I do agree - my feelings are that NATS management chose to apply the trustees' guidance on contribution rate to the letter in order to force this situation.
They have paid what they were required to pay - the minimum required. But, given they were already telling us there was an issue, the chose not to do something about it right there and then... reducing the future problem at source.

My point is that such mechanisms are subject to strict rules and procedures and everything they have done is within those. However, that doesn't mean they couldn't have done a lot more to address the issue.

Having received an email copy of an desperate plea from the top TU guys to please accept the deal... it would seem they are a bit nervous the vote will not go as planned. I'll be doing my bit.

EDIT: I must also add (strangely in defence of NATS) that my understanding is management did propose SMART a good while back.. but under their mandate to reject any discussion on the pensions issue completely, the TUs wouldn't entertain it. How times change.

Funny, I was told the complete opposite at my pensions briefing...i.e that the Unions had brought up the idea of SMART pensions but that Barron wouldn't accept it because he also wanted to cut costs at the same time. Who do we believe, the Unions or the management...I don't know to be honest.

Oh, and the ballot has now been put back to January apparently. I wonder why that is?? More briefings to attempt to brainwash staff in a last ditch attempt to push this through, perhaps?:rolleyes:

I've been keeping up with this thread since it began. As the majority of poster's appear to be "no" voters could I please ask you what would be acceptable?

I'm sure we're all of the opinion that doing nothing is not an option.

It's been stated on many occasions within this thread that we should not accept managements first offer (even though i'm of the opinion that this is not). But, I say again, what is acceptable to you?

I'm pretty sure that the SMART issue is pretty much a no brainer - so what would tempt us / you to vote yes? How about a cap of RPI +2% or 3%?

I've read a lot of posts who, and please correct me if I'm wrong, seem to say let's vote no just because we're p****d off at the managers - Not altogether a constructive attitude.

So let's have your figures in writing please.

Responses of "I want a better offer" will just heighten my beliefs about the people who are sipmly posting VOTE NO in big capital letters and bright colours :yuk::yuk::yuk:

I'll accept nothing less than my pension as it currently stands.
I'm willing to strike and stay on strike until I have that.
I am not open to offers and I don't have a price.

VOTE NO.

I want a better offer.
I am fed up with management.
VOTE NO.

if the ballot has been put back,i would like to expect an email asap from the union...... to save their now rubbish reputation for communicating to us meager members.
these are all last ditch attempts to get us on the yes bandwagon, and i hope for everyones sake no one falls for this garbage.
if they were so confident it would be going ahead anyway.
so, when fingers are pulled out of behinds will there be a ballot of a strike if this pension deal get forced through.
Philip james said it best with his 'depends how many vote no' quote.
And if rumours of 'that' TC ATCO who took on barron are to be belived, he will be spending the day with him soon.... i hope he has some nice questions for him regarding at least the last 30 or so posts.
voting no from the start and still a no.
and stilldarkandhungry, if you want more constructive attitudes, can you pass that on to management as they are clearly taking the piss out of us, phil james is proving this (see above)

That was the first real sign for me that they are weakening and have other offers. So when they say "there are no other options" what does that say about them? (keep it clean!)

Of course the management team have options B,C and D up their sleeve, even if the union do not.

One thing no one can accuse management of is that they are inept. They have manoeuvred the pension fund into this position, they have started to run NATS as a 'for profit' business, regardless of any mandate that stated it should not be run that way when we were first PPP'd.

Management are very good at what they are setting out to achieve, they are very effective. I do not like Barron or his cronies because of what they are intent on doing to the company. I do not like them for what they have done to morale and trust within the company since they joined.

I have the utmost respect for their abilities in as far as they are doing exactly what they have set out do do from the outset, and they don't give a s!ht if it upsets us or not.

Still Dark and Hungary

Both correct and wrong. People are p!$$ed off at the managers, but the reason some people are advocating the 'NO' vote is because they do not want to see an erosion of their pension, especially after NATS has taken from it during the good times, yet is unwilling to give it back.

