CousinEddie

About the only two things I can think of that changed for the better during the BK days were the introduction of the electronic logbook and the 9 / 18 training cycle. Both I would say were rather quickly viewed as universally accepted changes.

hopeSales

Hold on there Nelly! You do a disservice to every United pilot when you cut your Toddnel deals with your special CP. The company is forcing litigation on just about every part of the CBA and when our ALPA reps sets across the table, the company uses the Toddnel decisions to justify their interpretation of the contract. In some cases denying compensation to others using that same Toddnel interpretation. ALPA represents all United pilots including the SCABS for this very reason - To get correct, consistent interpretation of the CBA, not the Toddnel exceptions.

mccurtool

Pilot Advocate - I can't answer having only met the man once at a base intro

However, I am always suspect of any manager talking to their employees about a "high cost structure". Basic translation being it is partly our (the employees) fault and therefore we need to "help" by being more productive and in some instances sacrificing our job's.

See the following two websites showing UCH's and Delta's stated 2013 Year End financial information.

United Continental Holdings, Inc. - Investor Relations - Investor Relations
Delta Air Lines, Inc. - Investor Relations

Salaries and Related Costs - UCH 23.3% of Total OE/Delta 22.5% (Within 0.8% of each other, not the huge disparity that is generally inferred when discussing our "high cost structure")

nopac6

Nonsense! He's not cutting special deals, he's getting the CPO to help him with situations that fall through the cracks, i.e. that aren't specifically addressed in the CBA. CPO's that help pilots with unusual situations (especially family situations) are to be appreciated, not criticized.

You're right that the company is forcing us to grieve everything in order to get them to abide by the CBA but Todd's getting help from his CPO does NOT undermine those efforts.

hopeSales

All the things he claimed to qualify the EWR CP as a GREAT PILOT ADVOCATE are simple administrative task and could have been handled by a Flight Manager or the PSC. It indicates that he went outside the contract to get a special deal for himself and this is his way of payback to the CP.

Toddnel

That's the point, your worthless Flight Manager program doesn't work. There were no special deals cut nor was I given anything outside what anyone else is entitled to. I suppose I could have started the grievance process and spent twice the amount of time and effort to resolve what should have been handled by an office secretary, instead I made one phone call and all was fixed.

It never ceases to amaze me how difficult some of you folks make things just for the sake of making things difficult. I have been a union member my entire career, always paid my dues and spent my time volunteering during various rallies back on the CALALPA days. I am not going outside the contract, nor am I undermining the efforts of ALPA. I understand that a good majority of all United pilots don't think the way a few of you do but really, grow up, put on your big boy panties and stop whining. You're a professional, you can wipe your own backside once and awhile.

My only point was that there are good Chief Pilots and not so good ones. Mike is a good one. If you don't like him, great. You are entitled to your opinion. But, you are not entitled to attack my integrity or my status as a union member.

Toddnel

United does have a HUGE cost problem. We brought in more revenue than Delta last year but made 1.7 Billion less. That is a major cost problem. But, our costs are from the giant middle management harem in Chicago, our quarterly IT failures and our complete loss of control in operations.

When you have non-current pilots sitting at home on full pay for months at a time because of simulator scheduling, you waste money. When you meltdown in scheduling and have to cover it with senior and junior manning every week, you waste money. When you have a employees that sit next to each other in Chicago but they have to communicate by email through each other's supervisors, you will fail.

We have a cost problem but it is not the salaries of our crews or the fact our front line employees aren't working hard enough. It's 100% Willis Tower related.

catIIIc

+1 Todd and hopefully management gets it, because they can't cry foul on our contract as ours is pretty much even with DAL's.

SpecialTracking

Did your problem arise to the level where other pilots where being affected over the same issue?

mccurtool

I agree 100%. Just get tired of every manager talking about "our high cost structure" without giving specific details of where we are not in line with our peers. They throw around our rising CASM all the time, but fail to note that in the year end report it was listed at 1.2% yoy
(Less than inflation).

It would be refreshing to hear more about specific underperformance (the bad news) and the numbers behind them, instead of big picture generalities and specific data chosen to fit their agreed upon narrative.