boxer6

Why don't you address the retirement numbers and the relative stagnation you would have between the two groups? Those numbers are not perception.

Isn't that worth something for those at UAL? I would think that would be worth more that a SNJ and certainly your comment about forward mobility flies in the face of reality as far as the retirement numbers are concerned.
Drive one's destiny? You can desire that all you want but your desires don't matter when you work for the man, much less an airline.

A320fumes

You should discuss it with your Reps first. You are going to be allowed to fly new, clean airplanes at your current payscale on our equipment. At the same time, your MEC chair is trying to mind-**** us into a Sr grab.

".....asks Mr. Snake why he bit him, since the biting will also result in Mr. Snake's demise. A wry smile came upon Mr. Snake's face. "I bit you because I am a snake Mr. Turtle; that is my nature."

I personally hold no ill will towards our furloughees, and will most likely be flying with them by this time next year. All won't be so understanding of your MEC's recent actions. It really shows a lack of class and sense of entitlement to act in this way after the CAL group's most gracious gesture.

AxlF16

Spoken like a true 'Eastie'.

You can take the The boy out of USAir, but you can't take USAir out of the boy...

A320fumes

The retirement ratio's are almost identical, and CAL is taking delivery of over 100 new airframes during the 5 years prior to age 65 retirements commencing.

The stagnation would have occurred @ UAL. You corporate strategy was to shrink until someone would merge with you; also not your fault, but no less true.

A320fumes

Thank you Axl. I'm very proud of my time at USAirways. Not a better Pilot group around.

skypest

I did not ask what would be fine with you or for your previous experience on heavies. I had previous experience on heavies prior to United as well. So what.

The question is - Did your career expectation prior to May 3rd have you ending your career as a senior wide body Captain? Please answer the question so that I might know your career progression expectation.

Thanks

Rocketiii

Ill speak for myself. Yes. I will also have been a captain for 27 years while you puddle along as an FO awaiting your upgrade slot. Every hour I fly at $162/hour vs a guy at UAL with nearly the same seniority who is making $0/ hour adds in to the total career expectation. I could give a flying FK about flying the shiny 747 you all are so enamored with. Flown all over the world heavy metal and I dont give a crap. Its about pay and days off. And my total PAY career expectation far exceeds UAL career expectations at the moment of the snapshot. Keep holding on to your deteriorating fleet and holy grail airplane that isnt even made anymore and smoke the career expectation pipe some more. This is an argument we are begging to have. When our narrowbodies pay more than your widebodies, I really dont care about an argument of what your widebody ratio is. Im sure the arbitrator will enjoy your stories of how great your contract was a decade ago.

A320fumes

Yes. Easily.

gettinbumped

To be honest, Fumes, the only arrogance I hear on this post is yours.

I'm surprised that as an Eastie, you didn't learn from their colossal mistakes. You wanna "get at it" with regards to seniority. The smart move is to get a good contract first... That lesson is completely obvious. There will be plenty of time to argue about seniority later, and it's going to arbitration anyway.

I don't understand- you say UAL doesn't have any airplanes on order (not true) and they don't count because they aren't on property until 2016. Sooooo... What year do the orders need to be in to count as orders? Somehow I'm guessing your answer is "whatever CAL order years are".

You insist on talking about career expectations and then magically merge us with USAir, oh and saying that THAT JCBA would have kept our pay steady or downward. Where did you come up with that? We could just have easily negotiated an industry leading package for all you know

Look, United numbers in the last year have been right at the top of the industry in terms of operational performance and revenue. We are well hedged and looking quite strong going forward. One thing that I know about this business is that nobody knows what's going to happen. It's all about luck anyway. My career expectation was to retire at UAL as no worse than #9 and be a Captain for 35 of my 40 year career- the majority of it as a widebody Captain. We were in Section 6 negotiations, so who knows where our pay would have gone. There is no way you can say it wasnt going above yours- we simply don't know. I GUARANTEE you I won't be top 10 in the combined company, so this merger will hurt my career expectations. I didn't choose it, and I'm not thrilled about it, but it is what it is.

I strongly STRONGLY suggest you put the Career expectations fight aside and try to find some common ground to get this JCBA done SOON... aka SCOPE. Skywest just opened a IAH base and is cutting their ORD base almost in half. The shift is underway for the 70's to be doing the CAL flying. The longer the JCBA takes, the more the RJ flying is going to shift to your side.

boxer6

Gee, what part of the retirement list I posted leads you to believe its "almost identical". Except for 2016, UA has more retirements. Starting in 2020 it is more every year by the hundreds. That's pretty big.

Deliveries prior to the merger mean nothing. Future orders don't really play in the arbitrators mind..do they? Interestingly, out of the 80+ future orders, 53 are NG's...exactly the same number as the 300's and 500's combined. Replacements? Doesn't matter as future orders/options are as uncertain as oil prices and don't play as much of a role as something as concrete as retirements.

Hey, I have nothing against CAL or UAL. From the contradiction I posted a while back in Jay's letter (he won't agree to ALPA Exec. resolution to keep the JCBA out of the SLI) it seems patently obvious that he and the CAL MEC want to use their banding scheme
to advantage you guys in the SLI. It is the only reasonable explanation I can see right now.


On Order
737NG – 53 ( rights for any 737NG model )
777-200ER – 2
787-8 – 11
787-9 – 14