Voting NO to protect your pension is still possible, whether you like the management or not. It is people who believe that staff want to vote 'No' just to give management a bloody nose who are incorrect. Giving them a bloody nose may be an added bonus, but people will vote 'yes' or 'no' because they think that is the best for the penson, not because they either like or dislike the management.

If any management read these threads (I'm sure they do), then get it into your skulls that a 'NO' vote is not neccesarily as dig at you, it's a dig at your taking from the pension fund during the good times, and the belief that despite your protestations, the fund is still viable.

As an aside, if the vote has been pushed right by a month, are we happy with that?? Is this not just another example of the management getting their way??

All the time the pension drags on, our pay deal (payable from first Jan 2009) is not getting resolved. Considering that the Bank of England says inflation may continue to drop until it hits 1% next summer, it suits management to drag everything out, then plead poverty at every turn.

If it is true about any vote being pushed back a month, why are the Union allowing it when we have been promised a vote in December??

Another example of just how far removed the Union is from its members.
I also suspect management/unions (same thing) want more time to reposition themselves and decide on some new tactics

eglnyt

There is a hole in your Cost Pass Trough argument.

I don’t recall BA making a cash call to its shareholders to pay off the US Department of Justice fine of $300m for price fixing.

Neither do I recall BA making a cash call to its shareholders to pay off the Office of Fair Trading fine of £121.5m or the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) fines or the £100m passenger compensation package they had to put into place following all these illegal activities.

So presumably the fines for these illegal activities were paid out of their revenue i.e. passed on to their customers yet we are told by NATS management the CAA would never allow our pension scheme to be funded by our customers.

During the time of BA’s price fixing fuel surcharges rose from £5 to £60 per ticket, I have seen estimates that Cost Pass Trough for our Pension would be 29p per ticket.

Cost Pass Trough is the way ahead.

Mr Jones, BA are not a regulated monopoly.

BA and Virgin are both part of the Airline Group who own 42% of NATS. Both of them have managers facing jail terms. Nice owners eh?:}
But we don't like talking about these things do we? :rolleyes:
Office of Fair Trading charges British Airways executives with price-fixing - Times Online

Four past and present executives of British Airways will appear in court next month in a criminal price-fixing prosecution brought by the Office of Fair Trading (OFT), the regulator confirmed today.
A spokesman for the City of London Magistrates court said the four have been listed to appear before a judge on September 24.
In only the second criminal prosecution of its kind in the UK, the OFT has accused the four BA executives of conspiring with their counterparts at Virgin Atlantic to fix the price of fuel surcharges on long-haul flights.
Price-fixing — which was made a specific criminal offence, called the cartel offence, in 2002 — carries a maximum sentence of five years in prison and unlimited fines.
BA has been fined £270 million for its role in the cartel after a joint investigation by the OFT and the US Department of Justice. Virgin Atlantic avoided a fine after it approached the regulators to blow the whistle on the cartel.
The two airlines have also settled a £100 million class-action lawsuit brought on behalf of passengers who were overcharged because of the cartel.

These fines alone are half of what TAG paid for their share of NATS
The Govt received £765m from the Airline Group for its share of NATS, but it had allowed the Group to borrow £700 million of that, so immediately on being PPP'd, NATS was saddled with this debt and its interest payments.Financial & Business - NATS

I know they are not a regulated monopoly.

My post was about what costs get passed on to customers. BA passes on its fines to its customers but we are told we can not fund our pension from ours.

We need to get it sorted.

DEE QUOTE
I'll accept nothing less than my pension as it currently stands.
I'm willing to strike and stay on strike until I have that.
I am not open to offers and I don't have a price.

VOTE NO.

I'm with you mate:ok:

:mad: off my pension

I would vote yes for smart pensions, and a cap, but not a different pension for new employees. that doesn't work in anones interests

I accept that something needs to be done. But I'll be voting no as in my opinion the something that needs to be done is that NATS need to pay the extra required to return the fund to 100% (at least) funding after under contributing and causing the current situation.

They caused the problem. They can fix it. I'm not losing out to fund their bonus payments. It's time to make a stand to protect ALL of our terms and conditions.

NATS wants to be a world leader? It can start with world leading terms & conditions for staff.

NO NO NO NO NO

If it does go YES then.........

