then what you had? YES!. You just got a raise! Most civilian companies don't give raises that equal inflation either you know right? I'm military, I don't have my raise equaling inflation...Heck now that I think about it, I don't even get to have a say in anything that I do or get paid. Yet I joined, knowing this just like other join the regionals knowing full well what they are getting into.

The suggestion that you should get in and get out is the correct way to look at it. If you left NOW, this package is better then the last one. In 3 years when the next vote comes around, make it better. You build one brick at a time after all. Look at it this way.... You could have lost planes, lost routes, and lost QOL as may of our competing airlines are doing. You could have 40% on reserve like Eagle, or heck, you could be Republic. Things could be much worse then what you just got in this vote.

 

https://secure.vote-now.com/sa/skywest/

They use a voting software, then announce an almost perfect 2/3rds majority for the "vote". Wonder how many SAPA houseboat parties that costed.
0 transparency, another solid victory for SKYW management, they truly deserved that 30% pay increase, first year pay voters, enjoy that minimal pay increase because after that joyous first year windfall, you will be in the same leaky skiff as the rest of us. The true irony will be the $36.00 first year increase, will happen after you all move to second year pay. To all the "yes" voters, enjoy this "pay" package, because it will be here for 5+ years.

 

Does SW want to retain people? Serious question. It seems there is less and less value being placed on retaining pilots. SG said that during negotiations, the company doesn't think they will have a problem filling classes and they think by the time we negotiate again, they will be able to drop the PPS. Maybe they are planning on another airline going under and being able to pick up those pilots??

40% reserve coverage would be horrible. I would much rather have the 6% that we have right now. I can't wait for 2016 when the company can post meaningless numbers and have a pseudo penalty for not having enough reserves. Anyone who thinks the company will not continue to run lean and bleed every hour they can out of us is living in a dream world.

Interesting to see that our pay stubs already have the new rate on them. I wonder how the company knew the pay vote would pass and was able to get the new rate in there. Especially since we still do payroll manually??

 

Yes, in mere hours they are able to adjust our hourly rate, but last week they couldn't give us our bonus checks for 3 days because of a "technical" problem.

Dear employee,

As a result of a technical delay in processing the Q2 Performance Rewards checks, your payout will be available on Monday, August 3 to the bank account associated with your file. Thank you for your patience and we apologize for the delay.

SkyWest Airlines
Payroll Department



Opportunity lost, we are our own worst enemies!

 

It's their game, field, gloves, bases and rule book, they pay a lot of money to run SAPA and are getting their return on investment, in spades. This is the same as the 700 override pay vote, that they ended early and announced the UAL 700 deal 6 hours later. RJ is the new JP, kinda sad, since I have known RJ since he was a newhire, and now he has sold his soul for houseboat rides.

 

That's what a profitable company does though. Milk everything they can out of everyone they have. If they can get 110% from us they will. Capitalism at its finest. Only problem is, if you want different, open a business of your own. Run how you think it should be run and eventually you will end up right back where you were. It's the endless cycle that we have nowadays.

 

Yup, I completely agree with you that first year pay needed to be fixed. I am happy it's come up. What I am NOT happy with, is that the company basically sold it to us in return for nothing. We deserve a lot more than we got and we gave it away.

 

Haha, you realize Inthegoo IS JI right?