e6bpilot

This may come as a shock to many of you, but your experience flying the line has a positive correlation to your seniority in your seat.

Psycho18th

Until you show up at the airport. Then everyone is in the same seniority-less hellhole of the sodomizer.

SlipKid

Yeah, at most airlines that's true.

At SW, pretty much all that seniority buys you is choosing a domicile, vacation weeks (although most of that's going away soon), better chance of getting open time, which/how many days you work in a month, and whether your awarded trips start out as PM or AM.

As soon as you check in, and sometimes even before, all bets are off.

Is it too late to take VSP?

e6bpilot

I am sorry I am not as negative as the rest of you, but that has not been my experience at all.

When I do get rerouted, it generally means either way less work or more pay, sometimes both. I look forward to reroutes that don't impact my days off, which is to say the vast majority of them. I am here for the 5th and the 20th and that's it.

That doesn't mean I don't want better scheduling and pay rules...I do. I also think the entire construct of JA is ridiculous and needs to either be awarded with a day of your choosing pulled at full pay in addition to paying double legs or double rigs. Either that or abolished altogether. I am a solid yes on the strike vote and will vote no on anything that doesn't meet my standards for an industry leading contract.

I just think we need to be realistic when posting our experiences on here. Yes, there are things that could go better, but the world isn't crashing down around us.

SlipKid

Like I said, some of you must work for a different company. My reality is definitely not yours, and I am far from junior. My seniority allows me to minimize my exposure to the constant buffoonery somewhat, but I do have to show up and fly once in a while, and it's almost always a goat rope. I dread it nowadays.

I've been rerouted on many of my trips since May of 2021. Between June and November '21, I flew 3 or 4 pairings that weren't majorly rerouted. Every other one was a complete reroute, often with little extra pay, or worse, losing pay, due to being rerouted into fatigue calls. Bonus for 14 unscheduled overnights, all but one paid 6.5 at "double" time. A few of them paid 13 because I had enough foresight to place GDOs after those trips, but that's a crap shoot. Rarely do they pay much more, certainly not worth the extra effort required.

2022 was a smidge better, schedule wise, but due to PTSD from 2021, I flew considerably less, even after getting rid of most of my straight flying.

A good example was the last trip I bid on and was awarded in early Dec. It was an easy bait and switch premium 2 day, with a 21 hour layover in a place where I have lots of old friends. Before I went to bed the night before, it was already changed to an 11 hour overnight in a different city, with a long van ride to the hotel and 9 more hours of duty time. It paid an extra 3.4 tfp.

The only leg left from the original pairing was the last leg back to domicile, after getting up early on a short layover, 2 deadheads and a 4 hour sit. There's a good chance that would've changed, since, apparently, we're all on reserve once we check in.

Not sure how that one turned out, because I was not feeling well, and stayed home and didn't log into cwa for at least a few days. This is not an isolated event these days.

flyguy81

Been itching for a move up on my 18-19 hr overnights this month. Everything going straight or to reserves well ahead of time so it’s been quiet.

tlamjaj

Same experience here. I’ve only been rerouted once over the last few months, and that was because of another pilot calling out fatigued. Ended up with a nice paycheck from that trip.

loveislost7M8

The latest SWAPA Union podcast mentioned that 10% of all new hire pilots in 2022 quit!

YTD, SWA was suppose to have hired 164 pilots, but only 131 new hires are on the seniority list. SWA missed their goal by 20%. And of those new hires how many will quit this year?

If the 1221 Furlough Warn Notices sent out to our most junior pilots before Christmas wasn't enough to scare new hire pilots away, then our Leave of Absence, Short Term Disability, Long Term Disability and lack of benefits should definitely scare away any pilot from working at SWA.

If you are considering a career at SWA you can stay informed and listen to the latest SWAPA podcast here:

https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcas...S_Hzs9zSV2lJkE

WHACKMASTER

Thanks for posting that. Wait until Delta votes in their new contract this spring followed by UAL shortly thereafter. Attrition will increase significantly and not just new-hires.

The only question that will be left is will SWA management care? Bob Jordon did say he “loves us” many times over so I’m not worried 🙄.

WHACKMASTER

Btw, we’re on our fourth NH class for the year. ALL of them have had less NHs than what they were shooting for with this week’s having only 35 according to the CWA seniority list.