Fixed it for you. Regular negotiations can occur any time both sides want to talk.

Well again that is not the NMB's understanding. In two different mediations when Delta wanted to continue talks without the mediator they had to request permission and outline the disussions. This makes sense because in order to be effective the mediator needs to understand exactly where each party stands and their table positions. Mediators generally only allowed unsupervised talks when their schedules would create excessive delays.
This is also why their ability to ice negotiations is such a effective tool.

It's tough to certify a vote when apparently more than a handful of voters were jumped straight from the login page to the page saying "your vote has been recorded", with no way to find out what vote was actually recorded. The FA union is stuck between a rock and a hard place... The vote itself was run in a way that was so incompetent they should be getting sued by both the union and individual FAs, with damages to ever FA measured and paid out pretty much like we calculate retro. On top of those measurable damages could be other liability for the company exposing the actual voting data from an unsecured server URL shown during the livecast. The union leadership is scrambling to make themselves look good (not possible but they'll still try), avoid getting fired, while conducting a necessary revote and attempting to deflect lawsuits away from the union and it's leadership.

A recount is only one of the things that needs to happen after that screwed up vote, no matter what the actual results were and will be with a revote. I certainly hope for their sake that they use a different contractor to handle the voting otherwise the union is gonna open themselves up to a lawsuit of their own for running not one but two invalid votes with the same incompetent company.

Even if the revote is still a no, the FA union leadership will never voluntarily step down. That would go against everything they are.

It goes beyond "trying to claim". There are documented examples of FAs who begged both the union and the voting contractor for a chance to find out what vote was actually cast in their name after the voting webpage jumped them ahead to the page saying "your vote has been recorded". Should that ever get to court, the phone records of the panicked FAs desperately trying to find out what happened would lend an immense level of credibility to their claims.

And then the liability behind exposing the raw voting data from an unsecure website shown during the livecast...

I don't see why any organization would ever trust that voting contractor ever again after a poor showing like that. Merely using that contractor would open the door for endless lawsuits against anyone trusting them to do anything.

There’s been some confusion floating around with new hires. Let’s say you were hired February 2023. Do you get Year 2 rates starting February 2024 (your 1 year anniversary) or does that not actually kick in until September 2024? They seem to think those rates don’t kick in until September of every year assuming you were hired before September.

Years of Service Pay rates are tied to date of hire. It'll be printed on your ID badge if you forget :)
The contractual pay scale increases for everyone are effective on the anniversary date specified in the contract. But movement up the pay scale happens on date of hire.

There is some weirdness due to how our first monthly paycheck is an advance and the rest of the month is paid out on the 20th of the following month. For example...
Let's say you were hired in June. That means your June 5 paycheck which is an advance on your June pay, will reflect your next higher pay rate. But your June 20 paycheck which is really when you get your pay for May, will reflect the previous lower payscale since the June 20 paycheck accounts for work done in May. Then both July paychecks will reflect the new higher pay rate.

Thanks. So you’re not on year 1 pay for any longer than 12 months. Not sure where that’s coming from….

I think they are bastardizing or misquoting what you just explained.

Yes. MEDIATED sessions. They can’t nor will stop the union and company willingly meeting on their own.

🔥👇

Don't really see anything that's going to fuel regret for leaving in the AIP/TA snapshot and newest SWAPA contract comparison guide. $10/hr more on 737 rates is decent, but probably still undershoots what they should be. The medical remibursment amount is healthy and might lead the industry, but increased NEC, MBCBP, paid parking, pay protection for fatigue calls etc. all seem to be brought up to industry standards. Nothing really earth shattering there.

ya, I don’t think this contract with all its positives will keep someone from going to choice number one.