Kerosene Xwind

I'm Dfw based, one year in, and for sept I was able to trade trips to get every weekend off. All my trips are 4 day trips during the week. Only two of them have red eyes but the first red eye all the other trip days are late shows anyways, and the other red eye has me off for 45 hours before I fly a morning flt. I could have increased my hours by 6 or more if I was willing to fly over the weekends as those 4 days available for swapping in Flica have higher credit. There is a price to pay for wanting weekends off. I think the biggest effect or change I've seen over the past year is res pilots get called out / used a lot more than when I first got hired here and second, the seniority list at Dfw has stagnated as of late so I still have the same number of people below me as I have had since June. Where as my classmates in other bases keep moving up their base seniority list at a steady pace.

putzin

The qol isn't perceived, it's actual. There is not another contract out there with a GDO of 4 days.

Guys living in base will always have a better qol and make more than those outside of it. The money will be better, the question is how long and at what level.

SWA had a huge capacity dump in DAL, but now are maxed out. It will take time to be absorbed. Still plenty of growth at Spirit, DFW has obviously slowed/stopped. Will it pick up? Unknown.

Never join a company because of bases or orders, as they can always change. The model is solid, makes money, but patience is required here. It's not your typical airline.

Good luck...

Cheers

Rainbows

I wouldn't expect DFW to "grow" much more than it is now. You'll have turnover as guys upgrade and leave, but I wouldn't expect a huge boom there. I think we're on the edge of opening another base. The bigwigs haven't said anything, but even the most dense guy can see where we're adding flights at. That being said I don think Spirit and BB give a rat's a$$ what Southwest is doing. As much as a cattle car operation SWA is, I just don't think they care. We've got a core group of people who fly on Spirit, they are the Dollar General shoppers, Southwest is great for the People of WalMart. Too bad we cant accept food stamps for payment, we'd increase and diversify our passenger dynamic. Oh, the qol conditions in our contract are real. You can't put a price on four days off and our commuter clause. I think the only way that aspect of our contract could be better is if we were all home based, purchased tickets to wherever our flights were starting and a guaranteed FIVE days off between pairings. As a commuter, I don't know if it gets any better than Spirit.

Qotsaautopilot

Most airlines have a two flight commuter clause. It's pretty standard. Hell even Xjt has a one flight commuter clause. 4 days is damn good though. Although if you ask a southwest guy that has min days off at 16 id bet he probably has at least 4 days off between work blocks too.

Rainbows

LOL! That's pretty funny. Now, for those of us,who weren't able to attend the meeting, any special nuggets of info anyone can pass along?

putzin

I dont have any info, but does anyone know if it's true that there is some new hire monkey working in ops for free, for the last few months, trying to work his way into a sim instructor postion?

Tine

Probably true. Same kind of people hang out with the losers that volunteer to help out at job fairs on their days off. This stuff has to stop. I love their excuses, "oh I'm just trying to get my buddies a job here". Sweet. Will they work for free like you? Can't wait to meet them. One of the freebie workers grabs JRMs via ACARS too.

Rainbows

Working for free in ops has to stop, thats just plain ridiculousness and against the contract, but I don't have a problem with guys volunteering to do the job fair. It's probably a good idea that the pilots have representation and influence in the hiring process.

bruhaha

Although there are no trips that are longer than 4 days, reserve is in blocks of 6 days or 5 days (for the reserve periods that start later in the day).

There are a few lines that are built with a single 4-day trip on followed by 4 or 5 days off then another single 4-day trip, with days off after, but that is not the norm for DFW. Rather a typical line is a 2-day followed by a 4-day then 4 or 5 days off, then a 4-day followed by a redeye, then 4 or 5 days off, then a day turn, a 4-day finishing the week by another day turn.

Even if you are lineholder, if you commute you are looking at getting hotels for the overnight in base. Trips used to be non-commutable on both ends (early shows, late finishes), though recently (within the past month or two) trips are commutable at one end either the beginning or the end.

Reserves used to be pretty easy at least on the FO side, as you tended not to be used when I first started (2014), but once the union started enforcing the no-OT pick up within 48hrs at the beginning of this year, reserves are flying more often.

tx4012

Very helpful, thank you. Are you still looking at about 75 hours credit for that or are the lines with fewer days off also pushing higher credit totals?