mike33
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why such questions...read ur contract....cargo is contracted in lax.....even if you had cargo it's a different work unit....there has to be an opening
IAM Fleet Service topic 04Aug-
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why such questions...read ur contract....cargo is contracted in lax.....even if you had cargo it's a different work unit....there has to be an opening
Ramp Rogue
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Hair Red the Great
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SWA's total compensation isn't highest in the industry, pay rate maybe but not overall total compensation, ie; health ins, pension,etc.
Why would anyone advocate letting management do union work? Actually what's needed is less management, those nimrods haven't a clue and only get in the way. I guess Je(scab)ter doesn't care about his fellow laid off union brothers and sisters getting their jobs back. Go put a tie on and quit napping in the bin.
Why would anyone advocate letting management do union work? Actually what's needed is less management, those nimrods haven't a clue and only get in the way. I guess Je(scab)ter doesn't care about his fellow laid off union brothers and sisters getting their jobs back. Go put a tie on and quit napping in the bin.
The Janitor
Advanced
LMAO
I've noticed that your writings indicate that you are incredibly bothered and angry with your brothers and sisters on the ramp? The truth is that US AIRWAYS has blown SWA away in on-time performance over the last 12 months. US AIRWAYS also finished number 1 in customer satisfaction among the legacy carriers. And made more money than your most sacred Southwest Airlines. Allowing supervisors to get in the way would most likely reduce our productivity.
We are a very productive and proud group and have busted our butts making this company one of the most profitable carriers this quarter. Instead of trying to impress yourself on here, you ought to give credit where credit is due.
It's one thing to hammer the union but to hammer your coworkers makes you look incredibly dumb and pompous.
As far as allowing supervisors to work the bins, not until all those unemployed can get their jobs back [many of which sacrificed their job to get this airline back up in the sky when a BK judge and the creditors would have preferred Chapter 7] , could it ever be considered.
goodfellow
Senior
Last time we ok'd supervisors working directly with us was when we had Chief Agents who paid dues and were basically organized shift managers. Now its cutthroat knownothings handing out essons and other BS to the members!! The company provides Haterade so they perform exactly like Jester!!! Jester, whats todays flavor??? LOL
Jester
Veteran
Oh, the humanity! Oh, the irony! Oh, my aching head!
I have been accused of being a management stooge, and yet, Janitor, you sound like a corporate lackey... another Baghdad Jan, errrr... Bob with all of the corporate spin. Don't allow the facts to get in the way of a good story, right? But just between us girls... let's go to the facts anyway....
Quarterly Figures in Thousands:
QTR ENDING, SWA EBIT, US EBIT, SWA REV. US REV.
06/30/2010 $220,000 $366,000 $3,168,000 $3,170,000
03/31/2010 $ 53,000 $ 37,000 $2,630,000 $2,651,000
12/31/2010 $225,000 $-43,000 $2,712,000 $2,626,000
09/30/2010 $ 23,000 $ 1,000 $2,666,000 $2,719,000
Totals $521,000 $361,000 $11,176,000 $11,166,000
So for the last four quarters both SWA and US have nearly identical Revenues, yet SWA's Earnings Before Interest and Taxes (EBIT) were 40% higher. Was this what you meant when you posted that US "made more money"? Oh, you were just looking at ONE QUARTER to prove your point, and ignore all else? In terms of profit margins SWA had a healthy 4.66% versus US having a respectable 3.23% over the last four quarters. The Korporate Kool-Aid cups must be over flowing with you suggesting that US has been a more profitable than SWA, outside the most recent quarterly report.
Source:
SWA: http://finance.yahoo.com/q/is?s=LUV
US: http://finance.yahoo.com/q/is?s=LCC
However, Baghdad Jan's, errrr... Bob's spin doesn't stop at the financial reports... US works with a padded ground and flight time, and boasts about having a greater on-time performance. So just between us girls again...
Comparing Mainline Flights between PHX to LAS for August 20th:
Departure Time 0750, Southwest Flt. 2146 = TRAVEL TIME 65 minutes
Departure Time 0740, US Airways Flt. 602 = TRAVEL TIME 66 minutes
Departure Time 0855, Southwest Flt. 409 = TRAVEL TIME 75 minutes
Departure Time 0855, US Airways Flt. 453 = TRAVEL TIME 78 minutes
Departure Time 1035, Southwest Flt. 198 = TRAVEL TIME 70 minutes
Departure Time 1025, US Airways Flt. 939 = TRAVEL TIME 75 minutes
Departure Time 1450, Southwest Flt. 2725 =TRAVEL TIME 65 minutes
Departure Time 1505, US Airways Flt. 622 = TRAVEL TIME 65 minutes
Departure Time 1635, Southwest Flt. 2718 = TRAVEL TIME 70 minutes
Departure Time 1650, US Airways Flt. 355 = TRAVEL TIME 66 minutes
Departure Time 1830, Southwest Flt. 1762 = TRAVEL TIME 65 minutes
Departure Time 1845, US Airways Flt. 174 = TRAVEL TIME 66 minutes
Departure Time 2030 Southwest Flt. 623 = TRAVEL TIME 65 minutes
Departure Time 2015 US Airways Flt. 431 = TRAVEL TIME 69 minutes
So of the 7 mainline flights leaving between the same airports, on the same day, scheduled departure times no more than 15 minutes apart of the schedule demonstrates that US pads its schedule in order to be "on-time" to a greater degree than Southwest. Only one time did SWA schedule more travel time than US during approximately the same time of the day. Let's throw in SWA's standard 30 minute turn versus US standard 40+ minute turns and let's examine as to why "US AIRWAYS has blown SWA away in on-time performance over the last 12 months."
