I am not a scheduler but if 95% of our operations are scheduled, why 80 days to put in day off requests? I realize is it hard work for the schedules to put our requests into the computer, sorry we do that for them if it is a seamless system, OR better yet, why don’t we do it for them? We have our own IT department and we have some smart computer blokes paying union dues. What could happen if we got together?
Like I said before, not many know what is out there if you are comparing to EK, CI and GF.
I guess we will never know what could be achieved. We gave away 5 4 3 and reserve for the ability to request days off, 80 days in advance, 3- 4 times a year. I think we won that one. If you look hard at it, did you need to give that away to really request days off? No but the company wanted it gone.
“The company is quite happy to roster into the fallback”. Who made that statement, The Company? If you were negotiating, would you not say that even if you could not or chose not or simply don’t want to. One must learn to read between the lines when negotiating.
Does not help pilots doing W patterns or being called out off a 12 hours reserve to do a 12 hour duty with possibly two pilots, but, I can request those days off for the wedding, if you live that long. The days off are more important that safety I suppose.
This company is all about taking and the pilots are all about giving. If you keep giving the company with keep taking. When they want something, scare the pilots into giving. Don’t expect your roster to get better because CX will exploit all the deficiencies of any agreement, including this one.
Don’t think you realize all the new routes and increased services CX will be starting in the coming years. When they are undermanned your lifestyles request will be the last thing on their agenda and that will be for a long time. Revenue comes first at the expense of others including Safety.
Remember, money comes first and foremost for this lot. If you don’t have any protections like 543 or FDP starts on reserve, you will be rostered for some interesting patterns to say the least. You will get more fatigued and eventually call in sick and that will only perpetuate the problem. Any the famous words of all crew controller “It is legal” or “Are you refusing a duty”.
It’s not about now, look ahead. How many aircraft are we going to have in 3-5 years, what kind of new routes, how can this agreement be exploited?
It’s all about fatigue protection. How many ASR’s can be contributed to tiredness or fatigue?
Then again, it could be me not seeing the forest for the trees.
