AMFA stations

[Kev3188]

Seniority integration is the one thing we should all be concerned about.
What is the McCaskill Bond and how will it take place in this seniority integration?
Will it void out the Kaster decision?

Do we even have a say in this?

http://www.dallasnew...9#ssStory870190

MB provides a framework for resolving integration disputes if both sides can't come to an agreement. Theorhetically you *do* have a say, though with the TWU ATD, who knows?

I honestly don't know if it would void out preceeding rulings like Kasher. Maybe if the ultimate decision is something like straight DOH for everyone it might?

 

[paul1]

1. Mccaskill bond
4. http://www.amfanatio...dment_flier.pdf

 

[Anomaly]

http://www.mondaq.co...illBond Statute

The McCaskill-Bond Amendment clearly provides a "fair and equitable" solution of employee groups affected by the combination of two or more airlines. It dose not state much of the BS written about in these posts. This is simply you outhouse lawyers who suddenly know and can preach law.

The pilots are one group often spoken about in different articles and blogs concerning McCaskill-Bond. They are even the focus on some legal ground work. However, mechanics are not Pilots (Just in case some of you did not realize this). Up until now, there is very little case study that would decide exactly how the M-B Amendment would apply to mechanic groups. Fair and equitable are very big words to ponder.

So I guess this now goes back to the outhouse attorneys on this page. Have fun swamt.

 

[swamt]

http://www.mondaq.co...illBond Statute

The McCaskill-Bond Amendment clearly provides a "fair and equitable" solution of employee groups affected by the combination of two or more airlines. It dose not state much of the BS written about in these posts. This is simply you outhouse lawyers who suddenly know and can preach law.

The pilots are one group often spoken about in different articles and blogs concerning McCaskill-Bond. They are even the focus on some legal ground work. However, mechanics are not Pilots (Just in case some of you did not realize this). Up until now, there is very little case study that would decide exactly how the M-B Amendment would apply to mechanic groups. Fair and equitable are very big words to ponder.

So I guess this now goes back to the outhouse attorneys on this page. Have fun swamt.

The info I have posted is from our nego cmte living thru the law. Did you not think the law wasn't thrown at our nego's faces by the teamsters during our integration nego's with AirTran?? They followed the law, both sides, nego a fair and equitable integration. Both sides saw it fair and equitable by an overwhelming acceptance vote by both sides of well over 85%. All of our union groups had to go thru the same thing (integration nego's). All but one group, represented by the IAM on both sides. Nego's increases in SWA seniority, including pilots, F/A's, dispatch ect... All groups followed The McCaskill-Bond Amendment and nego fair and equitable integration agreements that were all voted on by the memberships of each group from both sides who the majority of all also agreed that they were fair and equitable. The same will be done again if/when there is another purchase, buy-out, or aquired airline by SWA. For those of you who still think followed the law, don't you think we would have been sued by now? How bout the pilots? F/A's? Dispatch? The law was followed gentlemen. Just because some of you out here don't agree with how the results turned out does not mean that the law was not followed. After AA and US merge they too will have to go thru the same thing and trust me, your union attorneys will not allow anyone to not follow the law as they would be sued and end up with drastic results after an arbitrator gets done with them. You guys better be AMFA before a merger, otherwise you guys will be stuck with whatever the TWU desides for you. If you want a say-so in integration nego's you better hope you are AMFA, this will be the only way for the membership to have any input what so ever.

 

[WNMECH]

The info I have posted is from our nego cmte living thru the law. Did you not think the law wasn't thrown at our nego's faces by the teamsters during our integration nego's with AirTran?? They followed the law, both sides, nego a fair and equitable integration. Both sides saw it fair and equitable by an overwhelming acceptance vote by both sides of well over 85%. All of our union groups had to go thru the same thing (integration nego's). All but one group, represented by the IAM on both sides. Nego's increases in SWA seniority, including pilots, F/A's, dispatch ect... All groups followed The McCaskill-Bond Amendment and nego fair and equitable integration agreements that were all voted on by the memberships of each group from both sides who the majority of all also agreed that they were fair and equitable. The same will be done again if/when there is another purchase, buy-out, or aquired airline by SWA. For those of you who still think followed the law, don't you think we would have been sued by now? How bout the pilots? F/A's? Dispatch? The law was followed gentlemen. Just because some of you out here don't agree with how the results turned out does not mean that the law was not followed. After AA and US merge they too will have to go thru the same thing and trust me, your union attorneys will not allow anyone to not follow the law as they would be sued and end up with drastic results after an arbitrator gets done with them. You guys better be AMFA before a merger, otherwise you guys will be stuck with whatever the TWU desides for you. If you want a say-so in integration nego's you better hope you are AMFA, this will be the only way for the membership to have any input what so ever.

