Clear Right

Capt,
Do you have friends at Delta? If you do, please ask them how much their seniority has gone up. You may notice that unfortunately for Delta folks not soo much. How much has your seniority gone up since you were hired at JetBlue? Quite a bit I would imagine. I would be careful what you wish for, you may not be much happier at Delta. I do have friends at Delta, and I can tell you hands down my schedule is better relative to theirs. Yes, JetBlue needs to improve, but it is not as gloom and doom as you make it out to be. In my opinion.

windrider

Capt Coolhand...agreed and we should clarify and demand what management has told to us. Delta line guarantee is 65 hours/month. I've been told they are less productive than us although I haven't researched it. They have no plans to hire in 2012. My goodwill truck is not full, but it's not as bad as some on here portray. I think we have it pretty good in comparison to many others.

P-3Bubba

I can't wait to work for an organic company. Being DCI and hearing the daily Delta drama is getting old. ALPA, DPA, JPA whatever. Gold jacket, green jacket who gives a sh!t. (Happy Gilmore for the old timers) I need job satisfaction, a decent wage and a home base. That's QOL! And that's what it's all about.

johnso29

At Delta PBS builds the average line value(it varies monthly), which in the slowest months is closer to 72 hours & 86 hours in the busy months. Do guys end up with 65 hour lines? Yes, but only by choice and rarely. NOTHING stops them from bidding reserve for 70 hours. Also, if you end up with a 65-69 hour regular line, you will have at least 17-20 days OFF. That makes it easy to pick up open time. One 3 day and you're now around 75-85 hours, & still have 14-17 days off. As a line holder about 3/4 of the way down the list in my base I was easily holding 78-90 hour lines with 14-18 days off.

Delta has stagnated somewhat, but I don't know why guys would expect anything else. NWA & DAL merged, & it wasn't to grow. Starting in 2014 Age 65 retirements are 250-800 pilots a year through 2033. At some point JB will run out of room to grow organically, & will either stagnate or be merged with someone else. Just look at SWA. At that point, they'll likely be stagnation as JB is a young pilot group.

Don't get me wrong. I have no beef with JB. I think it's a good company with great product. But it won't always be a great place to work, just like DAL, UAL, SWA, UPS, etc. Just food for thought.

Clear Right

Johnson,
I totally agree that one day JetBlue will stop growing organically. However currently B6 is growing very responsibly. The capacity growth is almost exactly the same as the passenger growth. That is good, healthy growth. It took Southwest 30 years to get where they are beginning to stagnate. Theoretically it will take 20 years for JetBlue to stagnate, I will be happy with 10 more years of growth in this economy. Seniority growth in my opinion is all that matters, I will take an average to slightly above average contract any day of the week as long as we keep growing organically. My opinion. By the way, I think Delta is a great company as well, I just don't see the organic growth happening there any time soon. Hopefully you can fix that with your scope efforts, I do wish you luck.

forgot to bid

To add to J29, it's stagnated for sure but some of that is base dependent. Not all, just some.

I mean the plug of the airline held 767 international... in NYC.

85%-90% down the list can still get you weekends off reserve on the right airplane. But weekends off lineholding might be around 50-60% or higher.

Really the grass is not going to be green on any side of any fence. Apply to what you want and want what you applied for and the bad with the good is easier to take.

Kellwolf

Although from what I hear from my friends that fly the 767ER out of JFK, there's a reason it goes junior now. They're all bidding off of it because the lines have gotten horrible. Where they used to fly augmented crews to Africa and Russia, they're flying domestic turns or unaugmented 2-mans to Dublin. Most of the good stuff they used to fly has been shipped over to the A330. Theoretically, they'll get it back when the 767s are done being retrofitted with the lay flat seats, but who knows?

johnso29

I agree with your assessment on growth. JetBlue certainly has greater potential for growth. Delta really has no room for it, unless we can actually fix our scope. Best of luck to all the JetBlue folks as well. I don't have the opportunity to commute on JB, but I know you guys always treat DAL guys great. I hope your experience is the same.

Merry Christmas guys & gals!

johnso29

Yes. Many have bid off or to other bases because so much international went away & was replaced with domestic. There is still quite a bit of international, but the teetering European economy has really stung Atlantic flying.

flyn2001

CCH...

Please explain. I don't know what PTO is.

Are you also saying there are lawsuits against JB for not correctly paying their pilots sitting reserve? That would blow...but more importantly, how is that even possible?

Thanks.