freightretriever

Wow that's quite a leap to take a cautionary word to our junior pilots to "spew death and destruction"! I try to be a positive person as well but in aviation it's always served me well to plan for the worse and hope for the best. Seems like a lot of our pilots don't think this will impact us at all. I hope they're right and I'm wrong. I just don't see it playing out that way. Are we going to get hit like the passenger carriers - no way. But, the V shaped recovery seems to be headed to way of "open for business by Easter". One thing that is guaranteed - eventually it will rebound at some point. What it looks like in the middle, no one really knows. We can agree to disagree. At this point I'm just glad I have a job this time around for the third "one in a life time event" I've seen in aviation. And yes, the May class will give a glimpse into what UPS is thinking.......maybe.

Section Eight

In 2008/09 timeframe one of our guys posted something similar here. He was vilified and barked at with hatred and vitriol.

Unfortunately he was right.

If this didn’t turn around, and I mean quickly, I fear you may be correct. It’s not something anyone wants to hear, hence the attacks against linear thinking.

Lots of us are worried about our families, our job, and our neighbors. Best free advice anyone can give us be as prepared as you can be and try not to let fear rule the day.

Take a moment and consider all those around us who already have pink slips. Covid, Wuhan, China, whatever you want to call (at some point) won’t discriminate pax or freight.

carry on.....

flyguy23

This economic downturn will without question hurt us, but im on the side that believes it won't be as awful as some think. The pax won't be picking up their international routes anytime soon, and when they do, it will take a LONG time to get back to normal levels. That leaves a ton of freight that needs to be carried. Freight volume will be way down, but capacity will have dropped even further. We are still retiring people and that can only accelerate as time goes on as mandatory retirements pick up.

Let's go to worst case though and we need to shed pilots, id like to think an early retirement will be offered and i can promise there is a large % of our group anxiously waiting for such a day to ride off into the sunset. Ive heard guys mention it with some regularity since this whole thing started. Id be floored if that didn't cover any staffing reductions needed. That's worst case though. I really don't think it will get there. Hiring may slow or stop for a while until the economy rebounds, and most if not all will be safe.

BoilerUP

"We will be furloughing by fall" seems a wee bit stronger than a "cautionary word to our junior pilots", especially the new IPA brother and sisters starting today.

Q2'20 is going to economically suck in this country, with April likely (hopefully) representing the bottom and May/June increasingly better. While a "V-shaped" recovery is probably optimistic there's no reason at this point to believe a GDP haircut of more than a quarter is going to last into the second half of the year.

Are we "immune"? No, absolutely not, and the length and depth of the recession that follows this epidemic wave is going to tell the tale. The longer it takes for this thing to peak and start declining, the longer the economic pain for EVERYBODY.

UPSFO4LIFE

Baseball back next month! We be fine😀

navigatro

I don't think UPS is the type of company that would ever offer early (paid) retirements to hourlies. I hope to be proven wrong.

I also think all the "eager to retire" types may rethink that after looking at their 401K balances.

So while I hope you are correct, should things go south, I'm not so confident.

Lykaskygod

How is class going to be conducted? Keeping distance and knowing there was a case last month?

flyguy23

I hope we don't find out if ups would offer early retirement. It would make financial sense to try and lose people at the top end of the payscale in such a scenario. As far as retirement numbers, we'll see what happens. People are still retiring at the moment. There is always a slow down during the summer months.

senecacaptain

the only thing I can see being a "threat" is PAX carriers deciding to get into the freight business to keep the lights on. They don't have the ground transport piece that UPS does but who knows what is possible in the new normal we may be facing in 2021 and beyond.

brownie

I just dont get how people talking V shape when unemployment is about to hit 25%. Maybe V shape in wallstreet as buyers be rushing to pickup all the beat up quality stocks but main street will be a very long U . We're heading towards a very deep but short lived recession and with that said anything is possible at ups. They could be forward thinking and keep everyone on the roster or our new CFO/ bean counter be like ole Davis and manage us based on quarterly performance.
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