Share your typical SWA Schedule
07-14-2023, 06:34 AM
#111
Spikes the Koolaid
Joined APC: Jul 2015
Position: 737
Posts: 403
Totally agree that losing pay/potential pay is a dangerous practice that disincentivises calling in fatigued when you need to. I also think that the fact that rigs are not included in premium/JA disincentivises people from fatiguing out on extensions/JA.
I also admit that there are going to be chiefs who call out people who they perceive to be abusing the system, but it is also important to note that they were not punished by the chiefs either.
I also admit that there are going to be chiefs who call out people who they perceive to be abusing the system, but it is also important to note that they were not punished by the chiefs either.
07-14-2023, 07:11 AM
#112
Gets Weekends Off
Joined APC: Feb 2018
Posts: 1,264
But I don’t remember the history on reverting to straight time when calling in fatigued on a premium trip. Do you remember?
It’s kind of amazing to me (not really) that the various powers that be who serve as safety watchdogs allow that to stand as if that doesn’t result in more pilots flying fatigued because of the rationalization that a fatigued pilot’s ethical code compels them to “do the right thing” instead of “losing a little money.” At the same time, they formally teach us that a fatigued pilot’s judgment and other capabilities are impaired.
Also, anecdotally, I’ve heard that people have been ordered to get a FFD exam when they’ve popped up on CP’s radars for calling in fatigued and/or sick “too frequently.” I don’t know how true that actually is.
07-14-2023, 07:32 AM
#113
Gets Weekends Off
Joined APC: Sep 2011
Posts: 1,027
I know that TA-2 last cycle (our current contract) conceded to earning sick leave at straight time for premium trips instead of earning it at premium time as had been the case prior to that.
But I don’t remember the history on reverting to straight time when calling in fatigued on a premium trip. Do you remember?
It’s kind of amazing to me (not really) that the various powers that be who serve as safety watchdogs allow that to stand as if that doesn’t result in more pilots flying fatigued because of the rationalization that a fatigued pilot’s ethical code compels them to “do the right thing” instead of “losing a little money.” At the same time, they formally teach us that a fatigued pilot’s judgment and other capabilities are impaired.
Also, anecdotally, I’ve heard that people have been ordered to get a FFD exam when they’ve popped up on CP’s radars for calling in fatigued and/or sick “too frequently.” I don’t know how true that actually is.
But I don’t remember the history on reverting to straight time when calling in fatigued on a premium trip. Do you remember?
It’s kind of amazing to me (not really) that the various powers that be who serve as safety watchdogs allow that to stand as if that doesn’t result in more pilots flying fatigued because of the rationalization that a fatigued pilot’s ethical code compels them to “do the right thing” instead of “losing a little money.” At the same time, they formally teach us that a fatigued pilot’s judgment and other capabilities are impaired.
Also, anecdotally, I’ve heard that people have been ordered to get a FFD exam when they’ve popped up on CP’s radars for calling in fatigued and/or sick “too frequently.” I don’t know how true that actually is.
07-14-2023, 08:52 PM
#115
Gets Weekends Off
Joined APC: Jun 2006
Position: American Airlines Brake Pad Replacement Technician
Posts: 476
Our pilot group as a whole isnt aware of potential financial harm a fatigue call at SWA can incur. This isnt really talked about much. When you ask Safety Professionals from SWA and SWAPA alike the responses are usual painful grimaces and conversational pump fakes and deflection about how that's just the way it is here.
07-15-2023, 06:58 AM
#116
Line Holder
Joined APC: May 2016
Posts: 78
I think this entire contract dispute comes down to one thing and that is the company’s ability to work us pilots how they see fit to keep the operation functioning. I fully believe they will pay us whatever we ask, but they realize that their ability now to use and abuse can’t be valued. What other airline has this flexibility with its pilots?
1.) Consistent am wake ups at 2am or pm releases at 4/5am.
2.) The ability to JA a pilot for days past his original release date.
3.) The ability to turn your 1 leg 4 hour day into a 5 leg 14 hour day with 2 deadheads, 5 airplanes, 20 minute connections, and follow that with a 10 hour overnight.
4.) Have you fly a 5 hour leg at 5am after trying to fight through airport lines so you can get breakfast because they will not provide us with food like the legacies.
5.) Give you a 5 minute connection to a deadhead so that you can sit in a middle seat before you fly another few legs.
The list goes on and on. We keep this airline going and they realize that if they don’t have the ability to keep these practices it won’t work. This is why the manipulated pay rates they gave to us of average 737 pay are so insulting.
1.) Consistent am wake ups at 2am or pm releases at 4/5am.
2.) The ability to JA a pilot for days past his original release date.
3.) The ability to turn your 1 leg 4 hour day into a 5 leg 14 hour day with 2 deadheads, 5 airplanes, 20 minute connections, and follow that with a 10 hour overnight.
