We'll all be lucky if United gets even regional level reserve rules in the next TA.

There are a few on here that say fixing reserve rules isn't worth the negotiating capital. Why is it our capital to spend? United wants pilots to upgrade. Pilots aren't going to upgrade without a significant NB CA pay bump and much better reserve QOL. It's United's problem to solve, so they should be spending the capital, not us.

Yep. I think that is what everyone is saying when they are referring to negotiating capital. Although, I’m not convinced that reserve improvements will fix the problem. Look at DL’s recent award. Extremely junior captain awards with a good reserve system.

You didn't address age 67?

I think you’re on to something. The contract must increase QOL and reserve improvements but pilots are still motivated by pay as well. Look at last January and 200% add pay as an example. Record completion factors. Maybe it’s time to increase the pay gap between CA and FO if CA is what they’re having problems filling. Tumi TA attempted to address the TK staffing issues with extra pay. Today anyone off probation can upgrade if they so chose so it’s not a senior vs junior thing increasing CA pay greater % than FO (while still getting FOs greater than inflation adjusted increases as well.).

Because "senior" FO's can still make more $$$ with even less work by getting bought off for training, bidding scheds with trips that are easy to give away and then being available for premium trips.

If your a junior FO then being a junior CA doesn't make much of a difference in QOL except for a lot more $$$$ to be junior.

If/when the music (hiring/training) stops/slows down to a slow rhythm you will see the captaincy return to it's more historical norms.

Okay - I fully admit to being the village curmudgeon, but I think I need to be honest and say I am a bit tired of the complaining about reserve. When I was a boy we would walk two miles in the snow with baked potatoes in our pocket to keep our hands warm on the way to school.

Okay . . . I'm sure younger pilots are a bit over hearing about how things used to be, but here's the problem folks.

An airline has last minute problems that arise and all of us would agree we want our company to do well so we need to solve the problem of how to staff last minute changes. At United the company's only tool available today is SC or FSB. At AA or DAL or at the regionals they use reassignments. Can the system stand to be improved? Yes. Is it the worst element in our current contract? To me? No. Reassignments are to me far worse.

When my seniority bids a Pheonix layover then by God the company better not send me to Peoria unless pigs are about to fly or they are paying me a ton of money.

Personally . . . reserve should be 100% short call . . . all the time. That's what reserve is in my mind . . . BUT . . . line holders game the system and can earn tons and tons of extra .. . . SO . . . reserve should pay WAY more.

Line holders work 12-14 days. Reserves should work the same.

A day off should be a day off whether you are on reserve or a line holder.

Anyways, rant over.

Just voicing an opinion.

Classic 😄😄. I'd rather remember C2000, but I'll settle for remembering that our reserve rules are way behind the regionals.

What does one need to do to allocate some or all of their PS to their 401K? Been on Schwab; been all over FT. Can’t find it.

Once they officially declare profit sharing, they will publish an option on Skynet how to make the selection. The link is probably not out yet, won't be out for a while.

follow the hyperlink on the announcement. It’s there, trust me, I did it.

I believe it means after someone explained the math to him and he realized our formula for PS is less lucrative than Delta’s but won’t acknowledge that so throws out a generic statement about how we can’t change everything to match Delta’s language, which of course we aren’t saying here, just saying that Delta’s PS is better because it is based of hard dollars vs ours being based of a percent of profit margin which the company can finagle with costs

[QUOTE=Sixty N Two;3578060]I believe it means after someone explained the math to him and he realized our formula for PS is less lucrative than Delta’s but won’t acknowledge that so throws out a generic statement about how we can’t change everything to match Delta’s language, which of course we aren’t saying here, just saying that Delta’s PS is better because it is based of hard dollars vs ours being based of a percent of profit margin which the company can finagle with costs[/QUOTE]


I don’t think this part is right. They have to use the same percentages as what they publish publicly in the SEC filings. I don’t think they want to intentionally reduce the profit margins they present to shareholders just to avoid paying pilots a few extra shekels.

That said, Delta’s formula is better the larger the companies get and since both companies want to grow, Delta’s advantage on this item will only grow.

