wait… I know it’s a weird somewhat unique situation, but didn’t we have pilots furloughed from UA who went to CAL and ended up higher on the integrated seniority list than their UA position would have warranted.

 

Yup. I ended up moving from NJ to CA and from an A320 to B737. But in the end, we are a far stronger company, make tons more money, actually feel stable, and now another merger introducing WBs.


Not everyone can move though, and we still have many guys that commute from the east coast to west coast bases at AS that are former VX.

 

It’s always a positive space seat.

 

I've heard about that but never met anyone it happened to. I do know that some lCal pilots left in the mid-late 1990s for lUal, because that was the call to make back then. United was going gangbusters, Continental was doing well but the recovery was still underway(1, 2). Those who jumped ship from Continental to United ended up junior to their former lCal classmates.



1: Right Away and All at Once: How We Saved Continental Airlines by Greg Brenneman https://hbr.org/1998/09/right-away-a...ed-continental


2: On Super Bowl Sunday 1998 Continental was almost sold lock stock and barrel to Delta, but NWA and the Continental pilots were tipped off and combined forces to stop it on what became known as "Black Sunday".


footnote: Planning was underway in summer 2001 for Continental to buy Alaska Airlines in 2002.

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J7HIxqDpJ0Q

 

That was a unique situation and the “rules” were well established. Short version was the CAL side was hiring. Had the SLI already been completed the positions would have simply been filled via the normal recall of the furlughed UAL pilots and a normal vacancy bid. However since the SLI was ongoing that wasn’t possible. So it was decided to extend an offer for furloughed UAL pilots to fill the “new hire” positions on the CAL side. The deal was even though they were at the bottom of the CAL list, they would be integrated from the UAL list (essentially they weren’t forced to resign their UAL seniority). So in this unique situation, yes some pilots did end up going from being junior to some pilots to being senior to them. As it is they went from being junior to and then senior to all the post merger “constructive notice” hires. Rule 1 that I stated a few posts ago still applied and was applied. Any pilot that any furloughee was junior to on the pre merger UAL list or senior to was still junior or senior as applicable. Just now they had been integrated with pilots from pre merger CAL. It was all above board and everyone knew the deal.

 

What about the lUal furloughees who jumped ship to lCal before Oct 2010 when the merger was announced? IIRC lCal had recalled all their furloughs in the Summer of '05 and were bringing the Schindler's List and PIGS onboard along with the OTS hires, and I'm sure there were more than a few lUal pilots who decided to take a job, any job, in case lUal went tango uniform.

 

There were several and they ended up senior to where they would have been if they stayed at LUAL.

 

No. It didn't work that way. When the merger closed (October 1st 2010) both CAL and UAL still had pilots on furlough. So anyone hired after that date that wasn't already on either the CAL or UAL seniority list was placed at the bottom after the SLI.

What you are thinking about was the ridiculous SLI proposal where CAL ALPA tried to argue that the merger wasn't until 2013 and tried taking credit for all upgrades and hires post merger as theirs only. It didn't work. That ridiculous proposal had UAL pilots placed ahead of pilots on the combined list that had previously been senior to them. Also that proposal had furloughed UAL pilots out of seniority, meaning their seniority was when they started in a post merger class date.

The problem was that even United recognized them as United pilots because they were paid based on their longevity as if they had returned from furlough, and not Year 1 pilots as they would if they were off the street hires.

 

No CAL wasn't hiring, because there was no "CAL" anymore. Don't conflate management's decision to hire and place those pilots on the former CAL side of the still separate operation with "CAL was hiring". That's a gross exaggeration and a SLI "talking point". It didn't work as the Arbitrators saw through it.