Alternate idea to national seniority list
02-12-2009, 06:46 PM
#1
Gets Weekends Off
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Joined APC: Aug 2008
Position: Moving backwards
Posts: 220
Alternate idea to national seniority list
In my couple years following discussions in this forum I have seen the idea of a national seniority list raised many times. I do think this would be a great thing for pilot’s careers. However, I do think this is about as likely as us seeing a large influx of good executives into the airline industry. There is another alternative though that will sound like a big crap sandwich to some but would also work.
A great deal of power that airline managers hold is the fact that no matter how bad it gets for the pilot group it is still in the best interest of the pilots to stick it out at that airline. No matter how bad their managers treat them, most pilots either do not wish to or cannot afford year one pay at another airline. They can’t afford the first few years for that matter.
We can remedy this by leveling the pay. That is, there is a large disparity between the top and bottom pay. We could, for example, change the pay at regionals so that the highest paid position goes from $121/hour to $100/hour and the lowest paid position goes from $18/hour to $50/hour. These figures are just examples. What would probably have to happen is that the pay is adjusted so that from management’s perspective the direct hourly rate for the pilot group as a whole would not change. I do not wish to give into manager’s wishes, however, there would need to be a little give and take to get this through. The leveling could also be done at the majors, albeit, with the appropriate higher pay rates.
From our perspective we would want the pay to remain equal through a career. So, we would ultimately see the same pay over the length of our career. It would just be spread a little more evenly. This would make it easier to walk on a crappy employer but it would also mean less debt and less money fed to the interest monster.
A few years ago a congressman, I can’t remember his name, had the idea of making our benefits portable between employers. At the time I thought he was a nutjob; however, I am beginning to see there is a great deal of merit with his idea and we could apply this to our career. The major pilot unions could form one entity together to manage our benefits. The airlines would pay an appropriate amount to fund the system and the entity would take care of all our employment benefits except travel. They would manage our paid time off, our retirement accounts and various insurance’s. Again, this would make it easier to transfer jobs and would actually open up some transparency as our various companies could no longer extract pay from us by making benefit changes behind our back (my employer recently snuck in a higher bi-weekly payroll deduction for health insurance). We could even have the option with this of having a small amount deducted each paycheck that would cover cobra costs for a set amount of time; or even just extend the union-managed health insurance a set time.
It should be a separate entity that each union works with to further enhance portability. Also, the unions would then have to remain transparent with the whole thing too. From an airline perspective the union managed benefit thing would be good as it could potentially be a cost saver for them to no longer have to manage it. Again, I don’t like to give in, but there will have to be a little give and take. Also, from pilot’s perspective, by all of us having the same system we could realize some cost savings with having a very large group negotiating for rates and this could mean better benefits for us.
By making ourselves portable and being able to walk employers will have to compete for qualified pilots on quality of life issues during the boom times. And during the bust times pilots that are furloughed or find themselves without a job because their airline went under aren’t completely out of luck. It would be easier to go to the other airline that does have jobs available. Also, many of the airlines that have a policy of creating a lower quality of life to push out senior (higher costing) pilots will no longer have incentive for doing so.
I would think that if we went towards this system managers wouldn’t care as they probably wouldn’t realize what we were up to until it was too late. For the unions leaders it would be a good thing as it means more power for them (unfortunately, we have to scratch everyone’s back). The only people getting the crap sandwich here would be senior pilots. We could work out a grandfather system so that they aren’t being completely hosed. I hate to see anyone get hosed but it would be a necessary evil for this idea to work (unless somebody has an idea to prevent this). The other issue is pilots that choose to not be a union member. The benefits will need to remain independent of being a member in good standing for this system to work. If the person elects to not be a member and has the option to not pay dues (right to work state) then you could make it an option for them to pay into the system but if they don’t then they don’t get benefits.
If you wish to tear this apart you will not effect my feelings even in the slightest. Just wanted to throw this out as food for thought.
A great deal of power that airline managers hold is the fact that no matter how bad it gets for the pilot group it is still in the best interest of the pilots to stick it out at that airline. No matter how bad their managers treat them, most pilots either do not wish to or cannot afford year one pay at another airline. They can’t afford the first few years for that matter.
