Originally Posted by
ElZilcho
The high life? That's a bit of a stretch.
An exaggeration sure, but there's obviously a reason that both Qantas and Air NZ SOs are declining to bid to the short haul fleets and lifestyle is surely a big part of it. Anyway, my point was just that there are other airlines facing the same issue as Air NZ.
As someone said, the A320 used to be a highly sought after position. When the 737 was the Domestic workhorse, it had rostering rules and CEA clauses (lower incentive threshold) to account for the higher workload of multi-sector days... remember, NZ isn't Aus. Our longest Domestic sector is under 2hrs and the main trunk, AKL-WLG takes about 30 minutes so you can do very high sectors on a Domestic roster. Even then however, 737 FO & Capt positions were a fair way down the list due to lifestyle considerations.
Anyway, when the 737 was retired all of the rostering rules went with it and we've been fighting with the company ever since. Some very minor changes were made through a working group which had virtually no impact. This is the biggest cause of grievance on the A320 and many SO's are simply staying put. Plenty would move across (the non commuters anyway) if the Company would just resolve the lifestyle concerns. As it stands however, Pilots are utilizing their right to choose and simply avoiding the fleet.
2 hours is about an hour too long in my book, but everyone's different. I understand where you are at. You have seen the conditions change within the company and are comparing what you have to what you had. For someone looking to move to the company though, they can only compare what they have now to what you have now. There are some clauses in your agreement that are just awesome compared to what's in my Australian agreement.