DEC Westjet Swoop

[Airbrake]

Do the westjet pilots have any scope protection in their contract? Can they buy another airline operating the same equipment and keep the companies and seniority lists separate? I was in on the swg town hall. They said the airlines would be ran separately, not that there would be separate pilot groups.

Yes

[cloak]

Pilot wage is only one of the cost factors, but the whole LCC / Legacy operating model is not compatible with a ULCC operating model.
CASM is based on seat density, aircraft type, specific airport in a given vicinity, time of day, airport processes, equipment configuration, etc. Seat density alone accounts for 9% CASM difference between WS Mainline and Swoop, but if Swoop picked a MAX 200 over a MAX 8 they could widen that gap to 14% with 199 seats and still stay with 4 flight attendants.

Lowest CASM wins for profitability when ticket price has to be matched to customers shopping on price for an equivalent flight route.

Ryanair as the gold standard of cost control in ULCCs consistently hits ex-fuel CASK below EUR 0.025 (equivalent to CASM of CAD$0.058) using mainly -800s with some MAX 8s and is generally the most profitable of the top 10 airlines by passenger revenue miles. They operate the same equipment as WS mainline at about 60% of the ex-fuel CASM.

WS mainline does not operate in any way close to a ULCC, Swoop does. Change in operating model throughout the whole airline are necessary to hit the aggressive ULCC CASMs.

Few informative posts, so thank you. Some are under the misconception that if Swoop was not created its flying would have been absorbed by the mainline, which is not case. Its flying would have simply been absorbed by others in that market segment. Swoop is a way for the WestJet group to capture some of that revenue. It is important for pilots to know the market in which they operate and have reasonable expectations as not to price themselves out of that market, e.g. Skyservice. As WestJet transitions into more of “legacy” carrier, it would be ok for it to compete with legacy carrier wowcon for mainline, as for what it will look like for Swoop will be the result of negotiations to be sure, but it’s important to have reasonable expectations and be flexible, possibly to set a ratio to mainline?

Speaking of reasonable expectations, bidding is usually for new and open positions and barring a reduction bid, an arbitrary “rebid” of sorts just because a few may have had a change of heart is tantamount to constructive dismissal since it likely forces some to downgrade and take a pay cut. It appears that a few are fixated on the past, rewriting history and hoping that eliminating Swoop altogether will bring back the “old glory days”! In reality though, that is not the case as mentioned above and will actually result in permanent loss of that flying. Instead of fixating on the past, it might be better like the vast majority to focus on the future and ways to create new opportunities to lift the entire group, especially in light of today’s announcement.

[pacman007]

Pilot wage is only one of the cost factors, but the whole LCC / Legacy operating model is not compatible with a ULCC operating model.
CASM is based on seat density, aircraft type, specific airport in a given vicinity, time of day, airport processes, equipment configuration, etc. Seat density alone accounts for 9% CASM difference between WS Mainline and Swoop, but if Swoop picked a MAX 200 over a MAX 8 they could widen that gap to 14% with 199 seats and still stay with 4 flight attendants.

Lowest CASM wins for profitability when ticket price has to be matched to customers shopping on price for an equivalent flight route.

Ryanair as the gold standard of cost control in ULCCs consistently hits ex-fuel CASK below EUR 0.025 (equivalent to CASM of CAD$0.058) using mainly -800s with some MAX 8s and is generally the most profitable of the top 10 airlines by passenger revenue miles. They operate the same equipment as WS mainline at about 60% of the ex-fuel CASM.

WS mainline does not operate in any way close to a ULCC, Swoop does. Change in operating model throughout the whole airline are necessary to hit the aggressive ULCC CASMs.

Few informative posts, so thank you. Some are under the misconception that if Swoop was not created its flying would have been absorbed by the mainline, which is not case. Its flying would have simply been absorbed by others in that market segment. Swoop is a way for the WestJet group to capture some of that revenue. It is important for pilots to know the market in which they operate and have reasonable expectations as not to price themselves out of that market, e.g. Skyservice. As WestJet transitions into more of “legacy” carrier, it would be ok for it to compete with legacy carrier wowcon for mainline, as for what it will look like for Swoop will be the result of negotiations to be sure, but it’s important to have reasonable expectations and be flexible, possibly to set a ratio to mainline and over time reduce the gap.

Speaking of reasonable expectations, bidding is usually for new and open positions and barring a reduction bid, an arbitrary “rebid” of sorts just because a few may have had a change of heart is tantamount to constructive dismissal since it likely forces some to downgrade and take a pay cut. It appears that a few are fixated on the past, rewriting history and hoping that eliminating Swoop altogether somehow will bring back the “old glory days”! In reality though, that is not the case as mentioned above and will actually result in permanent loss of that flying. Instead of fixating on the past, it might be better like the vast majority to focus on the future and ways to create new opportunities and lift the entire group, especially in light of today’s announcement.

Well in light of today’s announcement how do swoop pilots feel of the unions were to merge lists? Then all sunwing pilots will
Be ahead of swoop pilots making it virtually impossible to get to mainline. With encore pilots and now sunwing pilots which higher seniority.? Hope it works out for everyone involved. Crazy times

[cloak]

You assume that everyone wants the exact same thing!

