OK, where to start.....see what happens when you go away for a few days!
First and foremost, I am not picking on any one employee group. My big beef is regarding attendance and those that abuse the sick policy, whether it be through unnecessary sick calls or abuses of the FMLA. PitBull and I have had this same discussion several times and the reason that I sought her out in this topic was because of her claims that people do not abuse their sick calls and that because of the (unfair) sick penalty for crew members, they have to come to work sick. This scenario proved my previous points that 1 - there is an abuse of the sick policy and 2 - some people will call in sick regardless of the penalty, sick or not. I do hold the work and dedication of the Flight Attendants in the highest regard and know that the majority of the Flight Attendants 1 - do not abuse the system, 2 - do not agree with the abuses and 3 - are being penalized because of the abuses.
My intention in making this post was 1 - to bring attention to a major problem and 2 - making people aware of the results of their actions.
That being said let me address a few things:
Abonny - You are quite the great debater. Thank you for providing additional insight to things that I may have not been privy to. As I have said in the past, I am not an expert on the AFA contract and do not profess to be. I do have some comments regarding your statement and I will try to be brief.
1 - Responsibility does not totally lie with management. Employees should also be held accountable for their actions. Just as I would accept nothing less from management, I will accept nothing less from line employees.
2 - Since I am not a crew scheduler i can not speak to who was legal for what, when. I can tell you that when it first became appearant that the crew would need to be replaced, calls were made to crew scheduling and they were showing ample coverage. Who was taken from what trips and legal for how man days would be up to scheduling to determine. Again, they showed 10 available reserves and could only get 4 to work.
3 - You addressed the call out time of the crew members and when coverage was complete. Yes call out started at 2300, that is when the aircraft got back to PHL. It took until 0134 to cover, because of 3 no contacts and 4 sick calls. As I said, 2 of the CLT F/A's accepted the trip and sicked it 30-45 minutes late, causing them to re-open the trip for coverage.
4 - The times that you quoted for departure are inaccurate. The pushback time was 0551 and the off time was 0621. Those times were ACARS generated and not doctored. Please do not try to suggest there was some conspiracy to change times for crew legality issues.
5 - Your comments regarding early contacts of reserves and issues with child care, etc. The crews were contacted as soon as it was feasible to do so. If the aircraft returned to the airport and was not fixable in a "reasonable" amount of time, the trip would have canceled. As for child care and other reserve issues let me say this. I understand the strains of being on reserve, especially for those that have been forced onto reserve. In the PHW, these people chose to bid PHW knowing they would be reserve. Since the International departures leave only after 5p and if/when things go wrong, they are going to go wrong late in the evening. These F/A's should have contingency plans to 1 - be in base when on duty and 2 - have child care and other issues sorted out ahead of time when they know they are on duty.
6 - The issue of contacting Supervisors is a Crew Schedulign screw up and again there should be some accountability there too.
7 - Regarding Crew rooms - It was not scheduled as a 3 hour layover, it was because of the no contacts, out of base assignements and subsequent sick calls that they delay went s far as it did. Had the CLT F/A's not calle doff sick the crew would have been there between 3 and 3:30.
8 - The issue of meals. Were you aware that we made every attempt to secure meals for customers and crew? No, I am sure you did not. Were you aware that the kitchen was closed? No, I am sure you were not. Were you aware that we tried unsuccessfully to get the kitchen staff to come in and prepare meals but we were unsuccessful? Of course you didn't. You can not pull 270 meals out of thin air. Customers were served meals prior to arrival in PHL. Snacks and beverages were provided in the boarding lounge. We did the best we could with what was available.
9 - With regards to the airplane being ready at 3am, were you aware that there was another A330 in PHL at that time? When the FCO flight returned to PHL the second aircraft was going through a scheduled maintenance check and was not available, but became available around 3am. That aircraft could have been used at that time, had the crew been there.
10 - with regards to understaffing - WE BARELY GOT 8 F/A'S TO COME OUT, WHERE WERE WE GOING TO GET A 9TH!
I stand behind the facts that I presented earlier and appreicate your insight to additional facts that you brought forward. While this was an ugly situation, hopefully we learned something from it. We can all sit here as scream that we are short staffed until we are blue in the face but I don't think it is goign to change anything. I agree that we could have additional employees in nearly every department, but not to the fluff levels that the unions claim they need to make things work. Sorry, when scheduling says that there were 10 people available to work and we could only get 4, there is a problem on both sides of the table.