As you know SWAMT, SWA dispatchers also followed the law.
They could not come to an agreement so following the law they took it to arbitration.

The arbitrator then decided the fair and equitable thing to do was to award the SWA dispatchers a 4 year boost in seniority over the Airtran dispatchers.
This is the exact same outcome we mechanics reached at the table.
Some outhouse lawyers on these forums think we cheated the AT guys but, an arbitrator following the McCasklll bond legislation, ruled it to be the most fair and equitable thing to do in the case of the dispatchers.

 

[CIO]

You really should do more careful research before attacking people who are dealing with a bankrupt carrier as opposed to a profitable one like SWA. An AA mechanic will get at least $5.70 in pay increases (approximately 21 percent) during the agreement. I say, at least, because that doesn’t cover the industry standard pay adjustment, which will now be adjusted up to the DAL/UAL average at the end of the third year. Most of this increase (17.4 percent) is front loaded and paid by the end of the first three years. Under the MOU we will get approximately 7.5% in the first year and we retain 65% of aircraft maintenance spending. This is not as good as we used to do (normally 80 to 90%), but is far better than anyone else has negotiated.

AMFA’s agreement with bankrupt UAL in 2005 required an up front 3.9% percent cut in base pay and premiums and then a 1.5% yearly pay increase for the next five years. By the end of the contract, AMFA mechanics had received a whopping 51 cents in aggregate base pay increases. AMFA signed on to unrestricted outsourcing of heavy checks with the exception of the three lines that were operating in SFO. And it agreed to termination of the UAL pension plan. And there was no industry standard pay adjustment. Then there was the back to work deal with bankrupt NWA, but no-one wants to talk about that. Yeah, the TWU may not have done as well as the pilots ( it looks like they will get a 23% pay adjustment, not counting the industry standard adjustment that the TWU will also get), but they certainly did better than AMFA when it was faced with the same predicament. As for doing as well as the pilots, it looks to me like the UAL pilots got about twice the percentage pay increase as the IBT negotiated for UAL mechanics in their first post bankruptcy agreement.

In Solidarity,

CIO

 

[Tex-Mech]

You really should do more careful research before attacking people who are dealing with a bankrupt carrier as opposed to a profitable one like SWA. An AA mechanic will get at least $5.70 in pay increases (approximately 21 percent) during the agreement. I say, at least, because that doesn’t cover the industry standard pay adjustment, which will now be adjusted up to the DAL/UAL average at the end of the third year. Most of this increase (17.4 percent) is front loaded and paid by the end of the first three years. Under the MOU we will get approximately 7.5% in the first year and we retain 65% of aircraft maintenance spending. This is not as good as we used to do (normally 80 to 90%), but is far better than anyone else has negotiated.

In Solidarity,

CIO

Yes when you hit rock bottom like we have, a slow climb is inevitable. Nothing that I would brag about when you consider the entire contract is a turd.

 

[WNMECH]

You really should do more careful research before attacking people who are dealing with a bankrupt carrier as opposed to a profitable one like SWA. An AA mechanic will get at least $5.70 in pay increases (approximately 21 percent) during the agreement. I say, at least, because that doesn’t cover the industry standard pay adjustment, which will now be adjusted up to the DAL/UAL average at the end of the third year. Most of this increase (17.4 percent) is front loaded and paid by the end of the first three years. Under the MOU we will get approximately 7.5% in the first year and we retain 65% of aircraft maintenance spending. This is not as good as we used to do (normally 80 to 90%), but is far better than anyone else has negotiated.

