Isn't labor cost less, and possiblr competition among contractors ?Wow, what a shock that the capacity reduction comes in the form of 737s and not by getting rid of some of the 800 contract regional jets clogging up the airports and skies.
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Isn't labor cost less, and possiblr competition among contractors ?Wow, what a shock that the capacity reduction comes in the form of 737s and not by getting rid of some of the 800 contract regional jets clogging up the airports and skies.
My belief has been that the USAirways Management Strategy was to move capacity as much as possible to potentially lower cost competietive contract cariers. Is there a different slant on this I should consider? Not trying to be argumentative here, but would like to understand.If that was all that US paid for, you'd have a point. Since US pays for the whole operation plus profit, what's your point....
Jim
And the evidence that the contract carriers are less expensive when all costs - sales, passenger handling, baggage handling, advertising, insurance, landing fees, fuel, etc paid by US - are included is?
Jim
Just think how much better the current situation would be at mainline if just half of the express departures went back to mainline cockpits. Suddenly, the Nic award wouldn't be all that big of a deal.
Probably because it would be almost impossible to do because a significant percentage of the cost of outsourced Express flying is hidden from all but the company. How much does the average contract RJ operator pay for advertising (what little there is), res system, ticket sales, ticket counter space, gates & gate space, baggage handling, food/lodging vouchers for misconnects/cancellations, misplaced baggage delivery, etc, etc? Little to none - those costs are borne by mainline or the wholly owned carriers.For the life of me I would like to know why ALPA hasn't produced a working group on the true costs of RJs.
Probably because it would be almost impossible to do because a significant percentage of the cost of outsourced Express flying is hidden from all but the company. How much does the average contract RJ operator pay for advertising (what little there is), res system, ticket sales, ticket counter space, gates & gate space, baggage handling, food/lodging vouchers for misconnects/cancellations, misplaced baggage delivery, etc, etc? Little to none - those costs are borne by mainline or the wholly owned carriers.
Without allocating their share of all those costs to the contract operators, there's no way to determine their true CASM vs the wholly owned.
Jim
I see what you are saying Jim, but ALPA could put together an analysis based on what is discoverable, such as: cost figures from the aircraft manufacturers, typical lease rates, fuel prices, wage rates, etc. They could then assign a margin of error to the caluclation and given what most of us know about operating costs of jets (none of them are cheap), I'd wager that even with the margin of error in management's favor, the cost of RJs would far exceed that of a mainline CASM and mainline RASM. In other words, the strong inference would be that it is imossible for RJs to be profitable anywhere in the aviation system. Aggregate cost would be less, but that goes without saying. After estimating the operating costs of the RJ, the same data could be collected on mainline jets which would then allow anybody and everybody to make apples to apples comparisons. If there were a bias or error in the estimation, all airplanes would be affected proportionally. The point is that we have allowed management to get away with the mantra that RJs can make money whenever a mainline aircraft cannot. That is only true in a very narrow range of circumstances. We pilots have known this, but we've done nothing to rebut. Why? We just let management educate the masses with whatever misinformation that is helpful for their needs.
Actually there's an easier way to get the basic CASM of the publicly traded contract carriers - their quarterly filings with the SEC. Of course, that leaves out all the stuff they don't pay for so you'd have to come up with some approximation for that.I see what you are saying Jim.....
Wow Bob ! There's still hope for you yet.. :lolSo to paraphase, "Figures don't lie, but liars figure"
Probably because it would be almost impossible to do because a significant percentage of the cost of outsourced Express flying is hidden from all but the company. How much does the average contract RJ operator pay for advertising (what little there is), res system, ticket sales, ticket counter space, gates & gate space, baggage handling, food/lodging vouchers for misconnects/cancellations, misplaced baggage delivery, etc, etc? Little to none - those costs are borne by mainline or the wholly owned carriers.
Without allocating their share of all those costs to the contract operators, there's no way to determine their true CASM vs the wholly owned.
Jim
Actually, express is going to grow, with a projected gain of 14 E175's (Republic) vs a loss of 5 E170's (Republic), 2 E145's (Chataugua), and 2 CRJ200's (???).
Jim
That's what I understand, though I haven't been on either. However, the 170's are supposedly going to have another row of seats added to bring the capacity to 76, so pitch-wise they may end up being about the same.And I think the 175s are the uncomfortable ones and the 170s are the comfortable ones, pitch-wise. Right?