Polling
 

If you have nothing else to write in the last question on the poll, asking if you have anything else you want to say to the NC, please consider the following:

In the event that the company decides to implement assigned seating, add “no middle seats” on deadheads, or a financial disincentive to assigned middle seats on deadheads to the CBA. It is an easy no-cost thing to add now, but may be difficult to obtain if we wait until they make that change.

“Don’t give them an inch, now is not the time”

i am a little worried about all the questions asking if we would be willing to give up sick accrual for xx.
there should be no giving of anything!

thats a good idea. If for some reason this happens a fatigue call after sitting in a middle seat for x hrs will fix the problem pretty quick.
my old company would try and DH us on the JS. That didnt last long.

Oh I totally agree but had much more important and macro things I needed to get off my chest.

🔥👇

I agree. You don’t know when you might need a fat sick bank. They’re asking me to sell that insurance. No chance unless LTD 100% covers lost earnings plus NEC.

I need that sick bank for vacation, time off, mental health etc.

I figure most people will. But if someone was going to leave that blank, I thought the middle seats thing is better than nothing at all.

Medical freedom.

Two pilots per flight even if the damn thing doesn't have flight controls.

Don’t you already have dh must be window or aisle? If so consider premium if you end up in a middle. It can happen with last min bookings even with that language so might as well make them pay. We have that at f9 and got the premium on you with if we ended up with a C boarding pass. I should mention I believe there’s been a loa with a carveout specifically for swa flights but can’t remember exactly what it says now? It’s not C boarding anymore.

Since we don’t currently have assigned seating, no. There’s no language in our current CBA about middle seats on deadheads.

Yup. I know a few have it or gained that this round and we’re looking to do the same looking at our opening proposal.

Even for offline? If that’s the case yeah you’ll want that. Do you have no dh can be forced into the jump? I know it’s policy but is there language?

Yes. DH cannot be forced into JS.

Yes, that one is fortunately in there: "A pilot will be guaranteed a seat in the cabin but may at his discretion ride on the cockpit jump seat to prevent the removal of a customer from the flight if an over-sell occurs."

I agree we need no middle seats in the CBA. Assigned seating is the only thing that's going to put a stop to this pre-board circus.

I’m coming from a place that had labor friendly management for years and now doesn’t. It became pretty clear from our last agreement that language needed to reflect this fact. I try to share some of what was done last round to help with this fact. To my swa friends and here as well. I listen to one of your previous NC podcast and got the impression they understood this as well.

TFP needs to start with a 4. Zero concessions or a No vote.

We don’t dh on offline carriers… only SW flights. Deadheaders are allowed to pre-board and choose whatever seat desired. In a perfect world its not an issue, but the problem arrises when there is a tight connection and pre-board is not an option. In that case it may or may not be a middle seat depending on how full the flight.

There needs to be language to address that situation. Maybe the ops agent informs the operating crew to block an aisle seat for each dh’er that is on tight connect?? Or additional pay if there is not enough connection time to pre-board??

Spent 3 hrs in a middle seat on a dhd recently. Was hoping the dhd would push without me since it was showing a misconnect but they held it.

FA’s did me a solid saving room in a bin and got me a seat close to the front. Old Jewish couple refused to sit together but talked over me and passed their phones back and forth in front of me for almost 3 hrs. Finally I told them to knock it off or switch seats.

I just did a two hour deadhead in the middle seat because the plane was boarded when we got there. Last leg of the day (leg 5) or I would’ve fatigued before the next flight.

You don’t dh offline. You have a ton of frequency everywhere but it’s a bit hard to believe you don’t have the ability to dh on another carrier. What happens if you divert a broken airplane into a city you don’t serve? Or you were reassigned and contractually want to get back to domicile asap and only other carriers have service left that day?

Most contracts just have the dh middle seat language and it applies on and offline. Maybe start with that for other future unforeseeable scenarios (giving yourself the ability to go offline) and have additional carveout language for swa specific flights due to your boarding.

