SWOOP - A New Hires Future

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CaptainHaddock
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Re: SWOOP - A New Hires Future

Post by CaptainHaddock »

Airbrake wrote: Tue Mar 12, 2019 3:47 pm Image

Me Greenway has stated on LinkedIn that external applicants are now welcomed. I can only guess that the internal applicants were lower than the requirement.
The posted attachment from Mr. Greenway makes me physically ill. Boasting that you get on the WestJet seniority list if you come to Swoop. It’s like he’s gleefully running a Bowie knife down the underbelly of WestJet. 🤢🤮
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goingnowherefast
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Re: SWOOP - A New Hires Future

Post by goingnowherefast »

Looks like WJ management is finally figuring out there's a pilot shortage, that they shot themselves in both feet, and are too stubborn to admit their mistake.
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SwoopStar
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Re: SWOOP - A New Hires Future

Post by SwoopStar »

As an update, WestJet and SWOOP have separated recruitment. SWOOP remains confident and boasts that they've received a "strong response" regarding recruitment.

Below are a few thoughts for new recruits.

The 50 or so pilots who wish to bid back to WestJet will NOT be allowed on the next bid. Further, the Company will uphold the two year position freeze when a CA downgrades to FO. This likely means that many SWOOP CAs will NOT bid back to WestJet FO. This will limit, if not eliminate, the DEC opportunities.

Last year, WestJet delayed the arrival of the last 3 aircraft from spring 2019 to fall 2019. WestJet has found that mainline can make more money off a 738 in the summer than SWOOP. SWOOP recently cancelled the YEG-OAK route and substituted YLW-LAS. I suspect this latest move shows how limited SWOOP is allowed to grow to avoid overlap with mainline.

Enerjet/Indigo's plans are still unknown but it is suspected that they'll fly between primary cities, like YYZ-YVR, given the size of their A321NEOs. This will necessitate SWOOPs redeployment from YHM/YEG to elsewhere to chase Enerjet/Indigo. The consequence is either more deadheads and overnights, or a forced moved of which only 8000$ is covered, as per LOU. Employment as a junior will be precarious given the flexibility SWOOP requires to remain resilient.

With 300+ employees to support and only 6 aircraft, SWOOP is in a difficult position. Costs must be saved at every opportunity, including using extreme interpretations of the poorly written LOU. Every SWOOP pilot diligently reviews each paystub.

For example, a pilot on reserve receives a 4.0 credit. One pilot was called out on a multiday pairing with the first day being a deadhead. Deadheads are paid at a rate of 1/2 the length of the flight. This pilot lost the original 4.0hrs credit and received the lesser 1-2hrs credit for the DH. There are multiple more examples, all of them being grieved.
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Last edited by SwoopStar on Mon Apr 22, 2019 10:34 am, edited 3 times in total.
pacman007
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Re: SWOOP - A New Hires Future

Post by pacman007 »

make no mistake enerjet is not going after swoop......they will do directly after mainline Westjet and AC. They will be what Westjet used to be...swoop will be left in yxx and yhm and lose money for ever. Westjet is huge trouble I think. what is Westjet going to do if enerjet flies yvr- yyz? put swoop in it and canablize there maininle product? or just reduce fairs and loose money? the good news in all this is swoop will go away and Westjet pilots will have a new company, based out of yyc, to go work for! all this adds up to major pain for Westjet...
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Demeter
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Re: SWOOP - A New Hires Future

Post by Demeter »

Oh brother. Thanks for the business update! :smt008
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Re: SWOOP - A New Hires Future

Post by aerobod »

pacman007 wrote: Sat Mar 23, 2019 12:04 pm make no mistake enerjet is not going after swoop......they will do directly after mainline Westjet and AC. They will be what Westjet used to be...swoop will be left in yxx and yhm and lose money for ever. Westjet is huge trouble I think. what is Westjet going to do if enerjet flies yvr- yyz? put swoop in it and canablize there maininle product? or just reduce fairs and loose money? the good news in all this is swoop will go away and Westjet pilots will have a new company, based out of yyc, to go work for! all this adds up to major pain for Westjet...
As YYZ/YVR return flights compared with YHM/YXX automatically incur a cost penalty of approximately $40 per passenger (Higher AIF and airport charges), with everything else being equal between Swoop and EnerJet in terms of ULCC costs, Swoop will still attract people with a return cost including taxes and fees of less than $300 (as low as $247 for some dates in May at the moment), when EnerJet has to charge $40 more for the same margin, assuming they have access to “cheap” A320neos from the Ingigo Partners 430 aircraft order, as opposed to having to fund more expensive purchases themselves.

