Holly Hegeman FA smackdown!

[Be Careful What You Wish For.]

The FAs voted down the contract knowing it would go to arbitration, that's what LG, DP, and union lawyer said would happen. The FAs got what they wanted, arbitration.

So what your saying is that LG has no responsibility for the failure of this vote?
 
Heads need to roll and she is responsible for this.
 
If she does not fix this then she is of no value and needs to be gone.
 
This may be new to you but failed leadership does not stay in power.
 
You can't even govern your own poeple.
 
We voted yes.
 
Get your own house in order.
 
ps. Do you guys even know what "me to's" are?
 
AA

 

[Be Careful What You Wish For.]

The FAs voted down the contract knowing it would go to arbitration, that's what LG, DP, and union lawyer said would happen. The FAs got what they wanted, arbitration.

You left out the AAmateurs part.
 
I voted YES!!!

 

[WorldTraveler]

For all the prematurally self congatulatory AA people.
 
You may want to re-think your method of talking to people.
 
You turned alot of people off by being so AArrogant.
 
You're not in this by yourselves.
 
AA

so true. on so many levels.

 

[AdAstraPerAspera]

so true. on so many levels.

 
You have no clue what s/he is talking about. You haven't been participating in this balloting or following the developments from the beginning. You are like a child attempting to chime in to a conversation among adults. Come back when you have a frame of reference.

 

[AdAstraPerAspera]

For all the prematurally self congatulatory AA people.
 
You may want to re-think your method of talking to people.
 
You turned alot of people off by being so AArrogant.
 
You're not in this by yourselves.
 
AA

 
No body here is congratulating ourselves. Everyone I know on this board voted yes and is just as dismayed as you are.
 
However, I do believe if the so-called "hard 40" was left alone, the TA which had already been said to be "final" and not up for further negotiation would have passed. Once that key provision was changed (after balloting had already begun, no less!) the document seemed fluid and completely up for renegotiation for every Tom, Dick and Jane's pet issue. It was downhill from there.

 

[kirkpatrick]

>> not sure how long you have been in AA FA and if you can say when swapping/dropping rules were tightened but the point is still that non-working or low working employees do cost the money something. <<
 
I came here with the TWA acquisition and was in the first class of male FAs hired in 1972.  I gave up decades ago expecting anyone outside the industry to have an inkling of what I do for a living or why.  Let me put it this way:  two employees each doing 75 hours a month are two salaries, two benefits, two sick leave accruals and two vacation accruals.  Nothing changes if one does 90 and the other does 60.
 
In fact, the person flying higher time doesn't ever accrue more than the max vacation, sick accrual or vacation while the low timer can and often does lose some of these things, so I can safely say the company makes money with the system.  Years ago a friend of mine in manpower planning at TWA showed me figures where due to the vacation days lost by low time flyers the manpower requirement at JFK dropped by ten people.
 
MK

 

[kirkpatrick]

You can't even govern your own poeple.
 
We voted yes.
 
Get your own house in order.
 
ps. Do you guys even know what "me to's" are?
 
AA
 
I find your posts insulting and counterproductive.  I spend a lot of time on the US/AA Facebook pages and there's ample idiocy on both sides.  I've been through one merger (TWA) and lost a lot more than you ever will.  Don't blame AA for the changes you're about to experience.
 
MK

 

[WorldTraveler]

>> not sure how long you have been in AA FA and if you can say when swapping/dropping rules were tightened but the point is still that non-working or low working employees do cost the money something. <<
 

MK

I came here with the TWA acquisition and was in the first class of male FAs hired in 1972. I gave up decades ago expecting anyone outside the industry to have an inkling of what I do for a living or why. Let me put it this way: two employees each doing 75 hours a month are two salaries, two benefits, two sick leave accruals and two vacation accruals. Nothing changes if one does 90 and the other does 60.

In fact, the person flying higher time doesn't ever accrue more than the max vacation, sick accrual or vacation while the low timer can and often does lose some of these things, so I can safely say the company makes money with the system. Years ago a friend of mine in manpower planning at TWA showed me figures where due to the vacation days lost by low time flyers the manpower requirement at JFK dropped by ten people.

I understand all that.

but if an employee is getting rid of enough work that can be done by someone else and that someone else wants to do it, then it is worth more to the company to just eliminate the positions that are occupied by people who want to work for far less than the minimum the company is willing to require an employee work but that the company can get by with fewer people if everyone works a higher number of hours. Benefits, including health care benefits are expensive and becoming more and more valuable in the US.

AA and other employers are in a stronger position than ever to be able to say they will establish minimum hours in order to receive benefits and keep an employee on a payroll. And it is not enough for an employee to give up those benefits now but then "reactivate them" at some point in the future by working enough hours.

 

[jimntx]

 
 
 
As far as I know, the foreign FA's cannot fly anything except to/from the AA international gateways, and would have limited ability to cover any more than
 few US to LA flights than they already fly.
 
They cannot under any circumstances arrive in MIA and fly onward to DFW, PHL or CLT.
 
Anyone considering that as a big issue for their vote was an abject fool.
 

Everything you say is true, but some LUS f/as keep referring to the LOA in the contract that allows them to fly intra-U.S. routes, but I think it's in a  force majeure situation.  Don't care enough to look it up.  It could happen.  We could decide to go back to running the routes to the West Coast with wagon trains, but I doubt it's going to happen.

