At least you get the argument mbav8r. I argue that Westjet isn’t a true low cost airline. But uses that definition to pay its employees below standard. It uses the “low cost” label to make us believe we can’t afford Min Credit, trip rigs, night pay, nav pay, YOS etc.
It costs the pilots to work at Westjet!
You guys are out to lunch..you really think that your MEC should be negotiating things like nav and night pay for you and you're currently below Canadian standards? You should demand a signing bonus too while you're at it.
At least you get the argument mbav8r. I argue that Westjet isn’t a true low cost airline. But uses that definition to pay its employees below standard. It uses the “low cost” label to make us believe we can’t afford Min Credit, trip rigs, night pay, nav pay, YOS etc.
It costs the pilots to work at Westjet!
You guys are out to lunch..you really think that your MEC should be negotiating things like nav and night pay for you and you're currently below Canadian standards? You should demand a signing bonus too while you're at it.
If pilots are so unhappy, the simple answer is to quit!! There are so many super awesome pilot jobs out there, that you should be hired instantly?? If large amounts of your were to quit and move on to a better paying job, then that would be the best thing ever for the remaining pilots? Or if you are such experts on how to run an airline, go start one!
Well, I should have kept my big fat mouth shut! I just heard this morning that late yesterday the ALPA negotiators sent a letter to the WJ negotiating team adding a proposal requesting permission to attach orange stickers to WJ property, specifically the clipboards placed in the FD to which OFPs are attached. Additionally, ALPA is requesting that WJ revise the existing Evacuation checklist so that the final line is to read:
This will ensure that the crew will be able to contact the relevant ALPA authorities once the crew and passengers are safely away from the aircraft at an assembly point.
My source, high up within WJ leadership ranks, is telling me that when ALPA and WJ next meet, the company is planning to deny ALPA's two requests, but will instead suggest that ALPA have its members simply program the ALPA emergency contact number into their phones. Everyone wins!
I thought I could access the number through the app, but when I realized that didn’t work, I programmed it into my phone. Problem solved. Don’t care about the orange stickers on the clipboard. They could show up on every clipboard, or disappear completely and it would make no difference to me. However, I’m a big proponent of the other sticker I’m finding lately.
WeedPro2000 wrote: ↑Mon Mar 26, 2018 8:13 am
Well, I should have kept my big fat mouth shut! I just heard this morning that late yesterday the ALPA negotiators sent a letter to the WJ negotiating team adding a proposal requesting permission to attach orange stickers to WJ property, specifically the clipboards placed in the FD to which OFPs are attached. Additionally, ALPA is requesting that WJ revise the existing Evacuation checklist so that the final line is to read:
This will ensure that the crew will be able to contact the relevant ALPA authorities once the crew and passengers are safely away from the aircraft at an assembly point.
My source, high up within WJ leadership ranks, is telling me that when ALPA and WJ next meet, the company is planning to deny ALPA's two requests, but will instead suggest that ALPA have its members simply program the ALPA emergency contact number into their phones. Everyone wins!
John, if you haven’t noticed, you tend to post in order to make light of your actions or to joke about serious issues.
It’s a sign that you don’t have a supportive argument, just the fact you need to get the last word in. Quite sad.
Also to note and to answer another post. I like my job at Westjet, but that doesn’t mean I should accept below industry standard compensation and work rules. We are trying to bring the group up.
Hugh Jasshole wrote: ↑Sun Mar 25, 2018 5:11 pm
If pilots are so unhappy, the simple answer is to quit!! There are so many super awesome pilot jobs out there, that you should be hired instantly?? If large amounts of your were to quit and move on to a better paying job, then that would be the best thing ever for the remaining pilots? Or if you are such experts on how to run an airline, go start one!
Hugh Jasshole wrote: ↑Sun Mar 25, 2018 5:11 pm
If pilots are so unhappy, the simple answer is to quit!! There are so many super awesome pilot jobs out there, that you should be hired instantly?? If large amounts of your were to quit and move on to a better paying job, then that would be the best thing ever for the remaining pilots? Or if you are such experts on how to run an airline, go start one!
Unfortunately you don’t get it.
