Seems like only a few months ago we were fat on pilots and enjoying double digit bright green reserve levels. Now seems like we are back to a normal level (at least my base and seat). However summer is fast approaching with an increase in flying with our current routes and with the addition of new routes we are about to launch seems like we will be short staffed soon with this double whammy. Remember that summer flying starts the first week of May and we just got the May vacancy and there is hardy any new hires coming aboard and very few captains upgrading. What’s more is even if in June they didicde to hire/upgrade more for the June vacancy it takes a few months to bring new hires/CUP online and I’m sure we are going to be announcing even more routes soon with more planes coming on next quarter. Am I thinking about this too much or should I start thinking about my deal making strategies for when scheduling starts calling me off the hook?

Heard we are going to be announcing a lot of new routes out of BWI, ORD and DFW for July. Also heard next cities to be announced is SLC, BNA, CON, MEX, ICT, and STL. You heard it here first.

 

Pbs will improve efficiency as well as the optimizer building up to the new rigs. Crew scheduling is getting more creative with covering trips than in the past. A 4 day used to have coverage or it didn’t. Now they know how to use 4 different guys from 4 bases with single day availability to get that trip covered. What very few premium trips come through will have no deals and you shouldn’t be trying to make them. They are assigned in accordance to the CBA or NCCs will be filed.

 

Ah thanks for reminding me...I meant to talk about pbs as well. I just question how more efficient trips are going to get anyways. All that’s really changing is flight time is going from 8 to 9 hours. I can think of many pairings already where there is a bunch of one leggers and long layers already where they could of easily added another leg that day. (not complaing at all). The company is already wanting to get the most out us as they contractually can, I feel going to 9 hour days isn’t going change much. They use the best optimization software out there already. Idk I could be wrong.

Also how much more efficient is the company going to be with pilots per plane if a lot of pilots decide to keep their 4 days off? I don’t think it’s going to be that more efficient. But time will tell. It will be quite interesting if the company is wrong.

 

I’ve been called 3 times this week. You know how this place works, we’re not thin by any stretch right now but we seem to rubber band between thin and fat on pilots.

 

It’s all kind of a wildcard at this point. Everyone’s bidding strategy changed after transition was lost and will change again with pbs. Right now people pick up straight pay like a bunch of vultures which keeps rsv life easy but premium events next to zero compared to the days of old aside from maybe a major wx event or new year.

The company is wise to this imo and adjusting their staffing model accordingly based on current efficiencies from this contract, expected pbs efficiencies, and high open time pickups

 

Yeah, the union has to be careful. If pilots stop picking up trips like "vultures" and go back to pre-contract pick up habits another TRO is going to happen.......

 

CON as in Concord NH? I don’t think they even have a passenger terminal let alone one that could handle an Airbus. Did you mean COS or CVG or something else? The others make sense as they are large markets we don’t cuttenly serve.

 

Do you talk out of your ass intentionally or does it just happen when you exhale?

 

Holy baby Jesus .....

 

Nothing new, this has been beaten to a pulp.