 

[jimntx]

 
Mediation or arbitration? Which is it?
 
That is a very ambiguous email.
 
 

It's both.  The mediation to happen next week is a last ditch effort to keep the process out of arbitration.  If the two sides can come to agreement over a reworked TA, then arbitration does not have to happen unless the f/as vote it down again.

 

[AdAstraPerAspera]

It's both.  The mediation to happen next week is a last ditch effort to keep the process out of arbitration.  If the two sides can come to agreement over a reworked TA, then arbitration does not have to happen unless the f/as vote it down again.

 
Here's what I would do if I could go back in time and "rework" the TA. Move the top out pay scale back to 15 years. Use the value of the extra two years as a signing bonus. Add a "me too" clause for profit sharing. If the company is so confident that it will not get PS from the pilots, then it costs the company NOTHING, and it shuts up most the people bitching about it. Keep the 40 hour threshold in place, and resubmit. The low time fliers will cry foul, but I am sick of kowtowing to them anyway. If you don't like coming to work, then it's time to retire. Hopefully that would make the TA pass... we only need(ed) 16 more votes, after all.

 

[boston]

Jimntx, Its out of our hands now, not sure where some are hearing we vote again. There was a mediator at the table the entire time, during negotiations. I think people are reading that mediation, means going back for some time and mediate. however in this case, its already occurred and they will use a mediator on Dec 3, to decide what of the wages, premium pays, VC,SK ,Health and 401k will be arbitrated ( I'm missing 1 more item I believe).
 
I would like nothing more to see AA/APFA and the arbitrators, say lets let this TA stand as is. However, there are consequences and ramifications
When breaking a deal or contract.

 

[bigjets]

Here's what I would do if I could go back in time and "rework" the TA. Move the top out pay scale back to 15 years. Use the value of the extra two years as a signing bonus. Add a "me too" clause for profit sharing. If the company is so confident that it will not get PS from the pilots, then it costs the company NOTHING, and it shuts up most the people bitching about it. Keep the 40 hour threshold in place, and resubmit. The low time fliers will cry foul, but I am sick of kowtowing to them anyway. If you don't like coming to work, then it's time to retire. Hopefully that would make the TA pass... we only need(ed) 16 more votes, after all.

Seems very reasonable but won't the new people and the FAs who don't work (who cares about them) vote against it then? But of course maybe a few thousand of the indifferent will vote when theyrealizing they just threw away $17k.

 

[bigjets]

Jimntx, Its out of our hands now, not sure where some are hearing we vote again. There was a mediator at the table the entire time, during negotiations. I think people are reading that mediation, means going back for some time and mediate. however in this case, its already occurred and they will use a mediator on Dec 3, to decide what of the wages, premium pays, VC,SK ,Health and 401k will be arbitrated ( I'm missing 1 more item I believe).
 
I would like nothing more to see AA/APFA and the arbitrators, say lets let this TA stand as is. However, there are consequences and ramifications
When breaking a deal or contract.

I hope TA stands as is, becuase I have every confidence that the mechs are just as stupid as the FAs

 

[jimntx]

Jimntx, Its out of our hands now, not sure where some are hearing we vote again. There was a mediator at the table the entire time, during negotiations. I think people are reading that mediation, means going back for some time and mediate. however in this case, its already occurred and they will use a mediator on Dec 3, to decide what of the wages, premium pays, VC,SK ,Health and 401k will be arbitrated ( I'm missing 1 more item I believe).
 
I would like nothing more to see AA/APFA and the arbitrators, say lets let this TA stand as is. However, there are consequences and ramifications
When breaking a deal or contract.

Senario 1:
Both the company and the union agree that the last sentence in Paragraph 5 of the Negotiation Protocol calls for one last-ditch effort at mediation before sending it to the arbitrators.  Mediation is not a forced finality.  If the company, the union, and the mediator come to agreement, it will be a Tentative Agreement.  TAs must be voted on by the membership in order to be ratified.
 
Scenario 2: (This thought just occurred.)
On the other hand, there is always the possibility that the company and the union will simply agree to a package to be presented to the arbitrator.  If that is the case, it will make the arbitrator's job infinitely easier.  All he/she has to do is rubber stamp the agreement.  Done and done.  No doubt the whiners will start up that they didn't get a chance to approve it.  That's what happens in binding arbitration which the whiners forced on the rest of us.  Someone else makes the decision for you.  And that someone is constrained from adding anything new to the contract.  They are there to decide what gets cut from the rejected TA to get it down to "market aggregate."  If the company and the union decide that in advance, the arbitrator won't have a lot to do.
 
Bigjets, the TA can not stand as is if it goes to arbitration.  The rejected TA is estimated to be worth more than $92 (or 82 or 88) million dollars over "market aggregate."  The arbitrator (ideally, in concert with the company and the union) must remove that much value from the arbitrated document.  He/she is constrained to awarding, at best, a "market aggregate" total.
 
If it is Scenario 2, the f/as who have their knickers in a twist over the Hard 40 are going to be seriously disappointed.  I think we will find that the arbitrator (like most normal people) will have a hard time accepting the concept (or seeing the value) of an employee who only shows up to work when and if they feel the urge; yet, still expects to maintain seniority and benefits.