Give him credit for at least getting his handle correct
WeedPro2000 wrote: ↑Sun Mar 25, 2018 1:43 pm
I forgot to mention my Orange Sticker Club. Members receive a poster sized membership with spaces for ten orange stickers. For every ten stickers redeemed, the member will receive a free copy of the forthcoming German language non-fiction bestseller Ich Habe Mich Geschwüpt (loosely translated in English as I Schwooped Myself) wherein the author the describes how he ate too much BS at the ALPA buffet and forgot the old saying "der Spatz in der Hand ist besser als die Taube auf dem Dach."
88 days.
That's funny, honestly makes me laugh. But your ranting has me thinking an east coast saying "you're a bubble off plumb" no translation required.
Speaking of BS I have a few great books you may like: the epic "encore, don't worry we're just voting in the concept of a regional" or the classic "let's give up our options". Who could forget the lovable tale of “unsustainable, you lose your 10 year passes" followed by the children's tale “100 evps on a wall” that one you can sing, it's quite catchy.
Speaking of catchy I hear we’re making a movie, a spoof of a Dani Devito movie entitled “throw the culture from the train". I also hear recent rumors of a remake about DB Cooper.
Jokes aside you should be working for, not against your fellow pilots trying to improve your life.
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The feet you step on today might be attached to the ass you're kissing tomorrow.
Chase lifestyle not metal.
WeedPro2000 wrote: ↑Mon Mar 26, 2018 8:13 am
Well, I should have kept my big fat mouth shut! I just heard this morning that late yesterday the ALPA negotiators sent a letter to the WJ negotiating team adding a proposal requesting permission to attach orange stickers to WJ property, specifically the clipboards placed in the FD to which OFPs are attached. Additionally, ALPA is requesting that WJ revise the existing Evacuation checklist so that the final line is to read:
This will ensure that the crew will be able to contact the relevant ALPA authorities once the crew and passengers are safely away from the aircraft at an assembly point.
My source, high up within WJ leadership ranks, is telling me that when ALPA and WJ next meet, the company is planning to deny ALPA's two requests, but will instead suggest that ALPA have its members simply program the ALPA emergency contact number into their phones. Everyone wins!
John
Your German is truly embarrassing . Pls stop or take a course .... if you have taken a course , you truly wasted your time and money . Maybe try French ? Please stop . You don't speak German and you probably never will ...
Some people need to be involved. It doesn't matter how they feel or what they deep down believe, they just want to be a part of something.
Some have a mouth that gets them in a tiny bit of trouble and come online with their tail between their legs admitting they need the resources of a real/professional union.
Others then realize their past antics probably exclude them from participating in any meaningful dialogue moving forward so they revert back to the other side who will take any help they can get and offer the feeling of inclusion in a bigger cause. Kind of like the little brother in the neighborhood. Tags along hoping to one day be included, and when he is included, believes it is sincere whereas in reality, all the older kids want is the younger, unknowing kid to do their dirty work.
Some, are all of those.
I hope no one ever needs that orange sticker but we do deserve to have access to it. There was so much fanfare around those silly WJPA lanyards (that didn't even connect you to a pilot!!!) and no matter what stripe you wore, people had them on their body. I'm guessing the company would say no to an ALPA lanyard as well. Double standards.
Recent incidents, and even recent movies will demonstrate pilots will be thrown under the bus first chance given to an aircraft manufacture, or airline executive. We ARE replaceable commodities within an airline that cost way less than a stock market hit of bad news brings a company (see facebook). No pilot shows up to work thinking they are going to have a bad day. Shit happens. If it does, I want people in my corner.
We are all going to see countless executives and CEO's come and go in our careers. We outlive most of them at a single company (career wise). No one is going to remember you as the man who tried to stop ALPA when shit hits the fan.
Which is worse?? Someone placing and removing ALPA orange labels or ALPA members removing stickers with serial numbers off the front cockpit windows???? Pretty low if you ask me, I think everyone needs to grow up!
Blue42 wrote: ↑Tue Mar 27, 2018 8:31 pm
Which is worse?? Someone placing and removing ALPA orange labels or ALPA members removing stickers with serial numbers off the front cockpit windows???? Pretty low if you ask me, I think everyone needs to grow up!
Care to elaborate. I am pretty sure something as important as a serial number would be etched on, stickers are hardly a permanent method of identification for a critical component such as a cockpit window. I smell BS.
A awhile back I asked an ALPA rep, "How do we unite this pilot group? How do we bridge the divide amongst our pilots?" His response, "Don't worry, the company will do that for us..."
Yes. Yes they will.
Unity now more than ever, brothers and sisters! This will be resolved, but ONLY under a unified pilot group. Regardless of the current optics and rhetoric from the VERY small minority, we are in the drivers seat.