AMFA’s agreement with bankrupt UAL in 2005 required an up front 3.9% percent cut in base pay and premiums and then a 1.5% yearly pay increase for the next five years. By the end of the contract, AMFA mechanics had received a whopping 51 cents in aggregate base pay increases. AMFA signed on to unrestricted outsourcing of heavy checks with the exception of the three lines that were operating in SFO. And it agreed to termination of the UAL pension plan. And there was no industry standard pay adjustment. Then there was the back to work deal with bankrupt NWA, but no-one wants to talk about that. Yeah, the TWU may not have done as well as the pilots ( it looks like they will get a 23% pay adjustment, not counting the industry standard adjustment that the TWU will also get), but they certainly did better than AMFA when it was faced with the same predicament. As for doing as well as the pilots, it looks to me like the UAL pilots got about twice the percentage pay increase as the IBT negotiated for UAL mechanics in their first post bankruptcy agreement.

In Solidarity,

CIO

So you believe the UAL bankruptcy and the set up bankruptcy of AA with 4 billion in the bank plus the ready growth of a merger with US were the same?
AA got a lot of concessions in the years leading up to the bankruptcy.

 

[ThirdSeatHero]

You really should do more careful research before attacking people who are dealing with a bankrupt carrier as opposed to a profitable one like SWA. An AA mechanic will get at least $5.70 in pay increases (approximately 21 percent) during the agreement. I say, at least, because that doesn’t cover the industry standard pay adjustment, which will now be adjusted up to the DAL/UAL average at the end of the third year. Most of this increase (17.4 percent) is front loaded and paid by the end of the first three years. Under the MOU we will get approximately 7.5% in the first year and we retain 65% of aircraft maintenance spending. This is not as good as we used to do (normally 80 to 90%), but is far better than anyone else has negotiated.

AMFA’s agreement with bankrupt UAL in 2005 required an up front 3.9% percent cut in base pay and premiums and then a 1.5% yearly pay increase for the next five years. By the end of the contract, AMFA mechanics had received a whopping 51 cents in aggregate base pay increases. AMFA signed on to unrestricted outsourcing of heavy checks with the exception of the three lines that were operating in SFO. And it agreed to termination of the UAL pension plan. And there was no industry standard pay adjustment. Then there was the back to work deal with bankrupt NWA, but no-one wants to talk about that. Yeah, the TWU may not have done as well as the pilots ( it looks like they will get a 23% pay adjustment, not counting the industry standard adjustment that the TWU will also get), but they certainly did better than AMFA when it was faced with the same predicament. As for doing as well as the pilots, it looks to me like the UAL pilots got about twice the percentage pay increase as the IBT negotiated for UAL mechanics in their first post bankruptcy agreement.

In Solidarity,

CIO

When it comes to UAL you should follow your own advice about doing your research.....when it comes to your accusations about UAL, you don't know what you're talking about.

AMFA never "agreed" to the pension termination, it was seized by the PBGC. NO UNION AT UAL KEPT THEIR PENSION PLAN.

AMFA never "signed on to unrestricted outsourcing of heavy checks". First heavy maintenance was lost under the IAM bankruptcy agreement. Second, AMFA negotiated the protection of the 3 SFO lines as well as a host of support shops you convienantly failed to mention. Lastly, AMFA negotiated audit language to give the 20% farm out limit teeth for enforcement which it had lacked up to that time.

Perhaps you aught to sit back and think just how much YOU are saving because of the fights that have already occured between other unions and bankrupt carriers.

 

[swamt]

You really should do more careful research before attacking people who are dealing with a bankrupt carrier as opposed to a profitable one like SWA. An AA mechanic will get at least $5.70 in pay increases (approximately 21 percent) during the agreement. I say, at least, because that doesn’t cover the industry standard pay adjustment, which will now be adjusted up to the DAL/UAL average at the end of the third year. Most of this increase (17.4 percent) is front loaded and paid by the end of the first three years. Under the MOU we will get approximately 7.5% in the first year and we retain 65% of aircraft maintenance spending. This is not as good as we used to do (normally 80 to 90%), but is far better than anyone else has negotiated.