4.) Have you fly a 5 hour leg at 5am after trying to fight through airport lines so you can get breakfast because they will not provide us with food like the legacies.
5.) Give you a 5 minute connection to a deadhead so that you can sit in a middle seat before you fly another few legs.
The list goes on and on. We keep this airline going and they realize that if they don’t have the ability to keep these practices it won’t work. This is why the manipulated pay rates they gave to us of average 737 pay are so insulting.
07-15-2023, 08:02 AM
#117
Gets Weekends Off
Joined APC: Jun 2010
Position: DOWNGRADE COMPLETE: Thanks Gary. Thanks SWAPA.
Posts: 6,803
I think this entire contract dispute comes down to one thing and that is the company’s ability to work us pilots how they see fit to keep the operation functioning. I fully believe they will pay us whatever we ask, but they realize that their ability now to use and abuse can’t be valued. What other airline has this flexibility with its pilots?
1.) Consistent am wake ups at 2am or pm releases at 4/5am.
2.) The ability to JA a pilot for days past his original release date.
3.) The ability to turn your 1 leg 4 hour day into a 5 leg 14 hour day with 2 deadheads, 5 airplanes, 20 minute connections, and follow that with a 10 hour overnight.
4.) Have you fly a 5 hour leg at 5am after trying to fight through airport lines so you can get breakfast because they will not provide us with food like the legacies.
5.) Give you a 5 minute connection to a deadhead so that you can sit in a middle seat before you fly another few legs.
The list goes on and on. We keep this airline going and they realize that if they don’t have the ability to keep these practices it won’t work. This is why the manipulated pay rates they gave to us of average 737 pay are so insulting.
1.) Consistent am wake ups at 2am or pm releases at 4/5am.
2.) The ability to JA a pilot for days past his original release date.
3.) The ability to turn your 1 leg 4 hour day into a 5 leg 14 hour day with 2 deadheads, 5 airplanes, 20 minute connections, and follow that with a 10 hour overnight.
4.) Have you fly a 5 hour leg at 5am after trying to fight through airport lines so you can get breakfast because they will not provide us with food like the legacies.
5.) Give you a 5 minute connection to a deadhead so that you can sit in a middle seat before you fly another few legs.
The list goes on and on. We keep this airline going and they realize that if they don’t have the ability to keep these practices it won’t work. This is why the manipulated pay rates they gave to us of average 737 pay are so insulting.
07-15-2023, 08:45 AM
#118
Gets Weekends Off
Joined APC: Feb 2018
Posts: 1,264
I think this entire contract dispute comes down to one thing and that is the company’s ability to work us pilots how they see fit to keep the operation functioning. I fully believe they will pay us whatever we ask, but they realize that their ability now to use and abuse can’t be valued. What other airline has this flexibility with its pilots?
1.) Consistent am wake ups at 2am or pm releases at 4/5am.
2.) The ability to JA a pilot for days past his original release date.
3.) The ability to turn your 1 leg 4 hour day into a 5 leg 14 hour day with 2 deadheads, 5 airplanes, 20 minute connections, and follow that with a 10 hour overnight.
4.) Have you fly a 5 hour leg at 5am after trying to fight through airport lines so you can get breakfast because they will not provide us with food like the legacies.
5.) Give you a 5 minute connection to a deadhead so that you can sit in a middle seat before you fly another few legs.
The list goes on and on. We keep this airline going and they realize that if they don’t have the ability to keep these practices it won’t work. This is why the manipulated pay rates they gave to us of average 737 pay are so insulting.
1.) Consistent am wake ups at 2am or pm releases at 4/5am.
2.) The ability to JA a pilot for days past his original release date.
3.) The ability to turn your 1 leg 4 hour day into a 5 leg 14 hour day with 2 deadheads, 5 airplanes, 20 minute connections, and follow that with a 10 hour overnight.
4.) Have you fly a 5 hour leg at 5am after trying to fight through airport lines so you can get breakfast because they will not provide us with food like the legacies.
5.) Give you a 5 minute connection to a deadhead so that you can sit in a middle seat before you fly another few legs.
The list goes on and on. We keep this airline going and they realize that if they don’t have the ability to keep these practices it won’t work. This is why the manipulated pay rates they gave to us of average 737 pay are so insulting.
On top of that, according to SWAPA’s FP2020, we fly 83% more departures, 63% more passengers, and 24% more block hours per pilot than Delta’s pilots.
