Flybe to aquire BA Connect. Crew thread. (No Spotters)-(Part 2)

[biddedout]

No one is afraid of hard work at Bacon, but they sure don’t want to return to the dark old days of BRAL and its very worst when every two sector early picked up another two sectors on the day, lates were changed to earlies, earlies were changed to lates at the last minute and with an Ops Director who believed that he owned us 24 hrs a day and he could do whatever he liked with us. It was similar in Logan, but at least it was a small enough operation for the Ops staff to return favours.

Flybe is moving into a different league, its main competitors in the Loco area might work people hard, but at least they provide roster stability. Not only that, BA are working their shorthaul pilots up to the limits, but again, with an extremely stable roster.

If as their attitude suggest, Flybe are to continue with their current daily fire-fighting and bullying into compliance approach to rostering, it is going to be a disaster. We have been there, it’s not clever and it is not sustainable. The Bacon scheduling agreement is constantly rubbished by managers (note; not by those who actually work with it and have an understanding of rostering) yet it did not cause the downfall of Bacon (Evans and his cronies saw to that that).

I am sure the Bacon reps are willing to concede areas of the agreement which may not fit the Flybe model, but this agreement has been tried and tested. It creates lifestyle stability and it works. That’s why until now, Bacon tended to retain crews, and it probably explains why despite coming from similar backgrounds (Manx/ Bral v Jersey), the current experience level in Bacon is probably three times that in Flybe. JF needs that experience (if he wants to keep his insurance bill down).

Finally, does anyone know whether the Flybe manager who has been calling Bacon pilots and threatening them into compliance been hauled over the coals yet? He damn well should be and if that’s an indication of how Flybe middle managers behave and conduct IR, then we are in for a rocky ride. This most recent event has been the last straw for most at Bacon who are trying to decide whether to give it a go or to jump. If JF and his directors are wondering why there are very few Bacon pilots left, he needs to look on his side of the fence very close to home.