We can remedy this by leveling the pay. That is, there is a large disparity between the top and bottom pay. We could, for example, change the pay at regionals so that the highest paid position goes from $121/hour to $100/hour and the lowest paid position goes from $18/hour to $50/hour. These figures are just examples. What would probably have to happen is that the pay is adjusted so that from management’s perspective the direct hourly rate for the pilot group as a whole would not change. I do not wish to give into manager’s wishes, however, there would need to be a little give and take to get this through. The leveling could also be done at the majors, albeit, with the appropriate higher pay rates.
From our perspective we would want the pay to remain equal through a career. So, we would ultimately see the same pay over the length of our career. It would just be spread a little more evenly. This would make it easier to walk on a crappy employer but it would also mean less debt and less money fed to the interest monster.
A few years ago a congressman, I can’t remember his name, had the idea of making our benefits portable between employers. At the time I thought he was a nutjob; however, I am beginning to see there is a great deal of merit with his idea and we could apply this to our career. The major pilot unions could form one entity together to manage our benefits. The airlines would pay an appropriate amount to fund the system and the entity would take care of all our employment benefits except travel. They would manage our paid time off, our retirement accounts and various insurance’s. Again, this would make it easier to transfer jobs and would actually open up some transparency as our various companies could no longer extract pay from us by making benefit changes behind our back (my employer recently snuck in a higher bi-weekly payroll deduction for health insurance). We could even have the option with this of having a small amount deducted each paycheck that would cover cobra costs for a set amount of time; or even just extend the union-managed health insurance a set time.
It should be a separate entity that each union works with to further enhance portability. Also, the unions would then have to remain transparent with the whole thing too. From an airline perspective the union managed benefit thing would be good as it could potentially be a cost saver for them to no longer have to manage it. Again, I don’t like to give in, but there will have to be a little give and take. Also, from pilot’s perspective, by all of us having the same system we could realize some cost savings with having a very large group negotiating for rates and this could mean better benefits for us.
By making ourselves portable and being able to walk employers will have to compete for qualified pilots on quality of life issues during the boom times. And during the bust times pilots that are furloughed or find themselves without a job because their airline went under aren’t completely out of luck. It would be easier to go to the other airline that does have jobs available. Also, many of the airlines that have a policy of creating a lower quality of life to push out senior (higher costing) pilots will no longer have incentive for doing so.
I would think that if we went towards this system managers wouldn’t care as they probably wouldn’t realize what we were up to until it was too late. For the unions leaders it would be a good thing as it means more power for them (unfortunately, we have to scratch everyone’s back). The only people getting the crap sandwich here would be senior pilots. We could work out a grandfather system so that they aren’t being completely hosed. I hate to see anyone get hosed but it would be a necessary evil for this idea to work (unless somebody has an idea to prevent this). The other issue is pilots that choose to not be a union member. The benefits will need to remain independent of being a member in good standing for this system to work. If the person elects to not be a member and has the option to not pay dues (right to work state) then you could make it an option for them to pay into the system but if they don’t then they don’t get benefits.
If you wish to tear this apart you will not effect my feelings even in the slightest. Just wanted to throw this out as food for thought.
02-12-2009, 06:59 PM
#2
Gets Weekends Off
Joined APC: Jan 2008
Posts: 888
Good idea. Unfortunately there really is no unity among pilots. The senior guys would never go for it, and there's little chance of getting it passed without the old guys getting onboard. But if you draw up a proposal for the MEC's I'll go with you to present it, I'll even make a poster...
02-12-2009, 07:17 PM
#4
Property of Scheduling
Joined APC: Sep 2006
Position: Bus driver
Posts: 2,524
It also goes against the ALPA way of thinking that goes back to Bencke himself.
Raise the roof one pillar at a time. This is where the idea of "industry average + a few %" comes into play. What I could see is more of a absolute min put into the overall game. I could see a national list in regards to all ALPA pilots put into percentage based list where the process would be a flow chart...