[DHC-1 Jockey]

Well in light of today’s announcement how do swoop pilots feel of the unions were to merge lists? Then all sunwing pilots will
Be ahead of swoop pilots making it virtually impossible to get to mainline. With encore pilots and now sunwing pilots which higher seniority.? Hope it works out for everyone involved. Crazy times

What about what Sunwing pilots think? I definitely don't want date-of-hire. I don't even want a merged list and I think most Sunwing pilots don't want a merged list either. There's hundreds of WJ pilots that have been there since the beginning who would trump even the #1 pilot at Sunwing.

As someone else suggested, a weighted merge would be better (if a merge happened at all). For example, if you're 20% up the list at Sunwing, you land 20% up on the newly-combined list. If you're 50% up the list at Sunwing, you land 50% up the newly-combined list, and so on.

That's really the most equitable way without penalizing the Sunwing, Swoop or Encore pilots, but I'd prefer just to stay in my sandbox and let the WJ/Swoop/Encore list debacle deal with itself. Don't drag us Sunwing pilots into that mess.

[boeingboy]

I guess I'm holding to the thinnest of straws that they keep it separate.

I see this as serious competition to Rouge.

[CaptainHaddock]

The WestJet Pilot Agreement part of the Scope clause spells out all revenue flying operated by ‘the Company’ will be exclusively flown by pilots subject to the agreement. That agreement encompasses WJ airlines and Swoop pilots (with a heavily carved out LOU). I don’t think the SunWing pilots will continue to operate indefinitely as a separate entity, they will eventually be under the WJ agreement (whatever it becomes next year).
There are a lot of moving pieces at WJ currently, with this now added. We have 9 Max’s showing up this year, another 6 at Swoop and a dedicated cargo diversion launching this spring. I’m not sure of the average tenure of a Sunwing pilot, the most junior YYZ WJ CA is currently 10 years, Swoop is probably 3 years-but all the WJ pilots are back now and WJ is hiring for all three airlines currently, so it will continue to drop. I am not familiar with the SunWing contract, but would guess it falls considerably above Swoops (LOU), and somewhere a bit below WJ.

[DHC-1 Jockey]

I’m not sure of the average tenure of a Sunwing pilot, the most junior YYZ WJ CA is currently 10 years, Swoop is probably 3 years-but all the WJ pilots are back now and WJ is hiring for all three airlines currently, so it will continue to drop.

Most senior SWG CAPT is 2004 DOH, most junior is 2018.

Exactly 50% up the list is a 2016 DOH.

About 75% of the Sunwing list is less than 10 years of service, and there's about 470 pilots on the list.

[Bede]

Well in light of today’s announcement how do swoop pilots feel of the unions were to merge lists? Then all sunwing pilots will
Be ahead of swoop pilots making it virtually impossible to get to mainline. With encore pilots and now sunwing pilots which higher seniority.? Hope it works out for everyone involved. Crazy times

What about what Sunwing pilots think? I definitely don't want date-of-hire. I don't even want a merged list and I think most Sunwing pilots don't want a merged list either. There's hundreds of WJ pilots that have been there since the beginning who would trump even the #1 pilot at Sunwing.

As someone else suggested, a weighted merge would be better (if a merge happened at all). For example, if you're 20% up the list at Sunwing, you land 20% up on the newly-combined list. If you're 50% up the list at Sunwing, you land 50% up the newly-combined list, and so on.

That's really the most equitable way without penalizing the Sunwing, Swoop or Encore pilots, but I'd prefer just to stay in my sandbox and let the WJ/Swoop/Encore list debacle deal with itself. Don't drag us Sunwing pilots into that mess.

Those are really good points. Would you want to keep the SWG contract or get the WJ one?

[Oldcommercialpilot]

[/quote]
A weighted merge would be better (if a merge happened at all). For example, if you're 20% up the list at Sunwing, you land 20% up on the newly-combined list. If you're 50% up the list at Sunwing, you land 50% up the newly-combined list, and so on.

That's really the most equitable way.
[/quote]


Is that right? Most equitable way you say?
So… what you’re saying is that if you’re in the top 1% of Sunwing pilots - hired in 2015ish then the most equitable thing is that you get to parachute into the top 1% of the WestJet seniority list and bump out a senior skipper on the 787 that has been at WestJet since 1996… 2 decades before Sunwing was even conceived?

Give me a break.

[ALPApolicy]

The merger committees are free to use whatever method they want, including mixing DOH for certain ranges and a ratio method for other ranges.

[Oldcommercialpilot]

Well, I’m sure that will prove to be true. But I can’t help but wonder what method the merger committees consisting of Sunwing’s 460 Unifor pilots pitted against WestJet’s 2241-strong ALPA pilots will come up with. Somehow I doubt it will be a hokey seniority ratio metric that ignores 2 decades worth of seniority.

Time will tell I suppose. Or - perhaps more appropriately - Kaplan will tell.

