nene

I would have thought that prior to PS, the amount of commuters that didn't have a backup was very small..... but now that so many of them (especially the newer ones) have grown accustom to the no backup required policy, it will be interesting to see how many try to JS without a backup (pilot and FA) if we go back to no PS policy this fall. May be a slightly painful transition.

TED74

Clearly, we have to follow the policies in place or risk administrative action up to termination. But no matter what the policy is at any given time, an undermanned operation doesn’t leave room for the slop necessary to operate an on-time operation. Even your decade-old anecdote didn’t even result in a late push, much less some sounding effect on the operation. Plenty of folks following the policy have also had to divert or gate return on their backup flight…or rolled an ankle…or gotten food poisoning, etc. The real problem is not outliers taking risks with their commute (which is uncommon), it’s the chronic lack of short call reserves (which is common) in nearly every category. Our inability to handle IROPs and even ROPs very well isn’t on us - it’s on the company and perhaps a dozen poor manning decisions on their part.

CBreezy

This. I've been on a primary flight twice that diverted and arrived after my scheduled departure. And once my primary flight was delayed until the same time as my back up then after my backup left, the primary was delayed again. This stuff happens and has happened since commuting was invented. Using these examples as justification against PSC is disingenuous at the least

Nantonaku

Exactly, Sailing trying to lecture gets old. There will always be people who show up late or not show up at all due to any number of factors. Not all reasons are related to commuting to work in an airplane. The company has the numbers and account for it. Even if PS commuting goes away they aren’t manned to handle any hiccups. I literally just got a call for an IA trip that has a report time in the past. I know this wasn’t due to a missed commute because the trip was in open time yesterday. No doubt in my mind that manning issues are way bigger than any commuting problems. Them trying to blame this on us and running the operation the way they do is total baloney. Getting rid of PSC isn’t going to change their numbers and might only make them worse. That is all on the company, not on us.

crewdawg

Nah man, we're so properly staffed, we have categories that had 91% of their same/next day trips covered by GS/IA for this super busy month of April. Also, scheduling has said they're not following the PWA to cover the trips this weekend because they're about to go into meltdown mode...must be this holiday weekend or all that weather out there today! But you best "do the right thing" and commute in early to not cause a disruption!

Der Meister

I think it's about time we sunset both JL and RG those two knuckle heads had done more to disrupt the operation than any pilot not making a commute could. Yet they still recieve their years bonuses... err one time payment adjustments. 🙄

jaxsurf

Do you not trust the hiring team to ensure we bring people on who feel this way?

Myfingershurt

The weekend before Mother’s Day is always a killer, amiright?

TegridyFarms

Spot on. Add to that the fact that they EXPECT a certain % of us to work on our days off whether it’s a GS or IA , and there’s your problem.

Harvard Business Review and a couple other good outlets have all in recent years published articles and case studies on “when efficiency goes too far.” That’s where we are at right now. The empty suits JL and RG have squeezed every drop they can out of this lemon. We are now at a point where our efficiency has negatively impacted our resilience.

There is capital, and there is human capital. We are the human capital and I think that our current model doesn’t distinguish between capital and human capital. They for sure don’t acknowledge the “human” in the human capital equation.

Besides our operation running so efficiently that we have almost zero resilience… over half of our company rides on an airplane to work. I don’t care if you commute or you don’t commute. Delta needs to think about the following:
-Our flight schedules are still less than they were. People don’t have the same opportunities to get to work as they did before.
-Some cities we have eliminated or drastically cut service to.
-If pilot looks at the loads week after week, and they don’t look good. What will pilots response be? Sick? IVD? APD? Fatigued? And then ask “do we have the resources to handle any of those absences?” The answer is a resounding no.

Whether you’re buying what I’m selling or not doesn’t matter—sailing isn’t buying it. If a hurricane is coming and the loads are bad, his mindset is that I should walk to work. It’s a divisive issue, but at the end of the day it’s not on us. It’s on Delta to do what’s best for the employees and our efficient little operation.

We can’t even make it through a random weekend at the end of April before our peak summer flying schedule starts. To top that off we are losing 3 pilots that I personally know of to other airlines in the next 6 weeks.

This whole ******* show will make for a great case study for business schools someday. Not just the positive space commuting—but the entire state of the company.

sailingfun

They seem to do a pretty good job overall. As I have stated repeatedly it’s a small minority of pilots who cause issues. If you are ever in a category long term when things are somewhat stagnant you get to know most of the pilots in the base on your aircraft. I once went early for a trip with a 5 pm sign in because of the WX forecast. Looked at the copilots and saw I knew both of them and they were BOS commuters. I also knew one might be a issue for showing up on time. Big line of T storms went through NYC about noon moving toward BOS. I grabbed a day room and waiting for the 4:00 van and ran into the one copilot who also came in early and also got a day room. First thing he said was “I bet XXX is going to be late if he gets here at all”. Sure enough we took a 3 hour delay and they tried to send us with 2 pilots. Not a fun night. You also notice that guys who have trouble getting to work often carry that attitude over to actually doing the work.