Step A. Take ALL ALPA pilots collectively into a list. No sorting yet.
Step B. Take each individual ALPA carrier's list and put everyone into their respective percentile 1-100%.
Step C. Take ALL ALPA pilots and seperate them into each percentile- 1-100 overall based on their airline standing. Ex. The top 1% at FDX would be with the top 1% at DL AND top 1% of Comair, etc.
Step D. Take each percentile of pilots and organize by DOH within each percentile.
After you have this VERY long list you would have many pilots all over the map but here is how the list would be utilized:
In the event of furloughs... Any open hiring at ANY ALPA carrier would entitle (through contract provisions with all ALPA carriers) the first rights to that job using the overall seniority basis of other furloughed pilots- mainline or regional. I do not agree with any carry over of longevity with seniority as it was established from the integration of the initial overall list. Each carrier seperately has their own seniority list- much as there is a company seniority list that is different (in usage) than the list for your bidding (base/seat). You may be in the 60% in your carrier but you bid in the 90% in your base as an FO.... make sense?
Pay is something that would be very hard to implement with voluntary and involuntary moves between ALPA carriers. I think there should be min pay levels set by ALPA that is purely derived on MTOG for each seat, but thats just me.
While we are at it... I want to see each ALPA carrier have a seat on the BOD and a minority (voting right) share of common stock shares for each publicly traded company.
The safeguard on pay is that if you are somewhere with great QOL and stay 20+ years at a regional and get the company liquidated from underneath you while majors are hiring- you can get a job, if you stay somewhere for QOL you get the same positives as the mainline brotheren, just less pay (think MTOG formula with a safeguard for MTOG/Seat calculation).
And I want a Pony.
And I want.....
Then reality hits.....
Raise the roof one pillar at a time. This is where the idea of "industry average + a few %" comes into play. What I could see is more of a absolute min put into the overall game. I could see a national list in regards to all ALPA pilots put into percentage based list where the process would be a flow chart...
Step A. Take ALL ALPA pilots collectively into a list. No sorting yet.
Step B. Take each individual ALPA carrier's list and put everyone into their respective percentile 1-100%.
Step C. Take ALL ALPA pilots and seperate them into each percentile- 1-100 overall based on their airline standing. Ex. The top 1% at FDX would be with the top 1% at DL AND top 1% of Comair, etc.
Step D. Take each percentile of pilots and organize by DOH within each percentile.
After you have this VERY long list you would have many pilots all over the map but here is how the list would be utilized:
In the event of furloughs... Any open hiring at ANY ALPA carrier would entitle (through contract provisions with all ALPA carriers) the first rights to that job using the overall seniority basis of other furloughed pilots- mainline or regional. I do not agree with any carry over of longevity with seniority as it was established from the integration of the initial overall list. Each carrier seperately has their own seniority list- much as there is a company seniority list that is different (in usage) than the list for your bidding (base/seat). You may be in the 60% in your carrier but you bid in the 90% in your base as an FO.... make sense?
Pay is something that would be very hard to implement with voluntary and involuntary moves between ALPA carriers. I think there should be min pay levels set by ALPA that is purely derived on MTOG for each seat, but thats just me.
While we are at it... I want to see each ALPA carrier have a seat on the BOD and a minority (voting right) share of common stock shares for each publicly traded company.
The safeguard on pay is that if you are somewhere with great QOL and stay 20+ years at a regional and get the company liquidated from underneath you while majors are hiring- you can get a job, if you stay somewhere for QOL you get the same positives as the mainline brotheren, just less pay (think MTOG formula with a safeguard for MTOG/Seat calculation).
And I want a Pony.
And I want.....
Then reality hits.....
02-12-2009, 07:28 PM
#5
Gets Weekends Off
Thread Starter
Joined APC: Aug 2008
Position: Moving backwards
Posts: 220
I had an idea that might make this a little better for the senior people. That is, a regressive fee structure could be set up that would pay additional into retirement accounts for senior people based on how much they would sacrifice for the system to work. That is, the more a person has to give up for this idea to work the more would be paid into their retirement account. That amount would continue to be paid into their account a set period after they retire too.
