I don't see what all the fuss is about. Why would you go to a vacation BID page to check vacation AWARD. If you go to the most logical page and that would be Reports- Annual Vacation Awards, the easy, unencrypted vacation results are there.

I will agree that most of the vacation system is pathetic

Why would we bid may to may
Why do we have to bid our 2nd vacation week without knowing what we got for our first
Why are we bidding in feb of 2015 for summer of 2015. Dont most people make vacation plans well before that
Why don't pilots take all their vacation

Enjoy your time off, you earned it

I gave up on the bidding system some time ago and hired someone to do my PBS. He now bids my vacation for me as well. Money well spent.

I have to put blame for this on ALPA. They are the ones that pushed for PBS at CAL and put this silly vacation bid system in to replace one that was simple, worked and everybody got awarded all their vacation if they wanted to bid it all - although not necessarily all the days they wanted.

Right up there with trip trading and min reserve levels/staffing for must fixes on the next contract. I'm all for giving seniority its due, but giving the senior pilots two cracks at vacation on the first round of bidding takes the most desirable slots off the table for most of the pilots. What's wrong with bidding for one block at a time on each round, even allowing two weeks to be bid together? Senior pilots will still get the slots they want the most, just not both of the slots they want the most.

That's because #s 1, 2, & 3 got BOTH the Holiday AND the summer. Under the old system while they were choosing one someone else had a shot at the other.

Is there any transparency in this IT w/ wings system that allows you to see what other vacations were awarded?

There is a name, domicile, seat, vacation award file you can downloaded on flight ops page, staffing, in flying together... 100% transparent.

Well I must not understand the system correctly. We can bid for more than one week at more than one time in the first cycle? I thought it was one week (or 2 consecutive) at a time.

Apparently you can. My guy just got me Oshkosh week in July and Thanksgiving week in the first round. Dunno how he did it tho.

You must be pretty senior. No offense, but IMO you should have had to choose between the two on the first round to give someone else a shot at the one you didn't choose. Seniority should have its privileges, but only to an extent. Congrats, anyway.

A vacation period and a vacation week are not the same.

"11-D-3 A “Vacation Period” is a consecutive block of vacation days that are bid and/or awarded."

Up to two "periods" can be awarded in the first cycle and up to three in the first two cycles, with a period being a vacation of any length.

"11-E-3-a. A Pilot shall be entitled to be awarded up to two (2) Vacation Periods in the Primary cycle. No Pilot shall be awarded more than three (3) cumulative Vacation Periods in the Primary and Secondary cycles. All remaining days in the Pilot's Annual Vacation Election shall be awarded in the Tertiary cycle."

So the number one bidder in the first cycle using two bid groups could get two weeks at Christmas and two summer weeks.

The third cycle has no limits on vacation periods awarded.

At the other end, let's say a bidder did not bid deep enough and was not awarded any vacation in the first two cycles, he can now be awarded unlimited periods in the third cycle. If he has 5 vacation weeks he could use 5 bid groups to bid one week each in Jan, Feb, Mar, Sep, Oct (if weeks are available) and get awarded 5 unconnected bid "periods."