I was a SAPA rep many, many years ago during the development of AOS PBS. It was initially promoted to increase QOL. The company went with AOS because it was the cheapest. In fact the VP at the time (BH) didn't want anything to do with it until he found out it solved all the problems with transition, training, vacation, etc.

But make no mistake, SkyWest is the ONLY airline using AOS PBS with globazation as a priority parameter over seniority. Our PBS program meets the companies requirements first and then tries, and it really is tries?, to facilitate seniority.

If I as a very senior pilot want and can hold a great 3 day trip but the bottom line holder needs that trip to fit the "global" needs, the junior guy will get that trip and the senior guy gets effed. That is totally wrong, but it is exactly the way it is programmed and what occurs every month. That is why some one junior to you gets holidays off and you can't see your kids birthdays.

If you can't see that AOS PBS is a total crap program that serves one purpose, then yes, you are gone!

 

He called you Kelvin, not Kevin. If you don't even know who KH is then you have no idea wth you're talking about. You're either a troll or a -----. I'm guessing troll.

 

Yes, because the company is going to screw themselves by leaving hundreds of trips uncovered just so you can have the trips you want. That's how this works.

Seriously, I didn't like it any more than you do. But you're showing you know very little of how organizations and scheduling work. That or you don't care and you want the company to screw themselves over to accommodate you. People complain management does what they need to do to cover flying. It's called survival mode. Would you do anything differently if you were management? Of course not! Is that fair? No! But that's the way it is!

 

I think the issue here is other pilot groups seem to have better recognition of seniority in scheduling. I didn't see anyone say the company should leave flying uncovered.

It's reasonable for someone, I'd say, to feel a little abused if after 5 or 10 years of service they are awarded schedules other than what they bid when a new hire winds up flying them. If you want to avoid frustration and disappointment maybe the answer is to do away with the ides of seniority based bidding altogether. You can either hold a line or not. Might save some folks from false expectations.

I'm not saying whether anything posted is true, and certainly not taking sides, seems like most people are happy with how things are. I also didn't see anyone contend the company shouldn't operate flights so they could have their birthday off, either.

 

That would be horrible to reduce the reserve staffing. Because then I wouldn't be able to drop a trip because we would have insufficient reserve staffing. Oh wait.....

Exactly, you have no idea how much flying to bid for because you don't know how many hours will be required by the time it gets to you. Even if you do figure it out, PBS will just decide to award you something else. The only way I can do it is to bid for my trips and then throw in some locals or SU that I don't plan on flying to add the minimum hours. If they don't get picked up, then I guess I will just my platinum days.

It should award the lines, then work back up from the bottom to fill the gaps. Problem is, you can't pound a square peg into a round hole. No matter how hard you hit it. If you are requiring 89 hours with low credit trips, it will not work. If you are trying to staff all the flying without proper staffing, it will not work. Other airlines have line improvement windows, where you can swap or pickup trips before your line is finalized. Once again, it would take the company actually giving a crap about our QOL. The trip I am currently on has had 6 hours of airport appreciation. 6 hours of sitting around in an airport where we currently have a domicile. Yep that is efficient use of all our resources.

 

It is highly efficient. Pilot sit time at airports is FREE!!! Well OK, it costs $1.85/hour. You couldn't hire an illegal immigrant for $2/hour. It doesn't get any more efficient than that. It's hard to trigger the daily duty overtime rig with 117.

Pilot sit time in hotels is mostly free...again, hard to trigger the trip rig. About the only way is Mx base flying (0500 show, 2300 release).

Our idea of efficiency is not the same as the company's...

 

Yeah... Ummm tell you what man I sell real estate on the side. I've got some great beach front property in Kansas for sale id really like to talk to you about. You sound like a real smart guy who would be interested in this sort of investment.

 

Yup, great post and fair points! I definitely sense entitlement in some of these posts though. "The company owes me the days off because...."

 

Bingo! Herein lies the REAL problem! I agree with that!

I still want to have a little talk with whoever signed those contracts that some of the regionals have. Who on earth decided giving half your time of airport reserve to the company for ****ING FREE was a good idea?! Who decided to let airlines sit you for 2-4+ hours for FREE!!!!!

I just don't get it.

 

You guys fail to realize that we're at the mercy of our mainline partners who set our schedules. You might fly that early flight out of an outstation but that doesn't mean there is always going to be another flight to do 45 mins later. Mainline pairings have sits as well to so don't think we're the only ones doing them.