I'll Take This Contract Anyday!@!

[BoeingBoy]

mweiss,

Didn't mean to speak for you. My apologies.

When you start to dig into all the details, it's amazing how many little things there are that affect CASM.

PHL, according to our website, has 195 mainline flights per day spread over at least 4 concourses from A-west to D. WN would probably operate the same number of with between 20 & 25 gates - say 1 or maybe 2 concourses.

How much longer does it take our people, on average, to transport connecting bags from one flight to another vs WN? I don't know, but would suspect that it's longer - resulting in our people looking less productive (yet again).

With our banks of flights, how many more baggage carts, pushback tugs, belt loaders, catering trucks, etc do we need vs WN? Plus maintenance on all that equipment. Plus fuel for all the motorized equipment. Plus.....

Since our gates are all used at about the same time, how many more agents, rampers, mechanics, etc are needed than WN?

We need more gates so our gate lease cost is what - 50-100% more than WN's.

The list goes on and on. That's why rolling the hub is so important.

Jim

 

[johnnyfleet]

The company decides the staffing and what flights the rampers will work, not the union, maybe the down time has to due with the peaked hubs. I'm not sure how many Ramp Agents Southwest uses per flight, but it sure seems that there are a lot more of them in the Florida cities than US Airways has on the ramp.

 

[diverboy]

Southwest has approx 180 flights running out of LAS using 19 gates in the C concourse.

 

[mweiss]

WN runs a minimum of six and a maximum of eleven flights per gate per day, generally more on the high side. This is per an informal station survey taken on the USaviation WN board.

 

[diogenes]

FWIW,

The points regarding online connecting baggage (WN does less) and interline baggage (WN does none) has been made. Another implication of that is;

Assume a RDU-PHL WN flight, and a RDU-PHL U flight. Most WN bags are destined for PHL; hence no sorting. The U bags are travelling to the four corners of the earth, so more man hours will be needed to accomplish this.

How much freight and mail does WN handle? Some? None? A bunch? It all adds up.

Here's some more facts.

For a 737, it takes three people per bin to load/unload the a/c - two in the bin, one on the ground. This does not take into account the guy in the bagroom where the bags are checked, or the runners. In small stations the runners also load the flights.

Assume a fully loaded 737, fwd and aft bins full, onload and offload.

For the quickest turn, you cannot do it with less than 6 agents, 3 per bin.

Now, if you don't want to pay 6 agents, then 3 is the next right number. 4 or 5 is a waste of time - they don't gain you anything.

3 agents can work the bins one at a time, thus doubling the ground time.

It has been my experience that 3 agents can generally ground handle a 737, in about 30 minutes, as both bins are rarely maxed out. If there are special circumstances, such as troop movement, multiple freight shipments, or holidays, or a routinely maxed flight, more time will be needed.

Michael, interline baggage at U has spiked recently, due to the UA codeshare, and increased affiliate flying. U treats these bags as interline, as the bags have to be transported longer distances at the hubs than mainline connections.

Think about how the hubs are laid out, and where the commuter flights are vis a vis the mainline, versus the mainline flights sharing the same concourse(s).

I've said it before - the WN agents are great, but they are not supermen.

In an apples to apples comparison (a U 737-400, a WN 737-400, 200 bags apiece, 3 agents per flight) the outcome would be the same.

Where the costs come from have been pointed out - hubs are more labor intensive than linear flying.

On the other hand, WN will not be serving CAE or FWA anytime soon, either.

 

[mweiss]

Serious question: are we certain about the WN numbers, or are we guessing?

What I mean is, there are quite a few customers that make connections on WN, for a multitude of reasons. Do we know what that ratio is systemwide? And how does that systemwide ratio compare to US's systemwide ratio? After all, there are only three airports with significant online connecting baggage with US. I'd suspect WN's would be more uniform, but not as low as US's outlying stations.

And you asked about WN and freight. I have no clue; do you? Maybe it's a factor, and maybe it's not.

Geez, aren't these fact-based discussions boring? We need some good rumors to stir up this thread!

 

[BoeingBoy]

mweiss,

All those questions sound like the basis for a paper. Maybe it's time to dig into all that BTS raw data, crank up the spreadsheet program, and let the numbers fly.

Seriously, though, that's the kind of detail information that is not much in demand, hence no one is going to do that level of analysis. All we have left is anecdotal tidbits.

Jim

 

[mweiss]

That kind of information should be in demand. How else does one make intelligent decisions about where to focus one's efforts on improving the efficiency of the organization?

 

[BoeingBoy]

mweiss,

My apologies, I should said the there is little PUBLIC demand for that level of detail, hence it is not profitable for the anyone to do it for public consumption. You're absolutely right that those making the decisions within the company need some level of detail to make rational decisions. In our case, I often wonder what information actually gets to the upper reaches of CCY - I suspect that there's a lot of CYA in the layers between the line employee and the decision makers in the head shed.

Jim

 

[jack mama]

I think BoeingBoy's quote sums it all up...

It would be like GM cutting the assembly line speed in half and then blaming their workers for not being as productive as Ford's, so they have to work for less to make up the difference (of course they could speed it back up once the paycuts were in place and reap the bonuses, stock, etc for their "outstanding" performance)

This is what's going on with all the productivity talks...SWA does it with less people, less gates, less waste, and all at full speed!!!

 

[BoeingBoy]

jack mama,

I'd change that a little...

Due to the different business model, comparing us to WN would be like comparing Ferrari to Ford (the manufacturing process, not the product) - one mass produced and the other largely hand produced. Even going full speed, Ferrari will never produce as many cars per person as Ford.

Jim

 

[mweiss]

And yet, ironically, the Ford has better reliability. Perhaps a more apt analogy than you intended. :huh:

 

[moosedog]

:blink: It is interesting to see how many now want what SW has, but were never willing to take what they were paid over the past several years, which is largely why they have money and we don't. If we want the SW deal, then we should figure out how much each person in SW made in the past 10 years and how much we made. If we made more, then we should give the difference back to the company if they promise from here on to pay us the same. But that won't happen. Thought: perhaps we need not to compete with SW, but really, get our costs down well below Delta, American, NW and Continental, get their passengers to fly with us, and with those profits hold back SW. If we could take 15 passengers from those airlines on each flight because our costs were lower, that would be 15 x 1200 flights a day = 18000 people a day. We are no longer a Delta peer, probably never were, except in pay. We can survive but need to win some key battles. :Lets go after the big boys.

 

[diogenes]

That kind of information should be in demand. How else does one make intelligent decisions about where to focus one's efforts on improving the efficiency of the organization?

Michael,

I am unaware of any source that would cite that information.

I know SABRE collects all connecting baggage data, but I have never seen or heard of any internal or external report reflecting that data. Presumably, that info circulates at the veep level.

I'm sure there are valid reasons this is so, but it does keep labor from making apples to apples comparisons.