https://www.google.com/amp/s/thepointsguy.com/news/norwegian-air-adds-flights-chicago-denver-rome-paris/amp/

More service from ORD and DEN...

 

Why can’t these cockroaches finally die???

 

Maybe because of this???

https://nypost.com/2019/10/17/jetblue-partners-with-norwegian-air-for-transatlantic-bookings/

 

It looks like B6 has found a way to fly international without having to use its own pilots or buy new planes to do it.

 

And cue NEDude to the Norwegian rescue in 3.......2.........1.......

 

How long before the "No JetBlue pilots on my jumpseat!" posts start up?

 

United has another name for outsourcing..... Codeshare... yea!

 

As of right now the only thing announced is an interline agreement. Not a codeshare, not a JV, not anything meaningful. All an interline agreement does is allow bags/pax to transfer, not to fly a shared code, no shared revenue, etc. Different story if the agreement changes and becomes a codeshare or JV. Fortunately the JB pilot CBA has some scope restrictions against JVs and outsourcing flying...guess we will see how that plays out once LRs/XLRs get on property at JB if this morphs into anything beyond an interline. But to counter your point, if JB has aircraft capable of flying a route, it can’t just be outsourced. JB pilots have to fly a share of the flying. Once the LR/XLRs arrive, that checks that box.

Also of note, NAI is not the same as NAS. As of now NAI isn’t even flying to the US. The other subsidiaries of NAS (which are not flag of convenience carriers) are the ones flying to the US and are supposedly middle of the road paid European pilots, not outsourced cheap labor like NAI (the flag of convenience carrier).

Additionally, JB’s competition is all tied up in huge JVs/alliances in all these areas. JB can’t just waltz in and say hey British Airways, leave AA and oneworld and come be our partner. To have connections on the other end (and potentially just for access to some places), JB needs some sort of a partner, and there aren’t a whole lot of options out there (maybe easy jet?). Just like why you guys have a bunch of partners and JVs/codeshares/alliances, trying to become an international player solo probably isn’t a great idea.

This whole thing is worth keeping an eye on, but not worth having an NAIgasm over (yet). A theory going around is that JB is doing this to gain some of Norwegian’s slots since they seem to continue hemorrhaging money and have been close to collapsing recently. Norwegian supposedly got enough funding for the next year or two, which coincidentally is about the time when JB starts getting its LRs/XLRs.

I’ll also pose the following question: What’s worse for the US pilot industry....interlining with Norwegian who employs normally paid and sourced European pilots, or outsourcing 606 jets that say Express on the side to underpaid US professional airline pilots flying your pax? I dunno, I personally like that JB’s CBA disallows any “express” outsourcing, and careers in this industry would be significantly better if others would follow suit.

I’ll close with one final thought. Pilots don’t make codeshare/JV decisions. The limit of pilots’ control of that stuff is via scope sections, and besides SWA, I don’t think any US airline has a scope section that touches JB’s. So I’d say JB pilots did a pretty good job securing arguably the most important section in their first CBA. I guess you could say pilots can vote with their feet and go to another airline in protest of a Norwegian partnership, or publicly (via their union) denounce whatever decisions the c suite/BoD makes. But the average line pilot has about the same say in JV decisions/dance partners as they do in a merger/SLI (none). So taking your disagreements about who JB is tied up with on fellow ALPA pilots seems a bit misdirected (not directed at you, but figured I’d say it since the word jumpseat was mentioned above).

 

Their last quarter numbers actually looked decent.

It depends on how much cash they burn through this winter. They were able to slide their bond payments due this December to December 2021 so they've probably got one more summer of life before the December 2020 bond payments.

They're also selling off aircraft so that should cut their expenses. We'll have to see how that works out for them.

 

This is a good point. When we talk about scope we get hung up on rj’s. Scope is about all outsourcing to include joint ventures and regional flying. Our language is pretty good. There are things that we should have done better, such as cap the total number of rj’s, but it is working for the most part. The regionals are having trouble staffing what they have and legacy hiring demands are increasing. The 50 seat jets are getting really old and beat up, customers don’t like them, and they will become cost prohibitive to maintain. The market will help to reduce the number of rj’s, but we can’t forget that outsourcing involves more than express.