However, what you call a "very productive and proud group" I see people who complain endlessly, take little pride in their work, exhibit laziness, protest about "quick turns" (the Southwest standard turn), demonstrate contempt for corporate, and really don't care about inconveniencing the passenger if it involves some territorial pettiness over their beloved contract.
Spin and cheerleader all you want, Baghdad Jan, errrr.... Bob, but facts are stubborn things, and even your suggestion of SWA being a legacy carrier to compare against US Airways fails to be supported by the history or definition.
So Corrects Jester.
Jester, that's how LAS operated for YEARS. You had two rampers with the Lead planning the flight. Good leads would help with the down and uploads too, but sometimes you had a tricky flight that was a #### to balance.
They are different duty assignments, and you are required to transfer to get from one to the other, and only when there is an opening. Want to go from Tower to Ramp? Put in a PE66 (or whatever it is). Cargo to Lead? Again, PE66.
PHX, LAS, and LAX Cargo are protected until the end of 2011. They are all US employees.
My guess would be that it is a seperate function, thus only people in that function bid that function.
Any opening would be done by an in house transfer by senority. That would go same with the ops/tower function.
The Janitor
Advanced
Give credit to the US AIRWAYS employees Jester instead of making them out like a bunch of dopes. This is a very competitive industry and the fact that US AIRWAYS made hundreds of millions of dollars this quarter should not be taken lightly.
As far as my previous statements, they stand.
As far as my previous statements, they stand.
Jester
Veteran
Jan,
Your previous statements wither in blistering onslaught of the facts. I accept your defeat graciously.
So Embraces Jester.
ChockJockey
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Southwest. Different operation, different contract, different work conditions, different work environment, different load variables, different expectations, different management, different procedure, different staffing etc. etc. ad nauseum. I know another airline in which supervisors work diligently next to their flock, and one need not go to the other side of Terminal 4 to see it in action.
At Mesa all one needs is about a month of ramp experience and a red polo shirt and, voila!, a working supervisor! Back before the bag running was reversed and we were picking up mainline bags from their flights, I used to marvel at how long an RJ would sit on the J-line waiting to be brought in, until someone could sprint from another gate or stop loading/unloading an adjacent aircraft to bring in the one that had my bags. Mainline flights come in and the bin doors are usually both open within 30 seconds of block-in. It didn't used to be uncommon for their planes to be in the gate 10 or 15 minutes before the aft bin was popped. You know who else I've seen loading bags at Mesa? Pilots. All the help one can get indeed. Shall we discuss also the sub-dismal treatment of their employees, their interstellar turnover rate, or anything else from among their great host of ills? Let's not, it's all too depressing.
US/WN/YV; apples/oranges/prunes. It is my opinion, that within our operation in PHX, the only one for which I can comment on, that any manager that's resorting to "helping out" on a specific gate is doing so only because he or she has failed in fulfilling his or her managerial role, for if he'd calculated and provided the proper resources (bodies/data/equipment) to the people doing the job, i.e. us, then he wouldn't have to break a sweat doing work he's contractually forbidden to do. There are a good number of managers that understand this and hence have never been seen and are never seen performing union work. There are on the other hand a few that are either so high strung, paranoid, or disciples of micromanagement that they can't seem to help themselves.
And further I'd submit they're not even helping at all, even when they think they're helping. The last thing I want on a mean ugly turn is some manager at the gate being nervous, and making everyone else nervous. His very presence indicates he has no faith or confidence in his people doing the job, though by virtue of having worked many many flights the crew and I know we'll have our part done by push time. Having a manager second guessing and performing ramp work at my gate is, to me, frustrating, insulting and humiliating.
Whether or not SWA kicks our butts is not solely dependent on the workings of US fleet service. We are getting flights out on time. We are accurately connecting bags. We are improving our customer service. Provincial issues are issues nonetheless. We've shown we can meet the operational goals set for our work group by Imperial decree and it is our pleasure to discuss and address these issues that affect us most seriously and directly.
SWA can get away with this because their operational/procedural configuration is conducive to it (obviously). But I'd imagine that turning a flight at WN and turning a flight at US are quite different affairs. Why can't we turn a flight in 30 minutes? Because we'd be pushing flights out with only half of their passengers and bags. Having a more robust CONX operation we have to allow time for pax and bags to connect. We move more freight than does WN. More of our flights require security sweeps. We have more high-capacity narrow-bodies than they. We have an international operation. If US wants a 30 minute turn standard, the ramp is the least of their challenges in achieving this. Given management's reluctance to competently staff gate agents, and their commitment to "streamlined boarding", and the number of gate-checked bags we contend with, it's not unreasonable to conclude that management is satisfied with the amount of time they allot for the turns, especially with our on-time performance.
