DC462

Well, where to start? Reserve sucks here!!! 7 short call assigned in July last year. Plenty of coverage but just, because they can. No accountability for FSB or SC assignment. They routinely decide they may need 2-3 tomorrow at 21:00-22:00. Total *******ing BS. Oh and don’t expect any change despite the AIP rumors. Was there any polling from MEC prior ? Um, no there wasn’t so Hamilton and NC good old boys didn’t want spend good capital on those pesky reserve rules. But hey you might get 60-70% recovery on your inflation loss when the new contract passes. Oh and don’t tell me reserve is a choice. Because it’s not for a fair percentage of us

JTwift

I’ve not been long at UAL, but I actually know a few people who left for other airlines because of the reserve rules.

field standby and converting to short call “just because” is worse than some regionals play it.

Broncofan

I think there will be some significant change to reserve rules on this contract.. I might eat my words, but I think the company has an interest to make it better so they can get more people to upgrade.. we will see. And there was a poll pre COVID and I put reserve rules high up on my list. If there aren’t good changes to it, I’m a no vote.

Aldo Raine

I’m not going to get all worked up about what I don’t know, but I do know any TA without SUBSTANTIAL changes to reserve rules is an automatic no-vote for me, regardless of compensation. And I am a line-holder.

As has been said before on other threads, this business is subject to severe, immediate shocks, base and equipment changes, displacements, etc. There are very few people here that are immune from potentially finding themselves on reserve at some point in the future, so folks better think long and hard about how they vote.

Also, if you are on the 7-3 or Bus, you are going to be part of a global fleet in very short order, at least for a portion of your flying, so enjoy being subject to rolled days in the near future.

scns77

Refresh my memory but you can only be rolled for days from-to a global trip?

BAe3100FO

My thoughts on reserve:

1. Unused Field Standby pays 2:1 duty ie. 2 hours add pay if unused
2. Ability to make a “Call me First - Call me Last” list
3. AM or PM shortcall lines
4. Ability for reserve pilots to pick up on days off (especially on “100 add pay trips” and have that count as ADD PAY!

Just my thoughts….

GoCats67

UA has some pretty bad reserve rules that have been modified over the years including some changes in the merger agreement that were put in place to increase the pay of the reserve pilot when the company exercised some of those provisions. This included a Monthly Guarantee increase of an hour for every unused Short Call/ Field Standby assignment for the third and subsequent SC/FSB assignments given. ALPA believed that this would cause the company to reduce those assignments down to the absolute minimum. Unfortunately, we now know that Crew Scheduling views those assignments as very cheap insurance and they are more than happy to pay for them and that increase in pay has not achieved the ALPA desired effect of reducing these assignments.

Global Reserve also has “movable” days off every month. Your base is “Global” if you have any Global flying that month in your bid package, Global is Atlantic crossing, Pacific past Hawaii, and South America past 15 degrees South. If your base is Global, you get 6 HDOs that can’t be moved and 6/7 other days off that can be moved for a Global trip. A day off can only be done if there are no legal reserves to cover the trip without their days being moved. If that is the case, then the reserve that needs the least days moved is the unlucky pilot that gets their days “rolled.”

Both global and domestic reserve have one “movable” day off that can be moved for any trip. Same rules apply that it can only be done if there are no other reserves available to fly the trip without moving a day off

Now let’s be honest about reserve at UA. We all love the fact that UA is a very widebody heavy airline currently we have 96 – 777s, 63 – 787s, 16-764s and 38-763s. With that comes a great deal of flying that due to both FARs and Geography is difficult to cover with last minute sick calls and last minute mechanicals. You can’t break apart a SFO-SIN trip in the middle like you can a 4 day domestic trip.

So, with that operation comes a great many opportunities for us as pilots, but also comes the need for extra reserve staffing and associated extra Short Call assignments to protect these trips. We all benefit from that with upward mobility, but none of us wants to get our days off “rolled” when our kids baseball/recital is that day. So, how do you get the most pilot benefit out of the flying and associated staffing needs without having a miserable life for reserves?

In the last contract ALPA attempted to put in some mechanisms to reduce the Short Call/Field Standby “abuse”, but that has proved insufficient. I am hoping in this contract they will put in provisions that make SC assignments and rolling of days off dramatically more expensive (and kill FSB altogether). I believe if rolling of days off resulted in Premium Pay for the trip assigned, the likelihood of getting your days rolled involuntarily would go down dramatically, as somebody would volunteer for the trip at premium pay. Would it eliminate the day off roll, prob not, but reduce it substantially and then we would be back to just dealing with a very occasional issue that comes with being a widebody heavy airline.

Aldo Raine

Any field standby = a solid no. We are the ONLY major airline I know of that has this. We are a “major” airline with regional work rules.

Anything that doesn’t make it very painful to assign unlimited short calls = a solid no.

DashTrash

Rolling days off is complete crap, especially on a Basic fleet!!! I’m not sure if LUAL had the ability to roll days? I know that LCAL definitely did, and they used it with impunity!!! Hopefully there is some punitive language for rolling days off in this AIP/potential TA. Also, I’m hoping to see restrictions and pay penalties for SC abuse. Part 117 was designed around long call. I have seen where the Crew Desk (on a Global fleet) has put most of their available reserves on SC and then they have to roll a one day reserve for a five or six day trip because the pilots on SC don’t have the duty time. The Company needs to pay a heavy price for that!!!

massgflight

Spot on! No transparency, and there should be total transparency in the entire reserve process.

Lots of shenanigans and abuse from my peripheral view. It’ll solve problems if we get some nice rules that make sense.

Not sure if true but I’ve been told UAL is the only company that does Field Standby which has been echoed above. If so not good for us.