Ok I will admit deltas language is better. Our language is similar but inferior. The formula isn't the reason for the huge disparity that a few on here were spouting off at. They are just a more profitable airline.

Ok I will admit I was wrong. The delta language is better. I though it was historically closer or sometimes under the 2.5b customer in the delta language. We can fix the formula but delta still generates more profits for multiple reasons.

[QUOTE=Sunvox;3576513

An airline has last minute problems that arise and all of us would agree we want our company to do well so we need to solve the problem of how to staff last minute changes. At United the company's only tool available today is SC or FSB. At AA or DAL or at the regionals they use reassignments. Can the system stand to be improved? Yes. Is it the worst element in our current contract? To me? No. Reassignments are to me far worse.
[/QUOTE]

At Delta at least those are mainly covered by green slips.

True, however this ties into the sick leave use. They call in sick inside of the LC reserve window in order to generate the GS. Since they have no regards until the hr limit kicks in for the docs note there is no concern for them.

Our “absence monitoring” program would probably ramp up. Yeah, I know- if you’re sick, you’re sick; but it’s pretty eye opening when you put all of the prices together of how all parts of each contract intertwine and you can’t just take what you like from each company and mash it together. I’m not saying it can’t be done but there are a lot of intricacies that make each contract work differently. At the end of the day though, manning with drive premium.

not true.

A majority of the < 2hrs to report trips are covered by reroutes, and under our current PWA, it’s very possible there is no additional pay.

The TA has better language which results in either 150% or 200% depending on how long you are rerouted.

[QUOTE=But seriously;3578159]Profit Sharing is a topic near and dear to my heart, and I have posted on the topic in great length here. Your comment on finagling costs inspired me to want to respond, but in the course of researching the topic of costs at the two companies I came across an item I will be researching in greater detail once the annual report comes out for both companies. Suffice to say my interest has been drawn to Delta's ownership of a refinery. In years past this line item was minor or even negative, but at first blush it appears to have been the primary driver of the difference in profit for 2022 between UAL and DAL. I will hold final judgment until I can take a deep dive into the numbers, but the latest 10Q shows Delta with $5 billion in additional income from "other" and when you go down to the notes that "other" is largely revenue from the refinery operation. Now how much that impacts profit I have no idea yet, but it does make the revenue side of the equation quite different between the two companies.
https://i.postimg.cc/yxYn3Syc/delta-10q.jpg

https://i.postimg.cc/L5CDt6x7/UAL-10q.jpg

Thanks Sunox!

Yeah, looking at the ALPA Contract Comparison from '22.. it's pretty telling to see the amount of PS the Delta peeps got (and then you add in their 401k contributions to boot!)
Some politician once said something about being- Equal but different!

I've always felt that way about our PS.

A MEC Candidate mentioned about getting Stock Options as part of our compensation package.. akin to senior management. Pretty sure all the Legacy United pilots will tell the rest of us about their ESOP (excuse me if I got the terminology wrong) 'Experiment', back in 2000's.
That being said, at LCAL I remember us have the option of purchasing Continental Stock at a 15% discount. (again... correct me if I am wrong, or what more of the details were).

Seems that Delta's refinery was a gamble.. but one that might be paying off.
With any luck, in 10 years all you UAL Pilots still around will be reaping in the benefits and rewards from those little 4 seat electrical taxis buzzing around the Hudson River!

Motch
PS) Delta 5.023ish? United 1.6787.. for the year of 2022.

Does that include the 401k DC? How is that not in UALs language?

please post cuz I’m trying too!

Had to go to the NC to get the truth on this. The 16% that Delta gets is not extra profit sharing as is oft remarked by virtually everyone. The profit sharing pool is calculated FIRST using the much discussed metrics and THEN the 16% is calculated and taken OUT OF that pie. It is not an extra 16% paid out by the company on top of the profit sharing pie. Even though it's not as great as it seems on first blush, it's still great because it reduces the tax bill on the profit sharing.

This does not alter the fact that Delta consistently outperforms UAL on profit and therefore has much bigger profit sharing awards period.

Lastly, for those wanting to use profit sharing to enhance their 401k contributions one can simply increase the amount taken out of their regular pay check to equal whatever they desire, of course, within the limits set by the government which this year won't matter since the PS is so paltry.

