Virgin Blue EBA

[keeponsmiling]

well having read more of the new proposed EBA - I have to say I am slightly confused with a few things...

Does anyone know whether home standby and optional days are the same thing? I have a bad feeling they are not, and due to this I can imagine optional days will be hard to come by. They work out to be more than what we would be getting paid on an available day however I really wonder how many of these would be placed on our 28 day roster!!! I would say 1 or 2 if we are really lucky! I would imagine there would be more home standby days but the sad thing is we will not be getting paid for them (correct me if I am wrong please). How crazy!!!!!!!!!!!!! On top of not getting paid for them we can be on call for up to 18 hours! So you basically waste an entire day cooped up inside your house and then get called out on the 12th hour to do a duty and get no extra pay for it! Number 1 - they think they are giving us the pleasure of relaxing at home - Number 2 - you can't venture 5 metres out the front door for 18 hours just in case your phone rings! Number 3 -your span of hours can change at any time.
I really just don't understand - I thought that our lifestyle wouldn't be compromised at all, but if they can change them at anytime how are you meant to plan or have a lifestyle!!! I could be reading the whole thing wrong, but it is very concerning to me (amongst many other things in this EBA). It's all very fluffy and a bit difficult to read. It looks to me like crewing are going to have nervous breakdowns with all the changing to rosters to fit in with all this new overtime, over fatigue time etc etc etc. I'm pretty sure I know how I will be voting at the moment

I can't believe the only way you can earn extra money is by these optional days (which I can already bet we won't get many on our roster, and if we do have them we won't be called out), or elect to work on your days off!! Umm we kind of need these days off to rest. I personally like the available days the way they are