YouTube - Strawbs - Part of the union 1973

VOTE NO :ok:

On the contrary the hole is in your choice of example. BA has already decided that it can't pass the cost of it's pension arrangements onto customers and taken far more drastic steps than NATS to reduce its pension costs.

With regard to the fines if you look at the BA accounts you'll see that BA has made provision in its accounts for those and has effectively reduced its profit by that amount. Technically that means the shareholders have taken that hit because it reduces the amount available for dividends and reduces the amount re-invested and re-investment is usually to the benefit of shareholders. You are right of course that ultimately anything BA pays comes from money paid by its customers and they could put up fares to recover that lost money. Whether or not they do will depend upon how cost sensitive their ticket sales are.

BA is considerably larger than NATS and can absorb much larger financial shocks without recourse to its shareholders. The two companies are far from comparable in many ways.

The Airline Group is a shareholder in a limited company just as I and many others are. If we are going to worry about the provenence of shareholders presumably we'll have to assess all members of staff to decide whether they are right and proper to hold shares.

Even if that were true nobody has yet explained quite where the money to fix it would come from. There is no pot of cash and the regulator won't increase the charges so how exactly do you expect it to be fixed ?

if this ballot has been put back i will be having a 'chat' with our union rep when i am back in this weekend... and not in a good way.
maybe a boycott of these 'extra' brainwash pension briefings is in order so they get the message.... NO ONE TURN UP!!!!!

So as well as wanting a "no" vote you also want to deprive those people who have not been able to attend a briefing the opportunity of making an informed decision. Unbelievable.

I'd be reluctant to describe them as 'briefings'.

Think more...'sales pitch'.

eglnyt

According to the management woman at my breifing...And here we were led to believe that this is completely not an option!! This is management telling us that it is still a posibility, so which is it? Simply saying that "the regulator probably wont let us pass on the costs" isn't convincing enough for me to vote yes i'm afraid. How about the management approach the regulator and say "you don't know the depth of feeling about this issue, our staff are prepared to go on strike over this so we absolutely have to pass at least some of the costs through"?!? Surely that would focus the regulaor's mind??:confused:

As this whole deal is based on assumptions and possibilities, let me make some...We sign up to this deal...the regulator actually does allow cost pass through and next year NATS posts record profits (ok this one IS a bit far fetched i'll grant you:})...they become even more profitable, take home even larger bonuses for "improving the financial health of the company"(or whatever b:mad:llocks speak it was the Barron used on NATSNET!!) meanwhile we've signed away a very, very good pension scheme and have set the company up to be sold off to the highest (or lowest!!) bidder, which, according to the union guys, is also very possible!!

Vote no (SD&H...no capital letters or bright colours:E)

FB:ok:

Your 2nd paragraph FlyBhoy is why I am a firm NO. You can just see it can't you? This gets pushed through and somehow the company ends up getting fat off it. Does any of this then get passed back to us, the workforce (ATCOS/ATSAs/Engineers/CTC)? Does it f***. More record bonuses, Barron gets an upgrade to a DBS and we get nothing.

I'm also interested in your comments about discussions taking place about cost pass through because at my briefing we were told it was a definite "no chance", and that was by the Union. There is so much inconsistency in what people are being told, how anybody can possibly vote this in on the strength of these briefings, the word of Mr Barron and a glossy pamphlet, is beyond me.

VOTE NO.

Just got the latest Prospect ATCO newsletter, nothing more than a last minute plea to vote yes, oh go on please, pretty please....

VOTE NO!

Vote still set for December it seems then. The rest, I'll let you decide upon.

So the Union does not understand that people will vote 'NO' if they believe that is in the best interests for the pension fund.

Does the Union really think so little of its members that it believes a 'NO' vote will be based on petty things such as whether we like Barron etc?

The Union (and management) appear to be of the opinion that anyone who votes 'NO' is petty and of a childish persuasion.

Get it through your thick skulls that people will vote 'NO' (or 'YES') because that is what they believe is the correct vote for the pension fund. If a 'YES' vote is really the only true way of keeping a half decent pension scheme viable, then surely the Union and Management must not be too stupid to realise that the reason people are thinking of voting 'NO' is because they, the Union and Management, have by their actions and dealings over this matter, created a deep seated feeling of mistrust and have done a poor job in the briefings.

