We'll have to see how the chips fall.

Since we have a lot of furlough returnees in this class who will have first choice, I would anticipate that the only vacancies remaining will be SFO and EWR. Furlough returnees have to pick from unfilled vacancies unless that rule's changed recently.

The list I posted is from 18-06V, which closed in early Feb.

No matter, if a newhire ends up in SFO or EWR, they should be able to get to LAX fairly quickly.

If I were a gambling man I’d say

LAX straight out of indoc is 45%
LAX within 6 months is about 90% likely

Excellent, thanks for all the info. I'm hoping for LAX but I'd take anything right about now.

Returning furloughees use their current seniority, right? Are they required to bid what’s in a class drop or could they return to their previous seat. I know there were some pretty senior pilots who volunteered for furlough, but I’m really more interested in the process.

Last I knew, furlough returnees bid what was in the class drop in seniority order. If that's changed, it would be good, as most of them will likely bid larger equipment in upcoming vacancy bids.

Mil leave and medical leave would be able to return to previous equipment or, if they were wise and bid on larger equipment while out, they'd go to the BES awarded in a vacancy bid.

My information's a bit more than a year old so things may have changed since then. It's entirely possible that returnees let their desires known prior to the class drop and that BES would be in the class drop. At this point, all furlough returnees should be senior enough to hold WB FO.

Even better than that actually...mil leave can return to anything they "could have been awarded" during any vacancy bid during their time away. They don't actually have to have bid it. I returned to the 777 in that way. Furlough returns can only return to what is available for their recall class assignment drop.

... and I will now eat my words, based on the latest vacancy snapshot. LAX 737 is looking very doable for newhires.

Here are today's vacancy snapshot's unfilled vacancies (subject to change until the vacancy bid closes on 7 May):
1 DCA 756 FO
14 EWR 320 FO
16 EWR 737 FO
20 LAX 737 FO
6 LAX 756 FO
33 SFO 320 FO
68 SFO 737 FO
20 SFO 756 FO

Edit: It got more interesting for furlough returnees with this drop. All furlough returnees can hold WB FO or NB CA based on the first snapshot. I'm sure that will continue to be the case once the vacancy bid closes.

New Hire going from SFO to LAX
 

If you are taken as a new hire and end up in SFO, how hard is the commute from LAX? What's the QOL in SFO for a commuter? With that, what's the seat lock for new hires -- and how does the bidding out of your first base work? I'm looking to get staged out of LAX (unfortunately), and trying to figure out which airline offers the best or fastest opportunity to do that.

Hopefully you will get LAX as an initial assignment, there were 16 unfilled 737s in LAX on the last Vacancy bid, so there is a chance.

If not, getting SFO should be really easy. Then you would be eligible to bid for a lateral to LAX on any Vacancy bid that closes after you start. So, it would not surprise me at all if you had a lateral to LAX before you even finished training. Then you would request to have the lateral "activated" as soon as possible and hopefully not ever have to commute to SFO, or at least minimize the amount of time you had to do so.

Obviously there are a ton of flights between LAX and SFO, but commuting to reserve is never fun.

With all the movement that will be happening over this coming winter, I would anticipate having a new vacancy bid every month, so it will not take long at all to get back down the coast (if you don't get LAX originally)

as a new hire do you get to bid for the available vacancies or does UA just assign you one of them?