I say a regressive system because it is the junior most people that benefit most from this and the senior people that benefit least. This would have the junior people paying more into a compensation system that at would least partially make up for the sacrifice of the senior pilots. The junior pilots would see a little more of their paycheck leave, but their overall paycheck would be considerably higher.
This part would only run long enough for the grandfathered senior pilots to see benefit for their sacrifice.
I say a regressive system because it is the junior most people that benefit most from this and the senior people that benefit least. This would have the junior people paying more into a compensation system that at would least partially make up for the sacrifice of the senior pilots. The junior pilots would see a little more of their paycheck leave, but their overall paycheck would be considerably higher.
This part would only run long enough for the grandfathered senior pilots to see benefit for their sacrifice.
02-12-2009, 07:38 PM
#6
Property of Scheduling
Joined APC: Sep 2006
Position: Bus driver
Posts: 2,524
Originally Posted by Splanky
I had an idea that might make this a little better for the senior people. That is, a regressive fee structure could be set up that would pay additional into retirement accounts for senior people based on how much they would sacrifice for the system to work. That is, the more a person has to give up for this idea to work the more would be paid into their retirement account. That amount would continue to be paid into their account a set period after they retire too.
I say a regressive system because it is the junior most people that benefit most from this and the senior people that benefit least. This would have the junior people paying more into a compensation system that at would least partially make up for the sacrifice of the senior pilots. The junior pilots would see a little more of their paycheck leave, but their overall paycheck would be considerably higher.
This part would only run long enough for the grandfathered senior pilots to see benefit for their sacrifice.
I say a regressive system because it is the junior most people that benefit most from this and the senior people that benefit least. This would have the junior people paying more into a compensation system that at would least partially make up for the sacrifice of the senior pilots. The junior pilots would see a little more of their paycheck leave, but their overall paycheck would be considerably higher.
This part would only run long enough for the grandfathered senior pilots to see benefit for their sacrifice.
02-15-2009, 06:38 AM
#7
Gets Weekends Off
Thread Starter
Joined APC: Aug 2008
Position: Moving backwards
Posts: 220
For Highney, I think you may have misunderstood what the idea is. This idea is not a national seniority list. It is an alternate to one. I do fully agree that a national list would be in pilot's best interest. However, I think it extremely unlikely that we would ever see one. This idea would give us some of the positives but would be easier to push through.
Yes, airlines would not like having a mobile work force. They do like the fact that pilots are generally stuck in their jobs, and they use it to their advantage. This would give some of the power back to the pilots and would probably have a direct impact on quality of life as airlines would actually have to make themselves a more attractive employer to get pilots to fill their seats (this is where a free market system actually starts to emerge). I do think if it was done correctly that this could get through at at least a couple airlines before managers realized what was going on. I don't think they would oppose these changes initially as they would be cost neutral for them and actually might end up costing them a little less as they would need fewer in-house employess to manage benefits. The tricky part would be to keep the changes going after the managers clued in on what was happening.
Also, there are still a few things they could implement to keep pilots at the airline at least a little longer. They could make it so that the money the airlines contribute towards retirement are not fully vested until a certain point, and I think this would be fair. They could also have more training contracts, though I think this is far less fair and do not like the things.
Yes, airlines would not like having a mobile work force. They do like the fact that pilots are generally stuck in their jobs, and they use it to their advantage. This would give some of the power back to the pilots and would probably have a direct impact on quality of life as airlines would actually have to make themselves a more attractive employer to get pilots to fill their seats (this is where a free market system actually starts to emerge). I do think if it was done correctly that this could get through at at least a couple airlines before managers realized what was going on. I don't think they would oppose these changes initially as they would be cost neutral for them and actually might end up costing them a little less as they would need fewer in-house employess to manage benefits. The tricky part would be to keep the changes going after the managers clued in on what was happening.
Also, there are still a few things they could implement to keep pilots at the airline at least a little longer. They could make it so that the money the airlines contribute towards retirement are not fully vested until a certain point, and I think this would be fair. They could also have more training contracts, though I think this is far less fair and do not like the things.
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