[ads-b]

Alpa policy seems level headed and correct. Long term it’s a great deal for everyone.

Old commercial pilot you forgot the first 11 years of Sunwing. Maybe I’m the old one?

Ads

[ALPApolicy]

Well, I’m sure that will prove to be true. But I can’t help but wonder what method the merger committees consisting of Sunwing’s 460 Unifor pilots pitted against WestJet’s 2241-strong ALPA pilots will come up with. Somehow I doubt it will be a hokey seniority ratio metric that ignores 2 decades worth of seniority.

Time will tell I suppose. Or - perhaps more appropriately - Kaplan will tell.

Do you know for sure that the SunWing pilots will be merged with all WJ group company pilots, including Encore pilots? Or would they be merged with only the WJ mainline and Swoop pilots who are in one bargaining unit (Encore having its own bargaining unit)?

[Sharklasers]

Well in light of today’s announcement how do swoop pilots feel of the unions were to merge lists? Then all sunwing pilots will
Be ahead of swoop pilots making it virtually impossible to get to mainline. With encore pilots and now sunwing pilots which higher seniority.? Hope it works out for everyone involved. Crazy times

What about what Sunwing pilots think? I definitely don't want date-of-hire. I don't even want a merged list and I think most Sunwing pilots don't want a merged list either. There's hundreds of WJ pilots that have been there since the beginning who would trump even the #1 pilot at Sunwing.

As someone else suggested, a weighted merge would be better (if a merge happened at all). For example, if you're 20% up the list at Sunwing, you land 20% up on the newly-combined list. If you're 50% up the list at Sunwing, you land 50% up the newly-combined list, and so on.

That's really the most equitable way without penalizing the Sunwing, Swoop or Encore pilots, but I'd prefer just to stay in my sandbox and let the WJ/Swoop/Encore list debacle deal with itself. Don't drag us Sunwing pilots into that mess.

So purely as an outsider I have to say posting stupid shit like this only serves to get the Westjet pilots all spun up and start throwing out their own crazy ideas like “sunwing pilots to the bottom of the list”. And before you say “well that’s just crazy” the way the Westjet guys will frame Hunters comments about having 350 million dollars in debt at 11 points is that Sunwing was circling the drain and unlikely to survive the downturn without a buyout.
You sound just like when the Transat guys started antagonizing the AC guys on here a couple years back. Asking for 777 manuals and talking about stealing seats and bumping guys out of bases. Your not going to be gifted that much seniority and slide in beside someone with 10-20 more years on property than you so get that out of your head now.

[cloak]

Do you know for sure that the SunWing pilots will be merged with all WJ group company pilots, including Encore pilots? Or would they be merged with only the WJ mainline and Swoop pilots who are in one bargaining unit (Encore having its own bargaining unit)?

Good point, remains to be seen.

The merger committees are free to use whatever method they want, including mixing DOH for certain ranges and a ratio method for other ranges.

Also a good point and probably likely.

[ALPApolicy]

It might be reasonable for WJ pilots to seek a fence around the 787 positions for a limited period of time.

[Oldcommercialpilot]

Well, I’m sure that will prove to be true. But I can’t help but wonder what method the merger committees consisting of Sunwing’s 460 Unifor pilots pitted against WestJet’s 2241-strong ALPA pilots will come up with. Somehow I doubt it will be a hokey seniority ratio metric that ignores 2 decades worth of seniority.

Time will tell I suppose. Or - perhaps more appropriately - Kaplan will tell.

Do you know for sure that the SunWing pilots will be merged with all WJ group company pilots, including Encore pilots? Or would they be merged with only the WJ mainline and Swoop pilots who are in one bargaining unit (Encore having its own bargaining unit)?

Of course I don’t know for sure. But does that detail matter even slightly?

[Oldcommercialpilot]

It might be reasonable for WJ pilots to seek a fence around the 787 positions for a limited period of time.

I don’t disagree. But why would the 787 positions be so sacred as to deserve a fence while other positions are not?
Would a senior YVR or YYC captain not deserve a fence around their position or base? How about the guy that was 1 number short of holding a 787 position? Should his base & rank now be up for grabs?

Anyway… it’s ludicrous to even debate that 787 positions with over a quarter century’s worth of seniority might get displaced by Sunwing pilots. But purely for arguments sake, surely you can see what I’m getting at.

[ALPApolicy]

Well, I’m sure that will prove to be true. But I can’t help but wonder what method the merger committees consisting of Sunwing’s 460 Unifor pilots pitted against WestJet’s 2241-strong ALPA pilots will come up with. Somehow I doubt it will be a hokey seniority ratio metric that ignores 2 decades worth of seniority.

Time will tell I suppose. Or - perhaps more appropriately - Kaplan will tell.

Do you know for sure that the SunWing pilots will be merged with all WJ group company pilots, including Encore pilots? Or would they be merged with only the WJ mainline and Swoop pilots who are in one bargaining unit (Encore having its own bargaining unit)?

Of course I don’t know for sure. But does that detail matter even slightly?

I do believe it does.