WestJet and AC already have more hub traffic through YYZ and YVR than direct passengers, EnerJet and Swoop won’t be able to tap that market if they stay as ULCCs with point to point traffic only, if they start hubbing they will incur ULC level costs and lose their cost advantage.

WestJet / Swoop has been evolving to specifically take on ULCC competition, so far Flair hasn’t made much of a dent in their business, EnerJet backed by Indigo Partners is much better funded, but has no magic formula that WestJet / Swoop doesn’t already have access to. ULCCs don’t have many operations out of major airports, Ryanair only operates a fraction of their flights out of major airports such as FRA, so EnerJet may have to abandon major airports in time to be cost competitive with other ULCC competition operating from low cost airports.
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Re: SWOOP - A New Hires Future

Post by CaptainHaddock »

No need to go into details swoopstar

The majority of Swoop pilots can’t wait to get out, the majority of pilots that can go to Swoop (WestJet FO’s and Encore Pilots) want nothing to do with it. It’s a pay cut from WJ right seat to Swoop left seat (unless you are very junior), and it is far worse working conditions then they have at WJ and Encore.
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yvrpilot82
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Re: SWOOP - A New Hires Future

Post by yvrpilot82 »

Another update. While WJ pilots have to wait an extra week this month for their schedule due to the MAX issues. All employee groups travelling for business are now eligible for an upgrade to business class. With the only excluded group from this being "deadheading Westjet pilots".
FAs can be in Business, pilots stuck in middle seats in the back end.
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Re: SWOOP - A New Hires Future

Post by Kaykay »

yvrpilot82 wrote: Sun Mar 24, 2019 4:03 pm Another update. While WJ pilots have to wait an extra week this month for their schedule due to the MAX issues. All employee groups travelling for business are now eligible for an upgrade to business class. With the only excluded group from this being "deadheading Westjet pilots".
FAs can be in Business, pilots stuck in middle seats in the back end.
Ouch. Bit of a slap in the face.
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Re: SWOOP - A New Hires Future

Post by daedalusx »

yvrpilot82 wrote: Sun Mar 24, 2019 4:03 pm Another update. While WJ pilots have to wait an extra week this month for their schedule due to the MAX issues. All employee groups travelling for business are now eligible for an upgrade to business class. With the only excluded group from this being "deadheading Westjet pilots".
FAs can be in Business, pilots stuck in middle seats in the back end.
Sounds like a great way to increase the amount of pilots booking off for fatigue.
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Re: SWOOP - A New Hires Future

Post by Blue42 »

yvrpilot82 wrote: Sun Mar 24, 2019 4:03 pm Another update. While WJ pilots have to wait an extra week this month for their schedule due to the MAX issues. All employee groups travelling for business are now eligible for an upgrade to business class. With the only excluded group from this being "deadheading Westjet pilots".
FAs can be in Business, pilots stuck in middle seats in the back end.
Incorrect. As the only aircraft that has business is the 787.....

As per the new contract, DH pilots get the “premium cabin”. Not sure what FAs have for language in the frozen agreement. Our contract is still in a “draft”, but I’m sure all the tools are being put to good use....
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Re: SWOOP - A New Hires Future

Post by Demeter »

The YVR in his handle says it all :P
Back to watching the usuals in the therapy group chat on the Alpa forum :rolleyes:
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Re: SWOOP - A New Hires Future

Post by iNCApacitated »

It's been four months since the start of the thread with its summary of the contract.