AMFA’s agreement with bankrupt UAL in 2005 required an up front 3.9% percent cut in base pay and premiums and then a 1.5% yearly pay increase for the next five years. By the end of the contract, AMFA mechanics had received a whopping 51 cents in aggregate base pay increases. AMFA signed on to unrestricted outsourcing of heavy checks with the exception of the three lines that were operating in SFO. And it agreed to termination of the UAL pension plan. And there was no industry standard pay adjustment. Then there was the back to work deal with bankrupt NWA, but no-one wants to talk about that. Yeah, the TWU may not have done as well as the pilots ( it looks like they will get a 23% pay adjustment, not counting the industry standard adjustment that the TWU will also get), but they certainly did better than AMFA when it was faced with the same predicament. As for doing as well as the pilots, it looks to me like the UAL pilots got about twice the percentage pay increase as the IBT negotiated for UAL mechanics in their first post bankruptcy agreement.

In Solidarity,

CIO

Actually it looks like you need to do your own research. The IAM are the ones that gave up the in ouse maint at 2 locations prior to AMFA inheriting the contract. AMFA never gave up any pension at UAL, it was taken over, or rather, forced upon the PBGC not AMFA, but by UAL. Before you even start trying to praise the TWU about your up coming raises, first you need to explain for the decades of conncessions by the TWU. The TWU has givin back to AA for every contract since 1993 or 1995. As it has been previously posted, the TWU has been in bed with the company (AA) for well over 30 years plus. It is time to change the representational union at AA. Look how many times the TWU has done "behind closed door deals" since the AMFA driv has started. Then look at how many times since BK filing. The TWU knows their time is coming, hence, the teamsters being called in to help the TWU save themselves. The TWU invited the teamsters to come into AA and deflect from the AMFA drive. The time is coming, and soon the TWU will no longer be representing the mechanics of AA. Won't be much longer and AMFA will prevail at AA after a representational election. Now, go get yourself edumacated a liitle more before you spout off...
BTW: Your wonderfull TWU agreed to conncessions without even being in BK. They agreed to give back 17.3% back in 2003 (correct me if I am wrong here Bob). Plus, now they "agreed" to freeze the pension, give back vac, sick, hol, ot, large increases in medical, now the mechs have to contribute to the 401K in order to get a match. Not to mention the thousands upon thousands of jobs they "AGREED" to get rid of, as well as all the displaced mechanics that now have to comute to get to their jobs. It's time to fire the TWU, I'm shocked they have lasted this long...

 

[767 mechanic]

Actually it looks like you need to do your own research. The IAM are the ones that gave up the in ouse maint at 2 locations prior to AMFA inheriting the contract. AMFA never gave up any pension at UAL, it was taken over, or rather, forced upon the PBGC not AMFA, but by UAL. Before you even start trying to praise the TWU about your up coming raises, first you need to explain for the decades of conncessions by the TWU. The TWU has givin back to AA for every contract since 1993 or 1995. As it has been previously posted, the TWU has been in bed with the company (AA) for well over 30 years plus. It is time to change the representational union at AA. Look how many times the TWU has done "behind closed door deals" since the AMFA driv has started. Then look at how many times since BK filing. The TWU knows their time is coming, hence, the teamsters being called in to help the TWU save themselves. The TWU invited the teamsters to come into AA and deflect from the AMFA drive. The time is coming, and soon the TWU will no longer be representing the mechanics of AA. Won't be much longer and AMFA will prevail at AA after a representational election. Now, go get yourself edumacated a liitle more before you spout off...
BTW: Your wonderfull TWU agreed to conncessions without even being in BK. They agreed to give back 17.3% back in 2003 (correct me if I am wrong here Bob). Plus, now they "agreed" to freeze the pension, give back vac, sick, hol, ot, large increases in medical, now the mechs have to contribute to the 401K in order to get a match. Not to mention the thousands upon thousands of jobs they "AGREED" to get rid of, as well as all the displaced mechanics that now have to comute to get to their jobs. It's time to fire the TWU, I'm shocked they have lasted this long...

This is typical of cio. He needs to stick to something he knows like priming a wood chipper. He is no different than realaity check or overspeed. Tell a lie long enough and it will become the truth. Its nice of you to try and help the twu with their image,but I think that it is a lost cause. By that I mean the twu gave away 17.5% not 17.3%. Oh just to let you know if you didnt already realize it I'm joking about you helping the twu.

