Announcement
02-26-2020, 09:27 AM
#61
Line Holder
Joined APC: Feb 2020
Position: Jumpseat
Posts: 25
If the entire XR fleet is taken care of by UAL, then I take your point. I don't know for sure either way. What was relayed to me was that there were planes we were unable to pay for. Perhaps those were the original LRs?
To be sure, the downward slide happened over a long period. But something clearly snapped around the December time frame. Anecdotally, we know that United told XJT there were getting the planes at the same time we cancelled a class in progress. And we must have seen it coming to cancel classes for Feb thru Apr. For reference, I saw the classes dropped from the schedule either the last week of January or the next week. The Monday after that is when 23 new hires got booted.
To be sure, the downward slide happened over a long period. But something clearly snapped around the December time frame. Anecdotally, we know that United told XJT there were getting the planes at the same time we cancelled a class in progress. And we must have seen it coming to cancel classes for Feb thru Apr. For reference, I saw the classes dropped from the schedule either the last week of January or the next week. The Monday after that is when 23 new hires got booted.
02-26-2020, 04:57 PM
#64
ALL Days Off
Joined APC: Dec 2010
Posts: 385
Anyone know what’s going to happen to all the people doing the RTP that are still in flight school with $30k worth of training complete and almost ready to start indoc? Seems if TSA is not training anyone else they hopefully will not try to come after the money. I would assume they couldn’t since TSA didn’t give them an opportunity to start after they met their end of the deal.
02-26-2020, 05:04 PM
#65
Gets Weekends Off
Joined APC: Oct 2010
Position: 145
Posts: 219
Originally Posted by LateToTheParty
Staffing is just one side of the coin. The jets weren't flying enough. United will say it's because they weren't staffed properly. But prior to 4-5 weeks ago we were hiring pilots like crazy for an 18 month period. There were classes scheduled through April/May. No one suddenly realized "Oh ****, we're upside down on Captains!" as if it was some secret we were paying bonuses to FOs to get them in the door all that time. What really happened was that flying was shifted away from TSA at the beginning of the year or sometime just prior. So much so that we couldn't pay the lease on the planes. I think we tried to get more flying from United. When they said no I think we tried renegotiating the rate we were getting paid for the flights they did give. When that didn't work we cancelled the Feb and later classes at the end of January. Then sometime around February 10th I think United notified both XJT and TSA that the planes were going to XJT. That's when the January class got canned. Many will say TSA did this to itself and good riddance to such a **** carrier run by hacks. I don't agree with that. I think TSA was essentially pushed off a cliff.
The company was doing a great job of filling classes over the past year and a half, and were managing to fill newhire classes until the end (and classes full through May), but they had no incentives to retain the more experienced pilots, even our bonuses ran out, and you had newhire FOs making as much as captains that had been on property for a couple years. There was definitely a disparity between FOs and Captains, but much less exaggerated than management is leading on.
I disagree wth the "paying the lease" garbage. The XRs were United's, and their utilization was tied to the flying United gives and the efficiency if that flying (which markedly declined in recent months). Give us crap flying to cover = planes sitting around half the day at out stations = self-fulfilling prophecy.
There's plenty of holes in the story management paints. Clearly there was a ongoing discord between TSH and UAL. They refused to come to an agreement on the CPP and Aviate while both were stringing our pilot group along that we would get it "very soon". I'm sure that made United's decision to start consolidating the 145 fleet easier than if there had been a harmonic relationship. I'm sure everyone figured they could shut us down and sideline us to go to work for G7 and their 550 Experiment without the overhead costs and drama of a proper merger of the pilot groups.
Last edited by Celeste; 02-26-2020 at 05:16 PM.
02-26-2020, 07:18 PM
#67
Prime Minister/Moderator
Joined APC: Jan 2006
Position: Engines Turn Or People Swim
Posts: 39,290
Originally Posted by Rotor2prop
Anyone know what’s going to happen to all the people doing the RTP that are still in flight school with $30k worth of training complete and almost ready to start indoc? Seems if TSA is not training anyone else they hopefully will not try to come after the money. I would assume they couldn’t since TSA didn’t give them an opportunity to start after they met their end of the deal.
But seriously, read the contract. There's a possibility that it has weasel language.
02-27-2020, 02:02 AM
#68
ALL Days Off
Joined APC: Dec 2010
Posts: 385
Originally Posted by rickair7777
Get out your contract and read the fine print. If I know Hulas you're probably required to accept any job offered by TSA holdings, including ramper in DTW, EWR, etc.
But seriously, read the contract. There's a possibility that it has weasel language.
But seriously, read the contract. There's a possibility that it has weasel language.
Thread
Thread Starter
Forum
Replies
Last Post