It's not that we don't have the ability -- there is indeed a CBA paragraph specifically allowing it. It's that it just doesn't normally happen, aside from exceptionally rare situations like the offline divert you mention. Unfortunately all it says is that segments over 5 hours will be booked in first class, but only if they'll be followed by a flying segment that day. That's it.

Ok. So you can go offline. So any middle dh language you get will apply to both. Just come up with a swa specific carveout.
Here’s some fairly standard middle seat dh language.
When a pilot, through no fault of their own, is required to dh in a middle seat the pilot shall be compensated at 150% of the credit value of the leg(s) in which the middle seat was occupied.
This payment shall be in addition to the value of the sequence and above the pilot’s monthly pay guarantee.

The fact that you can go offline will give you the ability to tighten up reassignment language a bit and why I also mentioned that as well. I want to go offline and get back asap. You have to buy an offline ticket if there’s a flight available (you could make this voluntary) and get me back.

Easiest way to fix the middle seat issue, is DH legs pay 6.5 tfp or 300% if not allowed opportunity to pre board.

I know, I know. Squozenized Ballons and things.

Pre board solves the problem 95% of the time… until they decide some random Thursday that we’re going to assigned seating. Then all of the sudden we have to negotiate for no middle seats and they ask, “what are you willing to give up for it?”

It needs to go into the CBA now while it’s still a no cost item. Right along with “all SWA flights will be flown with a minimum of TWO flight deck crew members who have at least an airline transport pilot certificate and are type rated in the aircraft”

Good point on future assigned seating.

Let's do both Zap.

Pay+++ for no preboard opportunity.

AND

Future assigned seat provisions for DHs.

Exactly right. I should mention that pay override for a middle is a protection. The language is window or aisle only.

When it looked like we were merging with nk. They have the window or aisle only provision but no middle seat protection language. We asked them. What’s your standing remedy when a pilot ends up in a middle? Better to just avoid that issue and get the protection.

Good concept. Since we don’t assign seats someone could always say you they to sit in a middle seat. How about if there is less than one hour scheduled or actual prior to a deadhead, that leg pays premium.

Make it a multiplier %. If you’re on a premium trip then there’s no penalty if they force you in the middle seat. Automatic 50% override on any leg where you are not afforded the chance to pre-board…either due to ops agent being petty or scheduling dishing out a reroute where you’ve less than 1 hr ground time.

Would apply to straight, premium, JA, etc.

The example language I showed covers all those scenarios plus protects res with the over guarantee. And it’s fairly standard alpa so arbitrators are familiar with intent making it unlikely management would try to test it.

Looks like negotiations are picking up steam. Get those polls in ASAP.

Don’t let the company rush us into something less than what we’ve been fighting for, that’s the FH playbook after years of stalling to take advantage of our impatience and make it look like the company has turned a new leaf.

Doubt it. The company is stalling at best. Anymore it seems that company does not care about the shareholders or the employees..

I'll believe it when the get to the meat of it. Right now it's just agreeing to stuff we've already been doing for years.
Remember the un AIP'D STD and LTD this last go around

It’s not out of the kindness in Bob’s heart.
Attachment 7881

Wake me up when the CAB is gone, separate hotels and we have private transportation.

It seems there are only 2 choices for Southwest pilots, I think this should be the only real polling question SWAPA needs to get the answer to:

Will you (A) be happy with a contract that may be (very slightly) industry leading, but within a stones throw of all the details of the big 3. This is pattern bargaining. This will happen within the next 6 months, and will not require a strike, or,

(B) do you want to clearly far exceed any other 121 contracts and break pattern bargaining precedent. This will take as long as 18 months and require striking, or getting within a few days of it.

I’m personally for B.

SWAPA really only needs to know which choice 50% of the pilots (+1) favor.

Be ready for a long slumber.

b

b

b

b

b

pick number B m'lord!