FangsF15

Correct. I’m not sure, but my guess is this can happen when PBS can add only a day to a senior pilot’s reserve group, vs drive a whole new reserve stretch for the junior (next most senior), the more senior might get unstacked. But that’s just a guess. 🤷‍♂️

Top 50% of line in a holiday month (which is 8-9 months of the year)
Top 70% of line in a non-holiday month.
Top 15% of Reserve are all theoretically protected from unstacking/coverage.

The Engage podcast from Oct 22 does an excellent job of explaining the in’s/out’s of all this.

Also, the PBS reference handbook has an excellent discussion of strategies for bidding in a holiday month. Lots of resources out there.

Jaww

Any other commuters that live in FA bases having a problem getting reimbursed for their parking? Apparently, Delta did an audit and deleted the database and now we all have to get verified again before Concur will pay (according to Pilot Assist). Thanks for the heads up leadership.

DWC CAP10 USAF

Nope.

It’s not the top 15% of reserves that are safe. The PWA (12.M.5) says each X-day must be available to 15% of reserve lines. So if a junior guy gets an X-day, that counts towards that 15%. Consider a month where Sun is on the 3rd. You’ll see a lot of people with vacation starting that day. If they’re on reserve, they also have to have the 1st and 2nd off too (if the month starts on the first). Those junior folks X-days count towards that 15%.

Hubcapped

Are you sure about this? Ive been able to violate grouping requirements all the time with a new monthly bid. Its subsequent changes that go through pcs that dont allow this. I could be wrong, and vacation is a specific carveout, but i know that you can violate the rules for the first and last of the month. Ive used this to my advantage many times

DWC CAP10 USAF

In my example I was specifically talking about a month where the junior pilots vacation starts on Sunday the 3rd…PBS will award them the 1st and 2nd as XX days and those count toward the 15% quota.

This example was the reply given to me straight from the PBS Committee when I asked how the #1 guy on RES could get unstacked.

Hubcapped

is that a mandatory x day award? Can the junior bid on for the 1st and 2nd?

Verdell

You can't bid for "on call" days when bidding RSV. Can only bid for X-days. So yea, it's effectively mandatory X-days, or "X-day coverage" in a sense.

FangsF15

Not always. This would be true of the last day of the preceding bid month were a X-day, leaving an insufficient period of LC on the 1st & 2nd. However, if the last day of the preceding bid month was also Reserve and not an X-day (i.e. a LC day), a 3-99-5 category could have stranded a single LC day (or more) at the end of the preceding bid month. They would then be forced into LC on the 1st & 2nd of the following month.

You can violate grouping requirements (3-99-5 or 4-99-4) at the end of the bid month, stranding a single day, or two days of LC reserve. This is because PBS can’t see the yet-to-bid month after. However, when bidding for that following bid month, PBS will allow you to bid the 1st day as an X day - effectively stranding a day(s) in the previous month. But if you don’t bid the 1st as an X-day, PBS will look backwards at the preceding month, and enforce the 3-99-5. IOW, (barring coverage), you can always bid the 1st as an X-day, but if you don’t, PBS will enforce the rule.

Hubcapped

im getting confused cause im dumb. Rn i have the last 2 days on call in October, and my November bid allowed an xday on the 1st. This created a known 2 day lc block, in violation of the 3-99-5. I humbly submit that you can poach violations at both the front and back end of a month.

note:i also use training for this method. One day before training and one day after i bid on, and bracket it with an off bid so as to burn 2 on call days where they would be really hard pressed to use me (particularly 18 hr call now)

FangsF15

ABSOLUTELY. Every single CQ or ‘other’ pre-posted work (to include velvet, or LCP mtg, or…)