The new airline thread

[BashiChuni]

On 4/22/2019 at 8:04 AM, Guardian said:

Agreed. Great stuff.

3. Just finished it last week. Great book and very practical information!

[SocialD]

4 hours ago, isuguy1234 said:

Are u living in base for both gigs, or u commute to one?

 

I had to leave an airline to make it happen, but I live in base for both (~1 hour to my airline gig).  

  

54 minutes ago, Bergman said:

I know one of the plaintiffs from the lawsuit, and he is possibly the biggest A-hole I’ve ever met.  He was deliberately abusing the USERRA rules to his own benefit and got caught.

He also go fired as an ART in not only the ANG but also AFRC, several years apart, as a point of reference about his character.

 

This is my shocked face...

[slc]

Any specifics on the abuse of USERRA?  Curious to hear what this clown did?

[Gazmo]

Got fired from two ART jobs? Jeez.... he must be a real winner. It takes nearly an act of god to fire a GS or at least years of documented disciplinary actions.

[so.it.goes]

Got fired from two ART jobs? Jeez.... he must be a real winner. It takes nearly an act of god to fire a GS or at least years of documented disciplinary actions.

That's what I was thinking... Must have been egregious.

We have ART's on base I'd LOVE to get rid of, but apparently being terrible at your job is somehow NOT an offense worthy of dismissal.

[SocialD]

4 hours ago, slc said:

Any specifics on the abuse of USERRA?  Curious to hear what this clown did?

Starts around page 9.  Scroll down and click on the hyperlinked "HERE." 

Quite a few complaints are certainly legit, especially about a certain individual named in the lawsuit.  He definitely made the mil guys in our indoc class ask WTF?!  He's since been removed from his position but he definitely put a bad taste in the mouth of the ARC guys.  Sad part is that he was a retired AD/ARC pilot himself.  I'm glad to see he no longer has his hands in the process.

 

 

 

 

Edited April 26, 2019 by SocialD

[AirGuardianC141747]

A couple of examples of abusing the system...

Planting Mil Leave status every other day or so (I mean for weeks); thereby creating an unscheduable flyer for your airline and maintaining your guarantee. Mil requirements can be pulled together much more efficiently than the obvious seagulls who require rocks thrown at them to fly.

Worse yet, being on long term orders where you fly 2 weeks for the Gov, then you fly your commercial gig during downtime. You work for one or the other by law.  One of our unit members was removed from orders when this came to light. Lucky he wasn’t discharged.

Several other types of scud running out there, but it is black and white in your gut when you hear about it. You have your requirements on both sides and it can be beneficial - that ball is in your court. Common sense is the key, but that’s lost on a few unfortunately.

[SocialD]

Eh, those are some small fries compared to what some guys are doing.  I think even working both gigs can be legally done as long as you have permission from your CC and you don't violate the leave reg.  We've had a guy fired (quit in lieu of...) because he was taking MLOA then working at his contractor side gig.  That's real abuse and detrimental to the rest of us (vast majority) who use it as we should.  Other shenanigans has led to Delta moving to a policy wrt to dropping trips with MLOA, especially around holidays.  Say you attempt to drop a 4 day trip with 1 day of MLOA on day 1 of the trip.  They may now just drop that first day of the trip then have fly the balance of the trip starting on day 2.  

 

[gearhog]

For the past while, I’ve been abusing my unit’s “Airline leave of absence policy” to improve quality of life.

[Guardian]

I’m not an airline guy. I hear people say that taking mil leave from the airline or taking off time from the unit to work at the other or something else is bad for everyone else. What I want to know is why? And are there rules against doing what they are doing or is it perfectly legal and just makes everyone else work more or something negative? Not made up my mind on the topic. Just don’t understand the angst either way.

[gearhog]

17 minutes ago, Guardian said:

I’m not an airline guy. I hear people say that taking mil leave from the airline or taking off time from the unit to work at the other or something else is bad for everyone else. What I want to know is why? And are there rules against doing what they are doing or is it perfectly legal and just makes everyone else work more or something negative? Not made up my mind on the topic. Just don’t understand the angst either way.

When you take mil leave from the airline, you still accrue seniority, sick time, vacation, company 401K contributions, avoid bad schedules, get days off that you wouldn't normally be able to get, etc. I was joking above because increasingly, none of that is worth the a$$ pain of dealing with all the dysfunction when taking mil leave anymore (for me).

If you're routinely taking mil leave with the intent of not meaningfully participating, you're costing your company money and F'ing up the seniority system. Most people are legitimately serving, others are scamming.

[Bigred]

4 hours ago, Guardian said:

I’m not an airline guy. I hear people say that taking mil leave from the airline or taking off time from the unit to work at the other or something else is bad for everyone else. What I want to know is why? And are there rules against doing what they are doing or is it perfectly legal and just makes everyone else work more or something negative? Not made up my mind on the topic. Just don’t understand the angst either way.