 

[swamt]

This is typical of cio. He needs to stick to something he knows like priming a wood chipper. He is no different than realaity check or overspeed. Tell a lie long enough and it will become the truth. Its nice of you to try and help the twu with their image,but I think that it is a lost cause. By that I mean the twu gave away 17.5% not 17.3%. Oh just to let you know if you didnt already realize it I'm joking about you helping the twu.

Yea, I saw he had low number of postings. I think you guys can figure out who realityck is. The TWU just posted the questionair on why you guys want the old union gone. The title of it is Reality Check. Funny how things just seem to surface. I read and understood your post perfectly. Sorry for the typo. You see the TWU as well as the teamsters actually pay people to come onto this web site to try and help deflect the AMFA card drives. The teamsters now know first hand how much this site was in our SLI nego's.

On a second note; Notice how nobody from the TWU stepped up to correct me. That's because I posted mis-information in their favor. In the past (even if it was true) they would jump all over me telling me I was lying. Thx for the correction, I was going by memory.

 

[Bob Owens]

You really should do more careful research before attacking people who are dealing with a bankrupt carrier as opposed to a profitable one like SWA.

Bankrupt? With $4.5 billion in cash and 500 new airplanes coming?

The courts "assume " that a company would not file for BK unless they needed to, AA pretty much admitted from the get go that this was purely a strategy, not their only alternative. The court chose to ignore that.

AA self financed their BK, so obviously they were not broke.

At one time the courts made the same assumptions as far as individual BK, then they realized that many people were scamming the system, and they changed the laws to try and crack down on the scamming. So far they have failed to do the same for corporations.

When people filed for BK it was the banks that ended up getting screwed, so they changed the law, howver when corporations scam in BK the workers get screwed, so the law stands. Even though Corporations have been granted the rights of individuals they have not been charged with the same responsibilities as individuals.

And our Union does nothing to correct this.

You say that people should do more careful research, well you are right, they should. Are you aware that labor contracts were supposed to be afforded special protections under BK? That in order for the court to abrogate that the company was supposed to show that the contract was "onerous". One of the early cases involved a printing company, the contract called for them to employ workers who jobs were redundant due to technological changes that the company, and its competitors had put in place. The contract forcing the employer to pay people it did not need was considered onerous, so it met the standard and was abrogated. The 2nd District Court took a much more pro company view on the onerous standard. once again relying on the asumption that the company would not be asking for relief unless there was no other way to stay in business, even if its pretty obvious there are other options. Bankruptcy is there to provide a level playing field for an ailing company to get relief from terms that make it so they can not compete, it is not supposed to be a blank check where companys are given a cost advantage over their peers by court mandates. What has evolved in the airline industry, as the unions sat on their hands is an abomination of Justice, and we are at fault for not challenging it.

AMFA’s agreement with bankrupt UAL in 2005 required an up front 3.9% percent cut in base pay and premiums and then a 1.5% yearly pay increase for the next five years. By the end of the contract, AMFA mechanics had received a whopping 51 cents in aggregate base pay increases.

You have got to be kidding, you cant be that stupid.

So in other words in BK it was not a six (plus four plus six) year deal like ours. How many years, both pre and post BK did UAL go without any pay increases? Did they go four years with no increases like we did? We gave concessions supposedly to stay out of BK, we took a 17.5% paycut, in addition to vacation, Holidays and other concessions which brought it up to 25% and from 2003 to 2012 only got back 7%. for an aggregate pay cut of $3.97 over a 10 year period without going BK!!,

Per the new agreement our aggregate houly rate will have only gone from $37,24 in 2003 to $37.67 in 2018. You are citing how their pay went up a whopping 51 cents over five years while ours as written will go up a whopping 43 cents over 15 years!!!!



If you want to forget the past fine, forget it, lets look at the present, what does UAL currently get and what do we get? Remember BK is there to relive companies from onerous terms, not create a condition where competitors end up under comparatively onerous tersms with the BK entity.

You even admit that all our raises over the next six years will not bring us up to what they are making now.

Sure you can cite that we have the Mid Term Wage adjustment LOM, and that our wage is so far below industry standard that we would already be slated for a raise if it were to come in effect now, but who knows, Jim already agreed to dump two LOMs already. Whats stopping him from dumping that one as well? Whats stopping USAIR from buying us and going BK in two years and throwing it out in exchange for promising to keep work in Tulsa they cant outsource anyway like we did last August? All it takes is Jim Little signature.

