Inflight

[MitsubishiSam]

proudf/a,

Sorry that I made it sound so bad. I agree with you that West F/A's and pilot's do get along fine, but from what I've seen (14 years at East & 2 years at West from a pilot's point of view), the East had a better daily interaction between the two groups. Yes I agree with you that West pilots do help with the cleaning of the A/C, bringing food and drinks to the F/A's. And I do admire West F/A's for working the long hours.

As far as the F/A positions go, I'm sorry about generalizing that a bit. I should have said something like, the junior East F/A's almost never got the "A" positon.

Thanks for correcting me so that others can see what it is really like. I know that my peception can be a little bit off sometimes.

Another difference at West for the pilots is that, at arrival, F/Os will bring up the wheel chairs, baby strollers and any other carry on baggage up the jetway for the passengers. It was a major culture shock for me!

The pairings at West are in local times instead of Eastern.

 

[US1YFARE]

Another difference at West for the pilots is that, at arrival, F/Os will bring up the wheel chairs, baby strollers and any other carry on baggage up the jetway for the passengers. It was a major culture shock for me!

[post="307628"][/post]​

well at US/East (i am not an employee--but i think it so much more friendly than the HP/US designation)--anyway, I have found that a certain group of people are lazy and the captain or f/o has to go down and get strollers for passengers after they are waiting for 20 plus minutes and they are not delivered. This is not just in PHL...this is happening in several cities. And yes, I call it being lazy and poor customer service.

 

[BoeingBoy]

The pairings at West are in local times instead of Eastern.

[post="307628"][/post]​

Oh heck - I'll be in trouble if they keep that. Never can remember if it's Central or Eastern in IND.....



Jim

 

[crj58]

Crews staying together including front end crew and cabin crew works out for the best in "most" situations. Certainly in irregular operations. We at US-east do have extra positions that include: "F" on the A-321and "E" on the 767. Most of the time everyone gets along but sometimes you get the f/a that you just wanna reach over the cart and........ but at least we can say, "Adios" when the trip is done and hope to never see he/she again. Whatever a/c trip your on you stay on that trip the whole time be it 1 2 3 or 4 day trip. This of course changes as well in bad weather as stated in a previous post.

[post="307032"][/post]​

As was mentioned before the only time HP has extra positions is on charters.
6 f/as on the 757 and 4 on the airbus/737.
What circumstances require extra positions on US aircraft besides LOD?
Are they consistant about offering them? Are the extra positions posted on a line so you can bid for them? IMO all full HP flights or flights with meal service should
have extra f/as. I can dream...

 

[MitsubishiSam]

The West management has been much more pleasant and they seem to care more about their employees. The management actually comes in to talk to us (including Doug) during the recurrent and we actually have conversations! At East, I never got to see any of the top management. You have to give a big thumbs up for the HP management.

The $50 bonuses have been nice (I've received maybe 5 in the last 2 years). I still remember receiving a tin of cookies one year and a block of cheese the next as bonuses while flying for the East, which was a slap in the face (I thought)!

 

[HPGUY]

I won't be around long enough to see the integration, but I like the crews staying together.  PI did the "musical crews" thing - different F/A's all the time (or different pilots from the F/A perspective) and I like staying together the entire trip a whole lot better.

Hopefully that's one thing we can keep.....

Jim

[post="307010"][/post]​

I don't know if matching pilot/FA lines would be a good idea... Since the pilots are ruled by block time limits the trips won't be as productive as they are now for the FAs. I've also noticed some flight time limitations in the US contract. Like 30hr is 7day period. A lot of the RVs survive by picking up trips on their off days and limitations like these will severly limit what they can pick up.

Such things will also limit what you can trade with company open time and other FAs.

Everyone might want to start telling your Union Reps what you'd like to see...

 

[proudf/a]

I don't know if matching pilot/FA lines would be a good idea... Since the pilots are ruled by block time limits the trips won't be as productive as they are now for the FAs. I've also noticed some flight time limitations in the US contract. Like 30hr is 7day period. A lot of the RVs survive by picking up trips on their off days and limitations like these will severly limit what they can pick up.

Such things will also limit what you can trade with company open time and other FAs.

Everyone might want to start telling your Union Reps what you'd like to see...

