schone

Hello,

I'm a regional pilot, nothing too fancy. Was reading the thread that talks about what you guys are looking for in your next contract and I see mixed opinions about the scheduling/work rules portion.

Was wondering, if everybody could come with a ******* list - what would you say is bad about the work rules at FDX? How does scheduling play with your guys' lives?

I'm wondering for comparison... I know how our scheduling play with us and what are the points that are very soar on the regional level and I wonder how it plays out for you guys.

What kind of rest/duty combinations the company tries to put on you guys that makes it hell to come to work.

Thanks!

Adlerdriver

That’s a pretty broad question and as many people who answer will probably provide an equal number of opinions/points of view.
Just to clarify, are you asking about the way trips are built or how scheduling uses reserves (maybe both?). You’re going to get differing opinions from line holders and reserves.

There are plenty of pilot at Fedex who spend months flying the line and never talk with or deal with a scheduler. So, they don’t get “played with” by scheduling. Now, they might not like the trips they’re flying and that comes down to the contract. There are a pretty complex set of rules that govern how trips are built, #’s of legs based on duty periods, layover lengths, etc. The company uses an “optimizer” program that I don’t really know much about. All I do know is that when they crank it up you see the trips and schedules change. Where you might have deadheaded to a layover on a Sunday prior to operating a flight Monday night, now the DH leaves Monday morning. You get in at 9-10 am and you’re going to have to show for work at 7-8pm that night and work until morning.

A 12 day around the world trip used to have a couple of 36-48 hour layovers to reset your clock and get some extra rest. Now there’s one and the rest are 20-24 hours long. That might sound good to a regional pilot who’s busting his butt flying 8 hard hours each day and getting min rest each night. Unfortunately you end up having to sleep twice in that 20-24 hour period. When was the last time you did that? You’re tired when you get in so you sleep. You want to show up for the next duty period rested, so you have to sleep again before the next show. That’s not always easy to do. Not to mention a 24 hour layover means you swap working days and nights (or at least to the opposite side of the clock) between those duty periods too.

One other area many people have problems with is called “substitution”. It’s too complicated to get into a lot of detail. In a nutshell, if you have a trip cancelled due to conflict with a prior trip you’re on, maintenance, etc. you basically go on reserve for the footprint of the trip that’s getting dropped. It can be a good deal if your conflicted trip is a short crappy trip and they don’t use you. You get paid and go home after being available for a few hours. If you had a nice 12 day trip to cool places, now you’re stuck in MEM on call each day at the mercy of the schedulers.

Reserve is totally different from what’s going on in the 121 pax world these days. Since we’re 121 supplemental, our time on reserve does not count toward the 16 hour max duty day like it does for you. I could be on reserve from midnight to noon(available for trips that show from 0130-1330), get a call at 1159am for a show time of 1330 and operate a flight from MEM-ANC.

I could also work a series of trips the basically require me to work from 7pm-7am for a few days, then get back to MEM at midnight and be told to go home and rest. That’s because I now have a trip that shows at 1330 that same day. It’s going to require me to fly that afternoon to a normal night layover where I will now be attempting to sleep when most people sleep after 2-3 days of sleeping in the day. Those are extreme examples but both have happened to me. That’s not really the schedulers fault or a result of them “playing with me”. They’re just following the rules that are laid out in our contract and the FARs. They have trip to assign to a reserve and I’m next on the list.

Word is that because of the 777 ultra-long haul flying that will be starting in the next couple of years, we’re going to have to go to flag operations and no longer be 121 supplemental. Then we’ll be under that same rules as the pax pilots and that will require reserves to be “on duty” while they’re on reserve. That will shake up our reserve system significantly. Whether that will be company wide or just specific to the 777 fleet seems to be an area of differing opinions.

