flyguy81

Can't pick up anything because you hit buffers. Trip goes sideways and they have to pull something later on due to block/FDP issues. People calling in sick because they've had enough and need a break. They're burning rsv's on DOT and still issuing POT/VPF/JA's on HOT later in the day. IF they were smart they'd save rsv's for the HOT/SNOT stuff that doesn't get bid on and give out POT to all the DOT bidders. RSV's should be used to cover open time....that's idiocy.

e6bpilot

I haven't seen it like this in my 8 years here. Hard lines are built max block and max duty. Reserves at never before seen levels, yet utilization is sky high. The flight schedule is stretched out with planned 0500 launches and 0130 recoveries. Who flies at 5am you ask? Apparently everyone. The flights are completely packed.

One thing is clear. Crew planning and network planning have built a house of cards and they are rolling the dice like a degenerate gambler that this summer is all going to work out and they are going to make a fortune without any major disruptions.

Someone has decided that it is cheaper and more dependable to have a ton of prepaid reserves than it is to have legal and available open time players. I guess we will see in October at the earnings call.

at6d

Wait until the monsoons start in PHX. Season started the 16th. I can confirm reserves are getting used—tomorrow PHX has four PM reserves. One good for a four day.

Crockrocket95

Im seeing TONS of stuff got POT. Then eventually assigned to RSVs... I agree they are running it too close to breaking but they are awarding POT first. At least in MCO.

e6bpilot

They have been awarding certain trips POT and burning some reserves in the 0900. A few trips go straight to first year guys. The rest are getting absorbed in reroutes and exported. Still plenty of VPF every day of the week. That means they have more trips than bidders or available reserves (that they want to use). Some of those get absorbed in reroutes, some JA.
Thing is, they have written a schedule that they cannot possibly hope to execute using the available pilots.
Look around at the trips. They are all max blocking or max duty day or both. There is no safety valve. They took the shock absorber that they had built into the schedule and moved it to the reserves. It's a shell game with massive consequences. I don't know how many of you have been flying the line as of late, but it is exhausting. This will lead to more sick and fatigue calls.

WHACKMASTER

I for one am not complaining as I remember what it was like to be overstaffed (2018?) and MUCH prefer this environment.

Don’t be shy about dropping the F-bomb if you legitimately need to. Done….

e6bpilot

There used to exist a happy median where they would have some high paying, high blocking lines and some on the opposite end of the scale. Now all the trips are absolutely slammed packed with flying. The very fact that someone thought that doubling the reserves was going to solve the issue is laughable.

My seniority used to allow me a nice choice of lines and trips that would net me the best paycheck for my time spent at work. Now I get to choose between 100 crappy choices and hope that I can drop some high blocking days in overlap or ELITT.

By doubling the reserve coverage, the company is taking a little bit of your seniority and sprinkling it down the line.

Yes, I love that premium flying is available 7 days a week. The rest of it is garbage. Up until May, you could fly premium AND bid a line of easy going low blocking trips.

flensr

With the high block lines and high reserve utilization, it'll be interesting to see if the company tries to blame any cancels this week on an alleged illegal work action. SWAPA collects a lot of stats and we've already seen that there are a handful of pilots still picking up premium trips instead of going to the picket, but still I don't see the company not grasping at any opportunity to try to blame cancels on the pilot group or SWAPA in spite of us continuing to bail them out month after month.

Smooth at FL450

Southwest showing 29 cancels today (0%) and 0 tomorrow. so far...

waterskisabersw

Partly because they pre-canceled tens of thousands of flights a few months ago and blamed it on the pilots being fatigued.