Atlas Air Hiring
Gets Weekends Off
Joined APC: Mar 2015
Posts: 963
Reading the CBA lesson #91
Well, this thread really isn't the right place to air our internal dirty laundry, but there is, apparently, a portion of the CBA that says that for open time trips that start out of base "the Company is not obligated to choose a Crewmember on the basis of system seniority if the Company can select the next available Crewmember which does not incur a substantial cost to the Company".
So, theoretically, you could accept a trip overseas and out of seniority.
Because Atlas operates via a scheduling model of panic planning and management by catastrophe, not an ounce of forethought goes into staffing any trip. For instance, every month, I bid for and am awarded a line of fourteen to seventeen days of DHL trips, all of which will go and they will go on time. Unfortunately, I (and the entire remainder of the crew members who were awarded that line) will only fly the first one of those days. Upon arrival at our first destination, we all go in different directions, never to see any of the trips that we were originally awarded. Now, crew scheduling now has to cover all of the trips that we were pulled off of by redirecting other pilots from their awarded trips, and so on.
Consequently, there are literally dozens and dozens of open trips every day - very few of which are ever published as open time trips. This creates a situation that is ripe for the company bottom kissers to make deals with crew scheduling violating contractual rest requirements, notification requirements, seniority requirements, etc, etc.
As is true for a disturbing amount of the current CBA, this pitiful clause written by the Atlas lawyers and is yet another one of the many disgusting contractual flaws that we have to contend with at Atlas.
Forewarned is fair warned.
8
Well, this thread really isn't the right place to air our internal dirty laundry, but there is, apparently, a portion of the CBA that says that for open time trips that start out of base "the Company is not obligated to choose a Crewmember on the basis of system seniority if the Company can select the next available Crewmember which does not incur a substantial cost to the Company".
So, theoretically, you could accept a trip overseas and out of seniority.
Because Atlas operates via a scheduling model of panic planning and management by catastrophe, not an ounce of forethought goes into staffing any trip. For instance, every month, I bid for and am awarded a line of fourteen to seventeen days of DHL trips, all of which will go and they will go on time. Unfortunately, I (and the entire remainder of the crew members who were awarded that line) will only fly the first one of those days. Upon arrival at our first destination, we all go in different directions, never to see any of the trips that we were originally awarded. Now, crew scheduling now has to cover all of the trips that we were pulled off of by redirecting other pilots from their awarded trips, and so on.
Consequently, there are literally dozens and dozens of open trips every day - very few of which are ever published as open time trips. This creates a situation that is ripe for the company bottom kissers to make deals with crew scheduling violating contractual rest requirements, notification requirements, seniority requirements, etc, etc.
As is true for a disturbing amount of the current CBA, this pitiful clause written by the Atlas lawyers and is yet another one of the many disgusting contractual flaws that we have to contend with at Atlas.
Forewarned is fair warned.
8
Last edited by fadec; 08-01-2015 at 08:33 AM.
Gets Weekends Off
Joined APC: Apr 2014
Posts: 126
So if I call and make an overseas deal it is contractual as long as I dont violate other parts of the contract. Good to know. Thanks. I wont break the contract. But if I can legally spend an extra day or two travelling overseas and then get paid for an elided deadhead while avoiding imputed income and travelling back to base I'm going to jump on it. I'm not sure that's a flaw in the contract. Seems like a feature. I respect that some guys want to spend time in base/gateway or only pick up out of their base/gateway or have a commute situation that fits the gateway model. Those of us who live or travel overseas have a different situation. It's our contract too.
Its different VX'ing on the backside of the pattern because you've already begun your trip pairing. You are already away from your base operating in the system so scheduling is free to change up your pattern to use you on those VX days without putting those trips into open time.
Last edited by plift; 08-01-2015 at 01:09 PM.
Did the test the end of last December, didn't hear anything till the middle of April, interviewed end of April, put in the pool beginning of May. In the August 10 class. So it took me 8 months from first contact to hire date.
Thanks for the response!
Yep, don't give up hope, I emailed them just like you did and got the same response. I thought I was out of the running for the job after 4 months, but obviously they were just backed up. Best of luck.
So if I call and make an overseas deal it is contractual as long as I dont violate other parts of the contract. Good to know. Thanks. I wont break the contract. But if I can legally spend an extra day or two travelling overseas and then get paid for an elided deadhead while avoiding imputed income and travelling back to base I'm going to jump on it. I'm not sure that's a flaw in the contract. Seems like a feature. I respect that some guys want to spend time in base/gateway or only pick up out of their base/gateway or have a commute situation that fits the gateway model. Those of us who live or travel overseas have a different situation. It's our contract too.
This contract is difficult to understand at best. It was written by Atlas lawyers who did a very poor job. In my limited experience with our CBA, I have found entire paragraphs that make no sense what-so-ever due to carelessly omitted words. It is so bad that these flaws favor neither the pilots nor the company and have gone uncorrected for years.
Yes, it's your contract, too. My issue is when the contract obviously favors small subsets within the pilot group to the detriment of the vast majority. For instance, a disproportionate number of pages in the current contract favors instructors and check airmen (although this group is growing). Our dental plan allows for bridges, dentures, crowns, ... all old guy stuff and has nothing about orthodontics for all of us younger guys who have kids with fangs and buck teeth. And there are clauses like the one we're talking about that may favor the overseas guys like you which is maybe 2 -3% of the total pilot group.
Whatever your personal situation is, study up on the contract and protect yourself and the group. Letting the company violate the contract is no longer going to go unchallenged. Letting pilots violate the contract will no longer going to go unchallenged (by me, at least). There seems to be a very focused interest on completely rewriting the upcoming contract and I, for one, will be very vocal when it comes to representing our interests.
No matter what your particular situation, the message to the company is definitely going to be: NO MORE MISTER NICE GUY !!!
8
International gateways? -- I wouldn't plan on that scenario materializing since other priorities will take precedence from our end...however, it may get slipped into the CBA even though the majority of the pilots don't really rate that as a priority.
Gets Weekends Off
Joined APC: Jul 2008
Position: Ex USAF, ex-ATA , currently Atlas Air 747 CA
Posts: 324
Indeed. There are so many more things that need squaring away in the next contract that I can honestly say that international gateways aren't even on the horizon. They may appear, but there are a host of other things that are of more immediate concern.
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