And on top of that, according to the US Supreme Court, “the labor laws allow economic strength ultimately to control the establishment of contract terms, regardless of which side may have better reasons for its position … It is ‘permissible for a party to engage in `hard bargaining,' utilizing its economic power to its advantage to retain as many rights as possible’ subject only to necessity that there be a subjective ‘desire to reach ultimate agreement.’” (Independent Federation of Flight Attendants v. TWA)
And … the Supreme Court also said in a different case (Terminal Railroad Association of St. Louis v. Brotherhood of Railroad Trainmen):
The Railway Labor Act, like the National Labor Relations Act, does not undertake governmental regulation of wages, hours, or working conditions. Instead it seeks to provide a means by which agreement may be reached with respect to them. The national interest expressed by those Acts is not primarily in the working conditions as such. So far as the Act itself is concerned these conditions may be as bad as the employees will tolerate or be made as good as they can bargain for. The Act does not fix and does not authorize anyone to fix generally applicable standards for working conditions.
Up to this point in our history as a labor union, we have typically allowed our misconceptions about the RLA, our economic power, and our management’s affection for us to cause us to “tolerate” conditions that many of us now see as intolerable.
Hopefully, enough of these misconceptions are now clarified to the point that a majority of us will not tolerate anything that is not industry-leading for professional airline pilots, narrow body or wide body.
07-15-2023, 09:09 AM
#119
Gets Weekend Reserve
Joined APC: Jul 2007
Posts: 3,776
About time you put something motivating and not belittling our pilot group, Lew.
Yes, I really think it will take a strike to bring this to the conclusion. To "un-AIP" sections previously agreed upon is ludicrous in mediation, but I wonder if Carl is practically daring us to strike. Same with AW showing up to the lounge in MCO and not going to SEA to participate in negotiations. And where the hell is NoShoBoJo? He still thinks he's not allowed in negotiations?? By whom? Gary?
I keep hearing people wondering if it's incompetence at play here. I really don't think so. They know what they're doing and they're trying to induce negotiations fatigue so we'll settle just to get it over with. That worked in the past for them, and they're trying the same old playbook. However, unlike before, we have a completely different pilot group, different demographics, different industry, and these people are still stuck in the "fly-it-like-a-200" era.
There is no progress made and Carl proved it by "un-AIPing" previously agreed-upon sections. If anything, that sure doesn't look like good faith negotiation. The next step is up to the mediator. Personally, I don't think there will be any serious progress until the end of the cooling off period, and even then, we need to stay strong and not settle for anything not industry-leading in every section. If it takes walking, then we walk.
Yes, I really think it will take a strike to bring this to the conclusion. To "un-AIP" sections previously agreed upon is ludicrous in mediation, but I wonder if Carl is practically daring us to strike. Same with AW showing up to the lounge in MCO and not going to SEA to participate in negotiations. And where the hell is NoShoBoJo? He still thinks he's not allowed in negotiations?? By whom? Gary?
I keep hearing people wondering if it's incompetence at play here. I really don't think so. They know what they're doing and they're trying to induce negotiations fatigue so we'll settle just to get it over with. That worked in the past for them, and they're trying the same old playbook. However, unlike before, we have a completely different pilot group, different demographics, different industry, and these people are still stuck in the "fly-it-like-a-200" era.
There is no progress made and Carl proved it by "un-AIPing" previously agreed-upon sections. If anything, that sure doesn't look like good faith negotiation. The next step is up to the mediator. Personally, I don't think there will be any serious progress until the end of the cooling off period, and even then, we need to stay strong and not settle for anything not industry-leading in every section. If it takes walking, then we walk.
07-15-2023, 09:30 AM
#120
Line Holder
Joined APC: May 2016
Posts: 78
[QUOTE=Lewbronski;3666273]The list does go on.
On top of that, according to SWAPA’s FP2020, we fly 83% more departures, 63% more passengers, and 24% more block hours per pilot than Delta’s pilots.
You’re right that our economic output and power is our leverage. We provide an enormous advantage to this company. Our route structure, if properly run, provides and enormous advantage against our competitors. I don’t mind being the most productive pilots in the industry, but that needs to come at a cost to the company that benefits the pilots. The company wants efficiency, that’s fine, pay for it rather than nickel and dime us.
We are done paying for parking, paying for uniforms, scrounging for food in airport lines, getting JA’d when there were willing volunteers, being paid industry average 737 pay even though we produce more revenue than any wide body pilot. Everything has a price. Lock these negotiators in a room until they figure it out.
On top of that, according to SWAPA’s FP2020, we fly 83% more departures, 63% more passengers, and 24% more block hours per pilot than Delta’s pilots.
You’re right that our economic output and power is our leverage. We provide an enormous advantage to this company. Our route structure, if properly run, provides and enormous advantage against our competitors. I don’t mind being the most productive pilots in the industry, but that needs to come at a cost to the company that benefits the pilots. The company wants efficiency, that’s fine, pay for it rather than nickel and dime us.
We are done paying for parking, paying for uniforms, scrounging for food in airport lines, getting JA’d when there were willing volunteers, being paid industry average 737 pay even though we produce more revenue than any wide body pilot. Everything has a price. Lock these negotiators in a room until they figure it out.
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