And it agreed to termination of the UAL pension plan.

So did the TWU, it was the PBGC and the CC that squashed it because they did not want the PBGC to be the biggest shareholder of the company.

And there was no industry standard pay adjustment.

Good thing, if they had one, thanks to US and AA they would take a pay cut.

The Mid Term wage adjustment is basically an admission that they want the IBT and IAM and Non-Union Delta mechanics to fight for a wage and after three years they will bring us up to the average. they obviously feel that going for what AMFA negotiated at WN is way beyond what they feel their members are worth.

An AA mechanic will get at least $5.70 in pay increases (approximately 21 percent) during the agreement

Step back and look at the big picture, over a 15 year period and one BK filing AA mechanics will have seen their pay increase by 43 cents, but they will have a week less vacation, lost up to 80 hours of Holiday pay each year, 7 less sick days, they will pay around $4000 a year for medical coverage, lost 70 IOD day, lost their pension, retiree medical, doubletime and scores of other concessions.
.

I say, at least, because that doesn’t cover the industry standard pay adjustment, which will now be adjusted up to the DAL/UAL average at the end of the third year.

But that adjustment will not factor in the vacation, Holidays, sick time, doubletime or any of the other concession that put us at the very bottom of the industry. All in we are even below USAIR and they are in contract talks. So even if Little does not sign it away, even with the adjustment we will still almost certainly still be at the very bottom of the industry for the next six years.

 

[unionguy1]

This is typical of cio. He needs to stick to something he knows like priming a wood chipper. He is no different than realaity check or overspeed. Tell a lie long enough and it will become the truth. Its nice of you to try and help the twu with their image,but I think that it is a lost cause. By that I mean the twu gave away 17.5% not 17.3%. Oh just to let you know if you didnt already realize it I'm joking about you helping the twu.

Here's a joke: Jim"Fight Like Hell" Little and his ATD cronies walked into the forest to have a meeting with all his TWU members. He asked them Does poop stick to your skin when you take a crap? We all said " Hell No" so the ATD wiped their ass with us."
I know the joke is not funny. But how much longer are we willing to let the TWU dump on us before we get rid of them. Sign an AMFA card now!!!

Kind Regards,
Harvey West

 

[CIO]

When I posted last night I knew the sharks would swarm. I didn’t expect the utter nonsense I got in response. The point was simple – AMFA and TWU both dealt with a second round of concession demands from a bankrupt company dealing with hundreds of millions of dollars in losses caused by mismanagement. Both companies used the bankruptcy laws to their advantage. Given all the chatter on this board about how militant and tough AMFA is, I would have expected that it would have taken the path all the people on this board fault the TWU for not taking—that is, refused all concession demands, absorbed an abrogation, and waited to be released to strike. But, that is not what they did. Instead, Mr Delle Femine said “It’s a sad situation that we have to bear the brunt of mismanagement. We had to accept it or let the judge do it. It was the lesser of two evils.” And, spin it any way you like, but the contract AMFA signed after those words was far worse than what the TWU just signed off on. To be fair, for all of their tough talk, the IBT also did not avoid concessions in bankruptcy and at Frontier, for example, signed off on a deal far worse than the TWU just negotiated.

As for termination of the pension, I applied the exact same standard to AMFA that they apply to the TWU. The UAL plan was terminated on AMFA’s watch, they made proposals for a new less expensive plan prior to termination, and they signed off on a contract in which the old plan did not snap back or was replaced by a plan of equal value. I don’t doubt that it was inevitable that the government and the court were going to terminate the existing DB plans for all UAL employees, just as it was inevitable that the Bankruptcy Court handling AA was going to authorize it to impose a freeze on all its DB plans.

One other thing. AMFA negotiated a 5% defined pension contribution in its 2005 Agreement. The United pilots negotiated a 15% contribution to replace their terminated plan and within two years upped the contribution to 16%. And another thing --- people can spin anyway they like, but if the TWU dies as the mechanic and related representative at AA Tulsa will die with it. No ifs ands or buts. Anyone who believes otherwise is not reading this board or paying attention to what has gone on in the industry for the last ten years.

In Solidarity,

CIO