Denny Crane

If you don't participate in basic union things like surveys/votes etc., I don't think you have the right to complain about what comes along.....

Denny

sailingfun

Wow, just wow! Thankfully most pilots don't share your attitude and we have been able to go from chapter 11 back to the top of the industry in a relatively short period of time. At least this way you certainly won't be able to complain that you were ignored in this contract.

hockeypilot44

I can complain as much as I want. That's what being a dues paying member gets me. I will vote no to the contract if it does not meet my expectations (it won't). I don't see the benefit to filling out a survey that our union is just going to ignore anyway.

tsquare

Do you SERIOUSLY think they just flat out ignored it? Or do you not want to accept that maybe you are not of a majority opinion?

If you believe they ignored it for some black helicopter desire to screw everyone including themselves in the process, well that is a really pathetic view of those working on our behalf. And if that's truly the case, I hope you don't participate, we don't need garbage stats junking up the data.

DALMD88FO

I talked to some SLC reps while on a productivity sit in SLC. They had their power point up and running about the state of the union. What I walked away with is that they, meaning DALPA, is going to try and avoid protracted negotiations because our financial people are speculating that there is going to be a down turn in either 2016 or 2017.

They also pointed out that we are top of the food chain in relation to our peers in the industry, so we need to figure out how to get more money in our pockets without huge pay rate jumps because the company won't have us that much more than the other airlines. This, however, becomes a catch 22 because any kind of pay increase in certain other areas (I said we could adopt the DOD travel per diem rates which would be a huge increase for some cities)would not be entertained because the company would have to give it to the flight attendants. So does anyone have some better ideas?

Mine were:
1. DOD per diem rates
2. Definitely increase training pay.
3. Increase vacation pay
4. Increase number of vacation weeks
5. Have trip drops, with pay, for touching vacations like the old contract
6. Increase retirement contribution

I know the company likes to talk about our peers in the industry, however to date it is my belief that Delta does not have a peer. Because of how we went about our merger compared to UCON and AA/USA/AWA, we are at a competitive advantage and at least a few years ahead of the competition. I know the bean counters on Wall street don't like to look at it that way but that is the truth of the matter.

I do know this, I will vote no to any contract which has me partially financing my own pay raises by giving something up that we negotiated and paid for in previous contracts. (Im talking about profit sharing). We negotiated it, the company gave it to the other employee groups, then when the check started becoming really big they needed to get it back from the other groups but needed us to give it up first. Sorry that piggy bank is now closed.

DAL 88 Driver

Not quite right. It's possible. I've made it clear what that would take. However, I tend to agree with you that it's not possible with DALPA. That would require a major change in mindset (as demonstrated by your post) and, well, I just don't see that happening.



Yep. The proverbial "pretty pup in an ugly litter." We're the highest paid in the industry now (based on DALPA's view of it, which excludes the cargo carriers). Yet the standard of living our pay rates support is currently 34% below where it was in, for example, 1986 or 2004.

While a nice side benefit is that it doesn't require much effort and management and us can all be one big happy family with no controversy, I don't like your proposed "end result."

It's not going to be easy. That's for sure. Management is very happy and very confident that they sleighed the dragon of pilot costs once and for all via bankruptcy. And DALPA has given them no reason to think otherwise. For me, it comes down to whether we give up and accept this "new normal" in compensation for our profession, or we work to restore the value of this profession back to more in line with where it was for several decades. Your mindset is in line with the former. Congratulations, because your mindset is also in line with the prevailing view in DALPA. I'm sure that makes for a more enjoyable echo chamber experience for you.

DAL 88 Driver

I don't know anybody (including myself) who wants to "burn the house down." That's a straw man and you know it (or should know it).

There are no easy answers. Anything significant, challenging, and worthwhile in life takes a lot of hard work and takes some time. Generally, it works better if you get started on a major objective ASAP rather than putting it off, say, 10 years.

Where do we go from here?

We set the objective and develop a plan to achieve it. As I see it, that STARTS with making our objective known to our own pilot group and to management. Expectations need to be set that are quite different than the expectations we've set over the past decade. Otherwise, all we're going to see is more of the same.

I'm sure that's not enough detail for you. Sorry, I'm not a strategic planning expert. But I do know pretty much what restoration would look like for us and what it looks like when someone is trying (or not trying) to achieve it.

Do we set the objective to restore our profession and what's left of our careers?

Absolutely yes! And make it clear to all concerned parties.

That's why we needed to get started several years ago. But if you want to throw in the towel now, I guess you're just as entitled to your opinion as I am to mine.

TheManager

Why don't you answer your own question, being that you seem to enjoy asking others on here to do the same.

Do you SERIOUSLY think the that the majority opinion on the surveys for C12k reflected a desire to forgo and give up a large portion of profit sharing and 4-8-3-3 for pay raises?

What do you hope to accomplish by typing out the above statement and posting it?

Like it or not, with your position in the company that you have proudly identified yourself as holding, you are held to a different standard.

You are not meeting that standard.

Nor have you been lately in your other activity on this forum and others.

Mesabah

Yeah, but if you fail the EtD interview, you can never work at Delta mainline. Once that word gets out, who would take that chance?

sailingfun

I would not worry about pay banding. It's hugely over hyped on here as a massive cost savings to the company. It's actually proven out on airlines that adopted it to only have a minor overall effect on training. We essentially are very close to 4 pay bands now.
On the subject of returning to touching trips for vacation I would love that. By timing it right with 12 day trips I could drop 4 months of flying with just my primary and secondary vacations. I like it! June through September off and 3 weeks of vacation left!