.80@410 wrote: ↑Tue Mar 27, 2018 10:26 pm
Maybe WJPILOT facts could explain this new low:
Posted for SWOOP .. ( sorry the header is missing )
Foreign pilots. Contract pilots. 1200$ hourly .
Discuss. I'm too angry to say anything productive.
Technically it's a new high @ 1200/hour. Except it's 1200USD/day, for 21 days. Not exactly long term staffing.
It's the point tbaylx, regardless how you and Weedpro (JS) try to justify / make light / brush it off .
It's A big fat slap in the face to current wj pilots :
Foreign pilots welcome ! at wages higher than we pay our current pilots !
So first Swoop isn't paying its pilots enough and it's bringing down the industry, now they're paying a few pilots more than WestJet mainline for a few weeks and that's also a problem?
That contract is open to Canadian pilots too I assume, so not necessarily foreign.
Technically it's a new high @ 1200/hour. Except it's 1200USD/day, for 21 days. Not exactly long term staffing.
It's the point tbaylx, regardless how you and Weedpro (JS) try to justify / make light / brush it off .
It's A big fat slap in the face to current wj pilots :
Foreign pilots welcome ! at wages higher than we pay our current pilots !
So first Swoop isn't paying its pilots enough and it's bringing down the industry, now they're paying a few pilots more than WestJet mainline for a few weeks and that's also a problem?
That contract is open to Canadian pilots too I assume, so not necessarily foreign.
tbaylx wrote: ↑Wed Mar 28, 2018 6:29 amSo first Swoop isn't paying its pilots enough and it's bringing down the industry, now they're paying a few pilots more than WestJet mainline for a few weeks and that's also a problem?
That contract is open to Canadian pilots too I assume, so not necessarily foreign.
tbaylx, with all due respect, it is a problem. A very big problem, which can not just be glossed over. Yes, it is about pay and WJ pilots desire to maintain fair market value but it also goes much deeper than that.
I'm sure you can agree, especially after reviewing the training contract pay, that the company can afford to pay appropriate wages. So it begs the question - what is this all about? Is it about saving a few shekels on pilot pay or is about circumventing certified labour? I, like many many other WJ pilot, choose the latter.
This IS NOT about saving a few bucks on pilot salaries but rather an attempt by a multi-billion dollar corporation to undermine, by-pass and avoid good faith bargaining with organized labour.
I would say this is about as polarizing as the swoop announcement. They would rather hire unknown pilots to train more unknown pilots then just pay us to do the job. It's going to get very interesting quickly.
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The feet you step on today might be attached to the ass you're kissing tomorrow.
Chase lifestyle not metal.
I am not at Westjet. I have been in an Association for 39 years.
Thoughts from the sidelines.
Your need for a Union is two fold. Protection from an Employer who is not always completely fair in its dealings AND protection from your fellow pilot who might sell you out for personal gain.
( i.e. 243 pilots on layoff in 1993 and some greedy pilots flying 90, 100, 115 hours a month seriously delaying the recall of Other Brother Pilots. ) A. C. 1992-94.
Flying for cheap contributes next to nothing to a Companies bottom line.At the peak of pay rates the cost of flight crew was about 2.7 cents on the company dollar. With the decay of wages over the last 30 years, it is now less than 2 cents on the dollar. Flying for 10% or 30% less is just plain DUMB. You just end up giving up your salary for some Management bonus. It is false to think it contributes anything significant to the health of your Company. Everything that contributes to the cost of running an Airline has gone up a lot. Buying or renting A.C. ; fuel ; taxes and user fees are out of control! Canadian Landing fees, fuel tax, security tax, etc. The cost of fees and taxes on a ticket in Canada is an outrage, NOT the cost of it's pilots.
Management will try to create upset, pilot disunity and spread misinformation. Their job is to get your labor for as cheap as possible. IT is JUST BUSINESS! Nothing new here.
LAST and most important. Fly safe! Try to keep this discussion out of Flight Planning, off the Flight Deck. Save it for the layover or if it is clearly divisive, leave it alone. Politics, Religion and first contract Union talk should not interfere with safe flying.
I wish you all the best, it is a tough road but the rewards will last you all a lifetime!
A limited number of pilots ( perhaps as low as 10% ) can and will cause considerable damage to your Union in trying to get you the best deal. Just accept it as a reality.
