Otterman, I will try to answer your queries as best I can. Firstly KLM mainline. Nothing personal but I and most of my colleagues don't want anything to do with mainline, your bases are in Holland and we all live in Britain because we're British. I would no more consider working in Holland as you would Germany or France or Russia. I joined a British company called Air UK many years ago & never once did I ever plan on moving abroad. Secondly, integration into KLC, 1/3 positions in KLC is not a fair representation of the size of KLM uk, we are bigger than that, it just makes time to command for our FO's that much longer. There has been no guarantees to us over what happens to us at our base if our aircraft is pulled out, are we then expected to move to AMS. We have a final salary pension, we have not had that guaranteed yet either. As for moving to Buzz, we have to indicate our desire to move in the next few weeks or the option is withdrawn, all this without any Buzz business plan released to us. Are they expanding? are there any new bases( a lot of us live hundreds of miles from the only current Buzz base at STN)? what are the new terms & conditions going to be ( currently we all share the same T & C's but they are not deemed suitable for a low cost operator)? Why can't we stay one pilot force & just be seconded to KLC or Buzz? Also we are told there will no longer be any UK recruitment, as we can't join the VNV that means ex KLMuk pilots under BALPA just become a smaller & smaller group until the management can just dictate any changes to our T & C's or pension etc & we are not big enough to do anything about it. How would you like to be shown a plan for your own extinction?
Believe me Otterman, we are very worried!