Your question does not have a quick or short answer but there’s one limited point of view. Maybe that helps some.

dojetdriver

When this happens, how is the pay handled? I'm sure it's like you said, complicated. But when you are basically on reserve for that period where you were substituted and get called to fly, does that time get paid above your ORIGINALLY scheduled trip's credit? In other words, original trip worth 80 hours, get pulled off and reassigned to 25 hours of flying, do you know get 105 hours pay credit or just the 80?

Or, are you pay protected on the original trip and if your new assignment doesn't exceed that, you simply get what the original was worth? OR, does it reduce you down to your minimum applicable monthly guarantee for that bid period's length and your new trip would have to exceed that to break it?

Adlerdriver

Quote:

Originally Posted by dojetdriver

But when you are basically on reserve for that period where you were substituted and get called to fly, does that time get paid above your ORIGINALLY scheduled trip's credit? In other words, original trip worth 80 hours, get pulled off and reassigned to 25 hours of flying, do you know get 105 hours pay credit or just the 80?

Just the 80.

You are pay protected for the dropped trip. You don't earn extra for trips you are now assigned. You just fly them in lieu of the one you're getting pay protected for.

If the trips you fly pay more than the one that was dropped, you get paid for what you flew.


Yes.

Quote:

Originally Posted by dojetdriver

OR, does it reduce you down to your minimum applicable monthly guarantee for that bid period's length and your new trip would have to exceed that to break it?

No - it's does not affect the whole month's guarantee.

You do have some control over your situation:
1- You can refuse substitution and lose the trip guarantee. Those hours can be flown when you choose (up to 2 bid periods later, I think) at 125% of the original pay.
2- They may also offer you a re-assignment trip immediately when your original trip is cancelled. You can refuse that too and get the hours at 125% too.

Not a bad deal if you have the scheduling flexibility (i.e. you live in domicile). A commuter who was planning on working those days may not want to re-flow his month.

There's a lot more to this but that's a broad overview.

Lindy

Generally, pay protected for the trip, i.e. if it was worth 45 credits and you are assigned flying for 25, then you will be paid for 45 credits.

I say "generally" because we also have something called OTP (Open Time Priority), which, is a cousin of substitution. You can elect to decline sub, where the sub window is based on the Time Away From Base (and several rules apply), and elect OTP. Now, OTP can be very good or very, very bad. To be honest, that is all anyone needs to know that isn't working here, because the dissertation to finish the overview would take pages and pages.....

Also, I haven't seen any 80 hour trips at FDX, as our normal month is 68 hours (4 week) and 85 for (5 week).

v1 uh-oh

Scheduling is much more humane than at the regional level. The big thing is that there is no "junior-manning" here. (Although it could arise if/when the LOA is voted in) but I digress.

KDENPilot

Actually, if you look at the contract, the 16 hour day does come into play for reserves. It may not be "duty" exactly, but if you look at 25 M 1 f, it says that you have to be released for a legal no later than 4 hours after your reserve period. Remember, your RP ends at 13:30 LBT if you're an A or 01:30 LBT if you're a B. This only applies to domestic stuff, but that's because if you look close at FAR 121 Supplemental (Flag reads the same,) there is NO duty limit listed for international operations (insane, but that's how it is.) That's why you could be on reserve all morning and then launched MEM-ANC at 14:00 local. ANC is considered international. However, if they tried to launch you MEM-SEA at 14:00 local, you wouldn't be legal for it. You would be legal if it was a deadhead flight into a crew rest, or if scheds released you to showtime, and that release period was enough to be a legal rest period. In that case you wouldn't have stood the first part of your reserve day, so your 16 hours would actually start at the showtime for the trip. As I recall, the previous contract actually allowed us to go 5:30 past the end of our reserve period on domestic flights, and after the AA crash in LIT a few years ago, the FAA started making all airlines, including FedEx, limit their crews to a 16 hour day, in total, including time spent on reserve. The wording in the old contract was never changed, but it is reflected in our current one.

dojetdriver

Thanks, I was just curious.