[post="307699"][/post]​

The 30/7 is waivable at the f/a's options...scheduling cannot schedule you over 30/7, but you can waive that, and fly whatever you want. US reserves pick up time off their days off, its not a problem. Our time we pick up on our days off is pay NO credit, its paid above and beyond your pay guarantee. The beauty of the f/a line paring with the pilots is we dont get screwed by scheduling, whatever the captain does we do too.

 

[MarkMyWords]

I have seen the airline operate with F/A's seperate from Pilots and together, and I can tell you that together is much better from an operational stand point.

In the environment that HP operates in, having crew seperate may work for you. But imagine what happens when you inherit the PHL hub with the LGA, BOS and DCA focus cities. When you get into a severe irregular ops, having all of the crew together, making 1 phone call to contact a complete crew, is much much better. When crews were scheduled apart, with one delayed flight, you had the potential to delay 2 additional flights.

 

[BoeingBoy]

I don't know if matching pilot/FA lines would be a good idea... Since the pilots are ruled by block time limits the trips won't be as productive as they are now for the FAs. I've also noticed some flight time limitations in the US contract. Like 30hr is 7day period. A lot of the RVs survive by picking up trips on their off days and limitations like these will severly limit what they can pick up.

[post="307699"][/post]​

That's exactly why some airlines schedule the pilots & F/A's together and others don't (and I have no idea which is more prevalent in the industry).

At the old PI, the F/A's didn't have the 8 hr max day we pilots had (and I think the only common duty limit was the max duty day), so the company could utilize them better by scheduling them differently than the pilots. So we played musical crews.

At old US, the F/A's and pilots had the same duty limits, so there was no utilization advantage to scheduling differently. So the crews stayed together.

I suspect that whatever ends up in the combined F/A contract will have a big influence on whether crews stay together or not after integration.

As I said, having worked in both I prefer staying together. Back in the PI days, it wasn't unusual to fly 1 leg with one set of F/A's and the next leg with another and so on all day. If we pilots were the ones changing planes, there were times we had no idea who the F/A working in the back of the cabin was, and they didn't know who the pilots were.

Of course, like everything, there the disadvantages you covered.

Jim

 

[nycbusdriver]

US/east is very big on crew communication, staying together is from a safety stand point, great idea. Also, its alot of fun..As far as any jerks? Thats why there is a door, when you stay together you dont get too many jerks, because they know their diet depends on you...<laughing>

[post="307040"][/post]​

Your post seems to imply that jerks exist only on the front side of the cockpit door.

Oh, So NOT True!

 

[proudf/a]

Your post seems to imply that jerks exist only on the front side of the cockpit door.

Oh, So NOT True!

[post="307709"][/post]​

touche

 

[TheNewLowFare]

Are we going to be called US/East and US/West Flight Attendants now?

 

[HPGUY]

The 30/7 is waivable at the f/a's options...scheduling cannot schedule you over 30/7, but you can waive that, and fly whatever you want.  US reserves pick up time off their days off, its not a problem.  Our time we pick up on our days off is pay NO credit, its paid above and beyond your pay guarantee.  The beauty of the f/a line paring with the pilots is we dont get screwed by scheduling, whatever the captain does we do too. 

[post="307701"][/post]​

It also limits the kinds of trips available. IE FA who enjoy highly prodctive trips spanning low amounts of days will see a drop in these kinds of trips.

More importantly if we ask to match FA and Pilots pairing we risk the company push for FAs to follow 121.471 (pilot FARs) Then such limitations as 30 in 7 would would not be waivable. There is a potential for cost savings by avoiding extra scheduling systems modifications in this and we wouldn't want to dangle such a thing in the company's face.

 

[TheNewLowFare]

I actually prefer to have mixed pairings. Airbus mixed with 737s, I heard this allows scheduling to create higher yield trips. I do alot of 18 credit 3 days and if they make us stay with the pilots pairings, we might see a reduce amount of high yield trips which would suck big time!

I have a feeling that whatever is the lowest cost and the most cost effective schedule will dominate.

 

[BoeingBoy]

Your post seems to imply that jerks exist only on the front side of the cockpit door.

Oh, So NOT True!

[post="307709"][/post]​

Haven't you heard the one about what separates F/A's from the scum of the earth ------- the cockpit door!!



Jim