AllYourBaseAreB

literally an FO’s first PBS bid off IOE showed him bidding at 50% for September. People come to AA for CLT, DFW and MIA, not NYC. You will have fantastic seniority progression here. 90% of my FOs are brand new and leaving the base after their first vacancy bid (which happen 4x a year)

DjbR

That's awesome... 2.5 months and you're 25%. Being on the bus were you doing a lot of transcons? I've been reading a lot of negative things regarding QOL (I know to take everything with a grain of salt) how has your experience been so far now your back in DFW?

FlyGuy2021

Early on, expect lines that mostly consist of 5 day trips that end with redeyes back to base if you are on the east coast. Transcons are typically the "good" trips, with only a couple legs per day. The 3-4 leg days are the ones that most people do not seem to like. But you may view them differently. There are many more trips with 3-4 legs per day and 12 hour overnights than there were 4-5 years ago. Much less of a mainline type flight schedule and more like the regionals. But since the regionals can't staff all of their airplanes and we are doing a lot of the flying that they used to do, it is to be expected.

Expect to get reassigned. A LOT. 4 of my last 5 trips have completely fallen apart. Sometimes you get home a day late, but I usually get home the same day that I am supposed to.

Widebody flying is great, and the time to hold that went up quite a bit with the last bid. Figure about 5 years. Many pilots the bid from wide body FO to narrow body captain are bidding back because wide body FO is a much better job.

DjbR

wow... that's incredible. Im hoping if all goes well to get the airbus. Not sure how much different the seniority is compared to the 73 out of nyc.

DjbR

Your remark regarding reassignments is a common theme I've been seeing. Are there some sort of pay protections in the CBA that will at least benefit you. For Example at Jetblue we have a clause called EPS which essentially protects us 200% for scheduled/actual block up to two hours at 200% or 5 hours whichever is greater. I know career progression will be absolutely better at AA but im trying to gauge how the QOL will improve or decrease by moving over.

FlyGuy2021

With the new contract, "reassignments" pay 50% more. But the company can classify the reassignments as other things that do not pay extra. The new CBA has been in effect for a day and they are already doing this.

So, sort of. It is too early to tell. Once electronic notification starts, you can get reassigned any time, even after you land and want to go home.

This contract was all about pay and long term disability for the senior guys, not about QOL. Reserve bucket system got much worse. QOL actually took a major hit.

FlyGuy2021

It is almost impossible to trade/move any trips. If PBS awards you 92 hours of flying and trips every weekend, then you will be flying 92 hours and working every weekend. The company got rid of 1 day trips for September in most bid statuses, so that is a major gripe right now.

Scheduling is not good, and the trip trading system is completely locked down. Reserves are flying almost every day that they are on reserve, and many are "timing out" at 85 hours before the end of the month.

Money is good. Still a lot of retirements. But QOL is not great.

DjbR

okay tis is helpful information. Not to go tit for tat on contracts but we aren't allowed to get reassigned more than 2 times in a rolling 12 calendar months. im just trying to assess my options in making an informed decision. Thanks for the info!

AllYourBaseAreB

no limit to reassignments. In theory the lots of extra money they will be paying out will help reduce them, but….. yeah… time will tell

FlyGuy2021

I have flown with lots of pilots from JetBlue, Spirit, and ACMI cargo carriers, and lots of other places. Most aren't thrilled with the overall quality of life, but none of them really regret coming to AA. There is hope to get rid of the corrupt APA and try to continue to push for real improvements. It isn't rainbows and unicorns here, but it could be worse.

2 year upgrade on the airbus and you will be making $400k in a few years with this new contract, plus 18% 401k on top of that.

I can list 100 bad things, like we get 3 weeks of vacation but they really only give you a couple of extra days off each month and it is impossible to get more than 1 decent vacation even if you are really senior. Our sick time really only covers 3 missed trips per year. No trip trading ability. Always ridiculously busy and pushed by everyone (if you let them).

But there are some little things that are good as well.