Cosnuts

Good point Rat. Only 3 to 4 days of work with anywhere from $10,000 to $19,000 deviation bank per F/O runs into some coin. There were 26 SIBA HKG F/O lines for Feb 09.

gderek

If the company would make the lines commutable and not be against guys commuting they'd get more takers.

Haywood JB

Since it is tremendously more expensive to use siba, when and who is going to cry uncle?

Laughing_Jakal

Haven't read the posting yet, but I am willing to bet that if an FDA posting comes out and has to be open for 28 days and an excess has to be open for 14 days, then expect the first excess to come out two weeks from now. They will close simultaneously such that if you try to bid HKG Captain for POP, you run a serious risk of having to go to China.

Once that closes, more vacancies (or what's left on the original HKG Captain) bid, accompanied two weeks later by an associated excess. Remember this was a 6 to 8 week cycle according to the previous announcement.

1 Full FDA with parallel excess two weeks later closing at same time = 4 weeks

another excess alone = 6 weeks

2 Full FDA with parallel excess = 8 weeks.

Assuming the most vulnerable on property bid HKG Captain, then when the threat of downsizing/furlough/excess from FDA, I am sure the company is planning on doing some sort of negotiating to pay the very Junior HKG CA passover each month and fly them as F/os. This would generate no Passover for Conus or Anc guys because these CA's cum F/Os will come from the Captain vacancies.

Cheaper than SIBA to Pay/award Captain and fly as F/o's....Company doesn't have to give on it's position on FDA pay, union can claim they creatively kept everyone on property.

Wait.....I hear black helicopters.........

DornierPilot

Looking at the Fleet Status in VIPS, it currently lists 362 airframes. Doing the math on the Fleet Plan in the posting adds up to a loss of 98 airframes total by MAY '09. Am I missing something???

FDXLAG

Are you saying they would try to excess HGK Capts in the near future? I would bet even our lawyers could win that one.

Jumbo Pilot

See Post #5 of this thread

Mushroom

Seems to me if you could have held HKG before you would have bid it. Especially the Capt slots. If you were afriad of being excessed of the bottom of a Capt slot, who cares about bidding a vacancy for HKG Capt, when/if you get excessed you could do it then. As for the F/O, the LOA is such a shaft job, I would rather be in the least paying crew position stateside than an F/O in HKG under the current LOA. I found it very interesting and very telling that before the excess bid that has been the black cloud for months and after PC's latest FCIF, that this vacancy posting has come out. Like someone else has already said, I'ld be surprised if their are any new takers, but I've been surprised before.

AerisArmis

HKG posting is open 2 months 27 Feb -28Apr. Plenty of time for two excess bids in the middle. Ray Charles can see what they are up too.

Delco92

I was thinking the same thing. The CBA states: 14 days for permanent vacancies or excesses at an existing non-FDA domicile; 28 days for permanent vacancies or excesses at an FDA base; 45 days for the initial posting of permanent vacancies establishing a new domicile (including FDA domicile)

Initial Posting was Oct 07, therefore, by contract, VP only has to open vacancy bid for 28 days.

Why 60 days before 09-01 closes? The VP stated "the entire realignment process is expected to take approximately 6 to 8 weeks, from initial posting to the publishing of the final training letter" in his letter released yesterday. Therefore, I think it is safe to assume there will be two excess postings closing in the interim.

How does this affect bidding strategies?