Originally Posted by
DropYourSocks
What you describe is literally how seniority is supposed to work, not the hatchet job VA did to the WB guys just because they were inconvenient. The training shuffle of downgrading everyone onto smaller equipment is supposed to be painful for the company, by design, to discourage mass redundancies. This is how seniority is supposed to protect your job.
But instead, VA got rid of everyone, regardless of seniority, who was an inconvenience for them... ie everyone who isn't a 737 driver. What then is the point of seniority if it doesn't protect your job, but still traps you to an airline? May as well have a merit based system at that point.
I don't work for VA either, I've made my bed elsewhere.
The issue was the reemployment policy had no details as to how the pilots were to be reemployed.
The AFAP then went and negotiated a deed of reemployed which screwed over Narrow body pilots without consultation to the NB pilots. What isn’t widely know is whilst in negotiations to further drive their own agenda protecting WB pilots the union agreed to a further pay cut of minimum credit guarantee. Costing NB pilots between $5000-$10,000.
The audacity of some WB pilots was breathtaking to say the only reason people had jobs is because they took jobs (And the $$, lifestyle, low hours etc) on the WB fleet.
Plenty of very senior pilots didn’t take a position in the WB as they could see it had its risks and stayed on the 737. It didn’t take a finance degree to figure Virgin was in serious trouble well before Covid. Posting a loss year in year out; the writing was on the wall.
It was always going to be a cluster but some acknowledgment, empathy and tact for both sides was needed. Instead FOs got railroaded.