Hobbit64

Tumi TA. Wowzers.

I wasn’t on property for the last contract (TA1&TA2). But from all of the mentoring (Captains this is part of your job, sorry) I have been given it seems that UALPA has a few CK’s and TD’s in their ranks. It’s like the Rosenberg’s running towards 30 pieces of silver.
Money is great, but how do they shave?! How the heck do these Benedict’s live with themselves?! I couldn’t imagine looking in the mirror after some of the stuff these people do. Sheesh!

9mikemike

Just a quick clarification. The Alaska Pilots did not file for mediation. Alaska management filed for mediation with no warning and no indication after an ALPA sponsored weekend retreat negotiating session. 9am the following Monday. It was our informational picket attended by more than half of our seniority list along with a couple hundred pilots from other airlines followed shortly after by a strike authorization vote. A vote that saw 98+% of eligible voters cast a vote that authorized a strike by 99. something percent. That is what unity looks like and that is what it took to finally get them to show up for the first time in 3 years and actually negotiate….

rightseat

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^*
This! - sure wish there was a “like” button

Lewbronski

There was some discussion on this question of why Alaska management (as opposed to the pilot group) filed for mediation back at the beginning of June on the United forum under a thread titled, "Agreement in Principle."

One guy from Frontier had what was, IMO, the best guess at to why it happened that way, explaining:

In addition to the above, it's also possible that Alaska management underestimated the will and ability of the pilot group and their negotiators during this cycle. Alaska was the pilot group, after all, that made the monumentally stupid decision back in the 2000's to agree to binding arbitration, which resulted in the notorious "Kashtration." Perhaps management believed that their filing for mediation might intimidate the pilot group into a quick agreement.

Regardless of who filed for mediation this time around, though, the important point is that it was filed for and the mediation clock was started. That makes the strike authorization vote and the pickets much more effective and the threat of passengers booking away from Alaska in the face of a looming work shutdown much more real to management.

Another key factor as to why the pace and tone of negotiations have picked up at Delta and Alaska may be the fact that a national coalition of railroad unions, representing 115,000 workers and 30% of the nation's rail freight capacity, requested mediation in Jan 2022 and were then released from mediation in Jun 2022. That is an unprecedentedly short time in mediation. From a Railway Age article:

It may be no coincidence that this occurred only a few months after the balance of power on the three-member NMB shifted from two Republicans and one Democrat to two Democrats and one Republican. The one Republican member remaining in June voted against releasing the unions from mediation.

Alaska and Delta management may not have anticipated such a quick trip through mediation is even feasible. They may now be feeling the heat of a possible dramatically accelerated timeline before their disputes may also end up having an impasse declared and being released from mediation. That may also help explain what's going on at Alaska and Delta right now.

RJSAviator76

Lew, seriously, what do you think SAV result at this place would be? Far too many koolies don't understand what that even means.

WHACKMASTER

A strike vote at SWA would not go the way we need it to presently. There is not nearly enough frustration and anger out on line to get the high percentage that’s needed from it.

Lewbronski

Right now? I agree with you. My guess is we'd be lucky to get 50%.

SWAPA has conducted virtually no real RLA education. Even the RLA flow chart they printed in the RP recently in a RLA "education" article was wrong. I guess you could call that RLA "miseducation."

And, not that SWAPA is anywhere near proposing a SAV, but to conduct one before filing for mediation would make us even more of a laughing stock among our exec's by further highlighting how lost and confused we are.

At the moment, IMO, we're much closer to matching UA ALPA's negotiating trajectory than we are to that of Delta or Alaska.

The fact that SWAPA has publicly come out as part of it's RLA education campaign and stated that the RLA is "sugar in our gas tank" is much worse than simply meaning that we haven't filed for mediation and, therefore, the mediation clock hasn't even started yet.

It tells management that we just really, really don't get it. It's like waving a giant red flag in management's face and screaming, "Please toy with us." It's directly from UA ALPA's play book.

It also validates in the minds of our mostly-clueless pilot group lurking myths and conspiracy theories that say the RLA is designed to favor management. The real answer, therefore, is to pound the table about a pilot shortage and stage some pickets without making any moves to leverage the RLA because it's what's holding us back.

Look how far that has gotten us.

RJSAviator76

Yup. Nailed it. I'm very much prepared to be underwhelmed.