My sick bank has been waaay low so I've moved around my days off when I've been sick. A long term medical condition obliterated my sick bank and it's still recovering 3+ years later.

Any LTD is going to easily take out 250 hrs of your sick bank. I'll stop moving around my days off rather than burn sick leave once I've got 250 hrs of SL. This month, I finally have >200 hrs of SL again.

SFO 787 has a >49 hr SFO-PVG-LAX-PVG-SFO 6 day. Call in sick for that one trip and it wipes out a full year's sick leave.

Of course that's different than having a sick bank of 1000+ hrs.

 

FYI (not directed at you per se) but if you need to call in sick for say a four day trip and by day two you’re back up and running, you can pick up a trip and have the sick leave you didn’t use restored. I believe there are other avenues as well like AV days.

 

Will they PS you to SIN?

 

And what happens when there aren’t any trips for you to pickup? You can count on that. We need a quality sick leave program that represents what kind of work we do. It’s not like we can call in on a day by day basis. The majority of our pilots fly, and the majority of our trips are 4 days long and a minimum of 20 hours

 

That's what I'm effectively doing when I'm sick. Rather than call in sick, I'll drop the trip and then pick up something else in open time.

If I had 250+ hrs SL, I would just call in sick, but having been on LTD, having 250 hrs of SL is my target. Once you need to go out on LTD, you're not going to be able to build up your sick bank and you're not going to be able to pick up open time to make up for any pay shortfalls. That's the problem - very few options to make up lost pay once you lose your medical.

When I went out on LTD, I burned all of my SL plus the flight office moved my vacation time around so that I got paid (vacation) while waiting the 90 days for LTD to kick in. Even with that, I went without a paycheck for more than a month.

I was able to live without a paycheck for more than a month, but I'd prefer to not do that again, especially when there's a medical issue in play.

I'm not a huge fan of our SL accrual but there are workarounds for those like me with low sick banks - I use one method; there are others. If another pilot wants to retire with 1000+ in his sick bank, that's just money he left on the table for the company and the rest of us. I'd like to see SL improvements, but any improvement is going to mean that the company is going to put a $ figure on it and it will come out of our wages in the long run. What's it worth in hourly pay to improve our SL benefit?

 

Not sure I understand your point in that they have already been paid? I have over 1000 hrs. I've always called in sick when sick. I've usually have never been "physically sick" more than once a year. (yes 25+ yrs here) Am I stupid? Mayby, my mother raised me to have "stupid" morals! Doesn't mean I'm perfect just healthy DNA. I think the Delta model would be BAD for those of us healthier individuals! That being said, the reason I have a higher total is that i am worried about extended long term sickness such as cancer or heart conditions that I would like to get paid FULL time until LTD. (Look at how many guys are out on LTD over 50!) I'm in that 50+ group now

 

Andy,

I hear this line of reasoning from time to time. Respectfully, it is what management wants us to believe, but isn’t reality. Saying that improving sick leave will come out of pay rates is defeatist, IMO. It’s like saying that the pie is worth X. It’s our negotiators job to expand the pie! Contracts are not zero sum. It WILL cost them money. I realize it’s not unlimited, but we don’t have to horse trade our improvements, either

 

Exactly how would the DAL model be bad for SL hoarders? They can’t sell it back. If they blow one ACL or shoulder it’s gone and paid the same as someone who has their 240 hrs. And you both start up next yr with 240.

We need a better LTD plan other than hoarding SL that you give back for free when you retire.

 

The pie is worth X. Even the ALPA negotiators will tell you that. I understand that the negotiators will try to get more pie, but which flavor of more pie is best to go for once the two sides are 'close'? Which benefit? Or simply more pay?

There absolutely is horse trading on improvements. It's ALPA negotiators' job to find which combination yields the best overall compensation package from the company. It's the company's job to get a new contract passed by the rank and file at the least cost to the company.

Here's the rub with benefits. The company generally places a higher cost on benefits than pilots. And each pilot will have a different value for each benefit. Does a senior lineholder care about reserve rules?

Pay vs work rules is not defeatist; it's reality. The company isn't going to offer us $1000/hr and also the top benefit package in the industry. It doesn't work that way. Benefits cost money and it's all part of our total compensation package. We can choke the goose to give us more golden eggs, but there is not an unlimited supply of golden eggs.

We'll all fill out ALPA contract surveys and both sides' negotiators will negotiate a new contract. That's about all we rank and file can do - fill out surveys on what's most important to us. It doesn't even matter that you think my view toward these negotiations is defeatist; I will have near zero influence on the outcome (the only minor impact I will have is filling out the contract survey).

 

I think we’re taking past each other a little bit. My point is that if the company had their way, they would start and end with a dollar value that they were willing to spend. They ALWAYS end up spending more.
Why? It’s because we push them beyond what they say they want to spend. That’s the negotiators job. Some things, as you mentioned, can be horse traded. Others, are just gonna cost money. That’s the bottom line. And we should remember that the next time a suit tries to tell us that it’s a zero sum negotiation. Because it isn’t.