I can't figure out the menu path to get there through flying together, but this link should take you to the profit sharing 401k special election page (FT signin required):

https://dmshr.ual.com/HR/Special401K...s/Default.aspx

So we can fix this in the re-write. Dollar amount vs. percentage and a DC as well.

Additionally, most of us go over the yearly limits in the 401. I’d like the remaining to come out as a cash check as opposed to being dumped into the HSA.

That would be a good option to have, although I prefer the HSA’s tax benefit. Not paying 37% on the company’s contributions is beneficial to many.

This is incorrect for Delta. The 16% is paid on top of the profit sharing. If profit sharing is 15% and you had 300,000 in earnings you get 45,000 in profit sharing plus 16% placed in your defined contribution plan for a total total of 52,200. The profit sharing is pensionable exactly the same as regular earnings. You may also elect to contribute to the DC up to IRS maximums as much of the base 45,000 you desire.
In addition to being fully pensionable profit sharing also counts toward your FAE for disability calculations. As a example a CA earning 500,000 if profit sharing was 15% would be credited with a FAE of 575000. His disability payment would be 287,500 per year plus an additional 32% credited to his DC for a total of 379,500 per year. The union disability payment program which is pilot funded would be in addition to that number. The program described above is 100% company funded.

I think you’re misunderstanding what he’s saying. The percentage that you see already accounts for the 16% when dividing the pie. So in your example if you see 15%, you would have seen 17.4% without a DC since the size of the PS pie isn’t changing.

[QUOTE=Sunvox;3578856]Don't know how much "truth" there is in it, but the company always states how the TECH OPS is actually a profit center as they do a lot of engine work for other airlines and other MX contracts for smaller airlines.

[QUOTE=Sunvox;3578856]Delta also gets a significant amount of revenue from their AMEX partnership. I'm not sure where that would be accounted for though..

The payment to the DC plan is not figured in the profit sharing calculations. The profit sharing percentage is based strictly on profits and is in fact exactly the same for all employees however it’s only pensionable for pilots per our contract. All employees will get 5,1% this year. The pilots will get a additional 16% of that amount in their DC fund.

I’m sure either you or Joe are correct.

Sailing is correct.

What I'm getting from all of this....

UAL makes less profits as a company and has a sub-standard PS payout in comparison to DAL. Also....no DC on top.

Am I correct in saying so?

Thankfully we are in negotiations so this undoubtedly better be in the package.

Yes, the DC is on top of the profit sharing. If your MEC believes otherwise they need to call the Delta MEC asap before you resume talks.

The pool for both airlines PS jumps from 10% to 20% of profits above two different profit levels: $2.5B for Delta and 6.9% profit margin for UAL. That means for revenue levels above $36B the Delta formula is better. We need to change our 10%/20% crossover point to Delta’s $2.5B and add profit sharing to the compensation on which we get B/C plan contributions.

If you believe Kirby the company profitability should be comparable to Delta going forward which has not been the case.

Seriously, though, how do you know? Do you have access to the profit sharing plan? Not the few words that are in the PWA that aren’t specific enough. United makes it difficult to find the actual language of the plan, although I’m sure someone at ALPA has it (haven’t asked).

Again…why are we mirroring DAL? Surely we can come up with something better to set a new standard.

Delta guy here.......
How does he know what? What is in the Delta plan? The DC on top of profit sharing is as stated for Delta. The details were published years ago when Delta got the PS plan. The DC on PS will garner an extra (almost) 1% on all earnings for 2022. It is curious some are working hard to prove UAL is better on this issue.
Sunvox and I have been going on about this for several months. It would behoove UAL pilots to find the answer from your MEC and have them put out a comparison ....it will be to your benefit as well as the industry to pattern bargain off the better plan.....not assume you have the most beautiful baby ever born just because it is yours.

I wonder why some here attempt to prove UAL PS is better as opposed to, "Oh, there may be a better way? Let's discuss it and I'll do more research or demand more/better answers"

This DC thing is not chump change. The DC on profit sharing alone has exceeded 15k in the best year for a highly paid pilot.

If you don't have it get it!

A public service announcement😆