Anyone willing to share what the rostering has been like ? Is it still 18/19 days of work in a 30/31 day month ? :?:
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Re: SWOOP - A New Hires Future

Post by CaptainHaddock »

Silence definitely doesn’t mean improvement. Not one item of complaint has changed. Yes 18/19 days, same money,uniforms/ benefits/poor management.
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goingnowherefast
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Re: SWOOP - A New Hires Future

Post by goingnowherefast »

How are the staffing levels? More quitters than applicants still?
Can only blame pilots for ACMI lease costs so long before something changes.
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Re: SWOOP - A New Hires Future

Post by DropTanks »

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Last edited by DropTanks on Wed Feb 05, 2020 11:17 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: SWOOP - A New Hires Future

Post by George Taylor »

If the company doesn't kill Swoop I fear an "incident" will. Not one pilot I've talked to would even DH on them.
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Re: SWOOP - A New Hires Future

Post by SwoopStar »

iNCApacitated wrote: Tue Apr 16, 2019 5:19 pm It's been four months since the start of the thread with its summary of the contract.

Anyone willing to share what the rostering has been like ? Is it still 18/19 days of work in a 30/31 day month ? :?:
Nothing has changed. SWOOP's LOU is in the process of being reformatted to match the rest of the CA however there will be no material changes, just clarity in the existing language.

As for the schedule, expect MAX days (18/19) due to RESERVE as a filler. Further, SWOOP has an exceptional high ratio of red eye flying. (See my above post titled SWOOP'S geography problem.) For example, the majority of YXX-YHM flights are red eyes. The red eye flying destroys the productivity of pairings. YXX-YHM is covered by a 9hr 3 day with a 36hr sit in YXX. LAS and YEG are red eye returns, which are terribly fatiguing and experience a high number of book offs. As everyone is blocked to 18/19 days, there is little availability for OT coverage and almost no one picks up a red eye return in OT. Thus, SWOOP leans heavily on RESERVE for coverage and fills schedules to MAX days with RESERVE.

MAX days will likely continue for the foreseeable future as SWOOP aims for 15hr utilization on their new 738s. Coupled with Canada's geography problem, this can only be accomplished with red eyes.

For colour, RESERVE is issued as an AM or PM 12hr shift however a pairing can be assigned with a checkin within 2hrs after your reserve period. For example, AM reserve is 0300-1500. SWOOP at 1459 can assign you a 14hr duty day with a checkin at 1700, ending at 0700 the next day. The EXPECTATION is to show up fit to fly for 14hrs and then able to extend 3hrs for unforeseen if required.

This EXPECTATION is also extended to any day of your scheduled flying. In the past, a crew operating an afternoon 1500 checkin, short YHM-YWG-YHM turn, was then directed to operate an IROP YHM-YHZ-YHM afterwards with a checkout of 0400.

None of this will change in the next 4 YEARS, the length of the CA. And as Drop Tanks stated, none of the WestJet pilots care to give up anything for improvements at SWOOP. There are 1600 pilots flying at mainline and 80 at SWOOP, all of which are junior or OTS captains.

My personal opinion, most here at SWOOP feel it will be short lived. If you're coming here as a DEC, you may find yourself at mainline in 2 years as a FO waiting 10+ years for an upgrade. SWOOP is still an experiment and still a risk. Despite how deep WestJet's pockets are, WestJet will NEVER continue losing money on any initiative. Look how quick WestJet cancelled Mexico City last year.
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Last edited by SwoopStar on Mon Apr 22, 2019 10:19 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: SWOOP - A New Hires Future

Post by SwoopStar »

Also, please do not think of SWOOP/WestJet in terms of Rouge/Air Canada.

The business model of SWOOP is fundamentally different than WestJet with no overlap or connectivity to prevent cannibalization.

More important, the collective agreements' scope clause prevents any other airline engaging in a business relation with mainline other than a CPA with jets under 76 seats or turboprops under 78 seats.

SWOOP will live or die on its own merits.
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Re: SWOOP - A New Hires Future

Post by DropTanks »

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