Oh, I am not worried about that at all. I was just empathizing with anyone who may be forced out of their domicile that is raising a family and I was using my situation as an example. I can't leave Houston and likely won't until I am close to retirement and am looking for something with all four seasons and little to no snow. Holding out hope for the Destin Florida base............ Ready to pull the kids out of school at a moments notice for that.

 

The hot shots that were shorting Houston Residential and commercial construction lost some money. Construction and home sales are doing very well despite some contraction in energy sectors. We may have a third negative quarter, but since this is both a beta and a gamma city it has allot of redundancies and over-lapping of economic sectors that protect it in such times. Very unique city. Probably one of 7 in the USA in my opinion that could withstand some of the other negative factors and still come out in a favorable economy. The Tax base is still very strong.

 

Getting bumped sucks. Badly. I think the reason Kilder is getting some flak is that the LUAL side has been enduring this "base shuffling" since day 1 of the merger. We've had bumps from ORD, LAX, DEN, shifting flying out of SFO, and the complete closure of SEA. That's a lot of lives that were effected. Not much was said except a few gems about LUAL being lucky to still being in business. Now that there is some shifting in a LCAL base its a travesty and unjustified. This reeks of self centeredness. The pain that each of the LUAL pilots displaced from their domicile was just as great as it's going to be for the LCAL pilots out of IAH. I personally wouldn't wish it for anyone, and definitely hope that folks in IAH find a soft landing

 

That and the opening of "CAL" equipment nearly 2 years after the merger announcement where UAL guys couldn't bid it created a seniority situation where a chunk of UAL guys can't get back into their domiciles while being nearly 4000 numbers junior to the CAL pilots that took those slots when only avail to CAL pilots. I'm 4500. I'd love to drive to work, have had a DEN bid in for 5+ years, yet I commute while others nearly 4000 numbers junior to me drive to work. Just sayin - this hasn't been roses for anyone that I know on the UAL side. For Ben to act as if the company is somehow favoring the LUAL side of the ship is comical at best. It just happens that it finally affected him - Ben that is. Oh, boo freaking hoo.

Scott

 

Maybe this letter is a peek behind the curtain into the way things used to be done there. Perhaps each of the 2 (really only 2 big) LECs would hear a rumor of bad news that was about to affect them and begin to protest loudly in public while bargaining furiously and individually with management in private to mitigate or eliminate the purported bad thing. Thereby currying favor with both sides all while wrapping themselves in the "I'm-just-representing-my-constituents" flag.

Honestly; just speculation not trying to ignite anything.

 

Right.

I don't know what it costs these days, but in 1996 it cost over 10K to move my family.

If management wants to displace pilots it will be very expensive. I wonder three things really:

1. Does the company have the cash to move the pilots?
2. Whose budget does it come out of? Who accounts for it?
3. Was this in any of the financial plans published so far (another words was it previously planned for and budgeted?)

 

Last financial report there was about $6B in cash which means they could afford to move 600,000 pilots at $10k each.

Also, what's the cost (for just one month) to have a Captain in a base that they don't need, let alone 150 of them. At $14,000 a month it makes sense to displace.

Plus the company knows all the pilots who get bumped won't leave the base. They know many will just move to other positions, so there isn't really a big cost. Plus others won't move, they'll just commute until they can get back in base.

None of us hope to see anyone leave the base. But this is the reality of the merger. The LUAL guys are now running manpower planning and most of them have been here 20+ years, and this is how they did things in the past. They have more pilots and more bases to play with, and they are going to optimize it as much as possible.

 

I think ol' Herve is LCAL.

 

He could be. But VC and DK seem to be making most of the decisions. I think the SSC guys would know more. I was told whoever was running it pre-SLI were canned.

 

Don't know who VC and DK are but Ben and Mike are very clearly directing their ire at Herve. And yes Herve is LCAL and commutes from IAH to Chicago.

Really it matters not who is LCAL or LUAL here. The bottom line is making a profit. Herve wants to make money. He has already reduced short calls for reserves. What is not being mentioned in all this is that the rumor on the street is the A320 will go to 300 crews in IAH. There will be little to no net loss of CA positions in IAH.

Dogg