e6bpilot

Yes. Vacation and line bidding are a pro. Thank you. I was able to get two weeks off and all the pay for trips pulled out of one week of vacation in July. I worked 12 days in July and credited 130tfp.
Nobody that I know of sells vacation time back. That would be a huge financial blunder.

ZapBrannigan

Con: no Union hotel committee so hotels are almost all near the airport or in industrial parks.

Con: They bought the cheapest possible VNAV software (common vs geometric) so you have to watch it like a hawk

Con: they pulled out the retractable window shades and printers from the AirTran planes so they would be like all of the others

Con: scheduling software is fairly antiquated an not very mobile friendly. A cottage industry has sprouted up for mobile apps that the company fails to provide

Con: company uses reserves to cover open time they don't want to pay premium for so when there is an actual need for reserves they reschedule half the airline... which can be lucrative but it means no matter how senior you are you can be junior manned.

It's a different sort of airline. Not bad, just different. Once you get used to it, you'll learn to game the system the way E6B does (and he does it WAY better than me. I still can't figure out how to get rid of trips or put together 10 days off)

Burton78

Not to insult your intelligence or anything but while junior, monthly overlap and ELITT are good friends to have if putting together 10 consecutive days off is ever a goal. I've done it often.

SlipKid

FWIW, I've been here 21 years and have NEVER averaged even close to 108 per month.

You're working at least a few days more than your line every month to average 108.

Heck, the lines were so unproductive this month that I had to work an extra 2 days to make 95.

ANGFlight81

Well that's interesting because in July before picking anything up; I was able to elitt into 110 TFP.

SlipKid

Try it in February, or almost any other month besides June or July and part of August.

How many extra days did you work?

In July, I made 138, flying 2 extra days for a total of 14 over my original line, and yet, my average for the year is still well under 100tfp per month.

You are not gonna average 108 per month flying your line.

Period.

You can probably average around 100 tfp if you work the 15+ day lines every single month, but I don't even look at, much less bid on anything more than 13 day weekday PM lines, and I only even look at the 13 day lines when there are only a few 12 days, which has been happening a lot in the last year or so.

That 108 average number was old SWApAganda BS to make think you make more than you actually do, so you'd vote YES! on concessionary contracts and SLs.

shoelu

I absolutely believe the 108TFP number as an average for this group, however I think that average has more to do with a larger group busting their hump to average 150 or more every month.

I don't average over 85 or 90TFP each month but to attain those low numbers I was able to average 18 days off every month the last 2 years.

I work a lot less days than my friends at legacy carriers, but I also earn less money.

SlipKid

I worded that poorly.

I also believe that the 108 tfp average is pretty close to, if not 100% correct. My point was that it was not reached by the majority of us flying our lines.

Ditto on all counts. With the exception of the summer months, my target these days is as much as I can make in 12 days of flying, which is typically around 90ish, but that's not as easy to do as it used to be.

ANGFlight81

EXACTLY! You see you flew 138 in July, my guess in August you were most likely over 110. So, it slows in September and you do 88 (since you picked up) to get to 95.

So, what you do is add 138 to say roughly 88. Then divide that by 2. What's the average?

Burton78

If you aim to only work 12 days a month it makes sense that you would get around 90-95 TFP. Just another data point for the lurkers, but I'm a measly middle of the road blank line holder and I look for 16-18 days off a month and easily average 110-115. Granted, I tweak my schedule a bit to make it happen.