I’m not an airline guy (yet) but from what I have gathered is that some dudes drop a day of mil leave to get out of an undesirable 3-4 day long trip. I understand that it’s most prevalent around holidays, etc.

Thats apparently perfectly legal to do but they are buddy-ing someone else who now has to pick up said undesirable trip. I can also see how it’d leave a bad taste in management’s mouth if enough dudes did it.  

[Insert name]

On 2/7/2019 at 9:55 AM, TreeA10 said:

Sitting wide body reserve, I went for 105 days without flying at 76 hours paid per month although I normally averaged 1 trip per month.  This month, I'm working 12 days (4 trips) for 91 hours.  Just depends on what you want to do.

As someone heading to UPT for the guard at some point soon, if I decide to change from my engineering career...this is what I would want haha.

 

Heh, not the best place for this comment to drop in given the current discussion

Edited May 8, 2019 by Insert name

[AirGuardianC141747]

Delta is one of the most vilgilante on tracking the Reserve/Guard component. They always have had the most pointed questions when visiting the Headquarters, while most of the other leads at other airlines watched and took notes. They actually had lists of names in various military order sets to confirm. I am sure they have algorithms by now that calculate trends per individual whether it’s sick, vacation or mil leave since they did have mil member by name specifics when they showed up in 2013/14. We were able to data mine and confirm legitimacy of orders provided and duty performed.

It’s the perception value of same names/same dates annually that they were trying to answer vs lawful orders. Plenty of units switch manpower near holidays to give reprieve to those deployed, full-timers working non-stop/min manning/taking vacation  or on alert cycles. Use the part-time force to send folks home while it still benefits the part-timer in some form or fashion if you will.

They have the right to ask questions, they are a business after all. Military spends money, they make money.

[Tactical Void]

Does anyone have any info on the other companies’ policies on concurrent duty or double dipping? I’m not looking to game the system or anything, but it would be nice to be able to do some admin duty and/or telecommuting while sitting reserve or on a layover.


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[matmacwc]

There’s a spot open at PSA for those interested.

https://www.wdrb.com/news/pilot-for-american-airlines-arrested-at-louisville-airport-for-triple/article_a0e33820-73c4-11e9-9dd5-5fd5311b436d.html

[HuggyU2]

Tactical Void,

I submitted a letter to the company requesting approval to work theee additional jobs on the side. None involve me flying. It was approved. 

[HossHarris]

1 hour ago, HuggyU2 said:

Tactical Void,

I submitted a letter to the company requesting approval to work theee additional jobs on the side. None involve me flying. It was approved. 

If it doesn’t involve flying, why would:

a)the company care? and

b)you ask for permission?

[Danny Noonin]

If it doesn’t involve flying, why would:
a)the company care? and
b)you ask for permission?

Delta cares. That’s why they’re being sued for USERRA violations.


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[Bergman]

17 minutes ago, Danny Noonin said:

 

Delta cares. That’s why they’re being sued for USERRA violations.


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While the policy is for no concurrent duty, that is going to be changed (per the military liaison/manager).  Implementation is pending the outcome of said USERRA lawsuit, which has more to do with a few pilots covering their asses for gaming the system than anything Delta has done IMHO.  My understanding is that policy was put in place many years ago and was meant to prohibit concurrent flying duty specifically, back in the day when ARC pilots just flew airplanes.

I know several CC types who routinely go to their ANG bases on 30hr layovers to do admin and the company doesn’t go after them (aka enforce the current policy).

Having said that, Delta was definitely putting the squeeze on military members in the 2014-2016 time frame.  The manager and CPO guys doing it have been removed.  My experience with the new guys has been as good as possible.

[AirGuardianC141747]

Thanks Bergman! That is refreshing as it paralleled witch hunt proportions during that timeframe. We squelched 99% of their stack of names and were fortunate they were easy to substantiate. It was a bit eerie how pointed the questioning was by that specific airline.

That explains a lot Bergman - Appreciate the info on the new world order!

[HuggyU2]

Hoss,

It is also to prevent “conflict of interest”. 

The approval process was fair and simple, and supported by ALPA. I have no problem with it. 

[Duck]

Ignorant question. Whats to stop someone from being on 30 day alert orders, sitting their 12 days of alert in the first 3 weeks of the month and then picking up and flying an airline trip the last week that you are off but still technically under orders?


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[nunya]

The threat of prosecution/termination.  And for long term orders (30+ or so) I think you give a copy of your orders to the job that pays the bills.

Edited May 14, 2019 by nunya

[Duck]

The threat of prosecution/termination.  And for long term orders (30+ or so) I think you give a copy of your orders to the job that pays the bills.

Yeah, I guess I just don’t understand what the big deal is if you had already finished your alert commitment for the month. I guess if you could somehow take leave that last week or try to drop one week of orders you would be good?


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