Truly, SWA deserves all the accolades and respect they've received and will continue to for having perfected their very unique operation. SWA is a consistently profitable point-to-point domestic short- and medium-haul carrier. US is a schizophrenic networked international quasi-LCC whose fortunes seem to rise and fall with the fortunes of the greater industry, or at least similarly-structured airlines. Inasmuch as this data may invalidate Janitor's claims they do not correlate in any direct or meaningful way to the issue of ground turn times, at least any more than any of the other great many aspects of airline operations that SWA has mastered.
Point being that US Fleet Service can only be held to the goals and responsibilities as they are set by US management. We're not flipping flights in 30 minutes or less (late flights excluded) for the simple reason that US management does not consider that short of ground time to be suitable for our operation. US Fleet Service has no control over the amount of ground time allotted to flights. Our ground time requirements being as they are tied to the various aspects of the operation of the airline, one would need to re-engineer a whole lot more than ramp procedure to reduce this to 30 minutes; that is to say one may as well overhaul the entire US network and flight schedule and business model. This in turn highlights the greater point that SWA can do what it can by virtue of their being SWA, and US cannot perfectly emulate any given sizable aspect of SWA's operation because US is not SWA.
Would you go as far as to say this a majority of people in fleet service? System-wide or just in PHX? If not a majority, than a sizable minority? 40%? 30%? Is this to say that a person that complains necessarily cannot be a hard worker? Nobody likes quick turns, but they must be done just the same, and they are done, and usually the ramp is done first and waits on Pax services to finish boarding the flight (in PHX at least). There are a number of lazy people who do not take pride in their work. There are also a good number of people that work very hard and do take pride in their work. Corporate deserves contempt. The degree to which the customer is convenienced or inconvenienced by managers violating scope is negligible. I don't want my manager running up gate valets. I want him making sure the staffing is in order for this shift and the next, I want him doing his job the way he's supposed to, and if he is, and I am as well, then the passenger is properly convenienced. Indicting the entire work group with a blanket statement such as the above while containing your impressions and observations I would not consider to be accurate or representative of the whole.
Good thing management is on top of the endemic and debilitating laziness, they've diligently replaced all the old TV's in the break room with newer, larger flat screens. On time every time, baby.
How many of our managers have ever gone through initial ramp training? Not all. Some of them couldn't even cut it as leads. Are they trained? Are they safe? Do they have a damn clue about what is going on? What if one gets injured doing union work? Woe betide him. I have seen a manager, while at the gate, not only overlook and willfully ignore safety rules but encourage unsafe acts for the very purpose of turning the flight as quickly as possible. I should have reported it; I did not, and my not having done so I feel in hindsight was a disservice to my coworkers. There are only a handful of managers so desperate and incompetent to be this unsafe; in fairness most of the managers in PHX show saner judgment. Any more I refuse to suffer a manager attempting union work at my gate. Agents should never be afraid or intimidated to confront and/or report a manager attempting or performing union work.
So proflofflegates ChockJockey.
NYGiantsFan90
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Excellent post ChockJockey.
And if the so called manager has time to help work flights, then who is doing their job? I guess one less manager is required then if he/she has the time to load planes. Save money, eliminate the manager's position since they are doing another instead of their own.
And if the so called manager has time to help work flights, then who is doing their job? I guess one less manager is required then if he/she has the time to load planes. Save money, eliminate the manager's position since they are doing another instead of their own.
ChockJockey
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None yet, but I get the feeling that there's going to be more unstaffed gates, especially in the PM.
roabilly
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In all honesty...
I think we have been way too critical regarding our favorite Desert Gnome. Fleet Service certainly owes him a great deal of gratitude for reinforcing the need for Unionism in this industry. His berating remarks have left an acrid stench of sulfur in the air throughout these forums for years.
I applaud him for not only cementing the need for the NEW DIRECTION... but actually facilitating the campaign, and ultimate election!
It is folks like this that have created a need for Unionism, and he continues to perpetuate that need to this day!
Thank the man when you get a chance... the next round of bromide is on me!
So... dons the DCU/BDU’s...
BroBilly
I think we have been way too critical regarding our favorite Desert Gnome. Fleet Service certainly owes him a great deal of gratitude for reinforcing the need for Unionism in this industry. His berating remarks have left an acrid stench of sulfur in the air throughout these forums for years.
I applaud him for not only cementing the need for the NEW DIRECTION... but actually facilitating the campaign, and ultimate election!
It is folks like this that have created a need for Unionism, and he continues to perpetuate that need to this day!
Thank the man when you get a chance... the next round of bromide is on me!
So... dons the DCU/BDU’s...
BroBilly
goodfellow
Senior
Well Said my Brother BRO!!!
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