If the briefings were done differently and not perceived to be such a hard sell of one option only, then maybe a 'YES' vote would prevail. As it is, do management really think people are stupid enough to vote 'YES' i.e. believe what they are being force fed, considering the level of morale and mistrust over so many issues since PPP?

A 'YES' vote not only says you agree with the proposals, but it says you trust and believe that NATS have done the best for the pension scheme over the recent years!!

Voting 'NO' does not mean that this is some playground tactic because we do not like Barron or whatever. Management are the immature ones if they believe a 'NO' vote is all due to some childish spat. :ugh:

If a 'NO' vote prevails, what are management going to do? Run off to mummy crying 'the workforce doesn't like us'?

DO NOT (continue to) patronise your workforce, we are an above average intelligence demographic. We are voting on the pension scheme, not on the popularity or not of the Management.

Anotherthing

Can someone please explain why voting No is in the best interest of the fund?
And I don't mean individuals benefits, but the fund as a whole?

Kinglouis

Just because I may be contemplating a Yes vote doesn't mean I'm in direct contact with management by the way. :=:=

I just love this from the branch....


Our plea would be to those
still considering a No vote that you
attend one of the remaining
briefings to be absolutely clear of
the consequences we may face
and the action you want your
Branch to take on your behalf if
the vote is not carried.

Well we don't bloody well know do we because we are / were being told at briefings that industrial action has been ruled out! W@nkers:ugh:

250kts:
i do not believe that anybody was not able to go to at least one of the briefings available to us so far.
if people haven't been yet, they obviously don't care enough or are just going to vote from hearsay.

Still Dark and HungyCould someone please explain to me why voting yes is the best thing for the fund... briefings haecertainly not convinced me that. Voting yes helps alleviate pressure on the fund and is the best solution for management.

There are probably quite a few different ways that the fund could be made viable - however NATS as a business wants to implement the one that has the smallest burden on NATS (which means a bigger burden on the employees)

A 'NO' voter is saying thet they believe that NATS (who have enjoyed contribution breaks/reduced contribution levels when our fund has performed well) should dig deeper into their pockets now that the fund is not doing as well.

The size of the deficit is directly related to the contribution break and reduced contribution levels. Therefoe NATS should be more inclined to bolster the fund out of its own pockets.

Band4All/Mr777

I have just received a copy of an e-mail sent to a colleague of mine, in which the union are virtually imploring with him to vote yes.

Not only is it an indication of how worried they are, but I believe it is totally out of oder as it is trying to influence the way a union member should vote in what is a free, supposedly democratic, ballot.

I only have a paper copy, so will type it our in full (and post it tomorrow) and let others see what they think of how the union (PCS) is behaving... I personally think they are overstepping the mark and trying to employ strong arm tactics.

That is shocking. We all know where this going now....NO. And the management and the Unions have got absolutely nobody to blame but themselves if it does. The handling of this highly sensitive and emotive issue has, at best, been hamfisted...I'd prefer to call it inept.
NATS and the Unions deserve everything they get out of this vote.

As far as I know there is currently some sort of investigation by senior managers into "falsehoods" perpetrated by someone at Union or Management level in order to strengthen the YES vote.
I can't expand on this as I don't know any more detail, and wouldn't on here anyway.
( I am wearing my serious hat here, and not trying to wind anyone up, and would not post this if untrue despite my obvious voting intention!)

If there are post them here and we can see if they are any better than the NATS/NTUS proposal.

Sorry that is just not true. Throughout the contribution break and any time at which NATS paid less than the underlying rate the scheme remained fully funded. It will almost certainly currently be in deficit at the moment because of the fall in shares but this is the first time and it is not any current deficit which is the problem. The problem is the future liability which could go up by an amount NATS says it can't afford to fund. The three main factors expected to cause that increase in liability are increased life expectancy, an increase in forecast inflation rates and a reduction in the expected rate of return on investments.

Why were these three factors not taken into account before we arrived at where we are now?
They seem fairly obvious and could they not have been rectified some time ago ?

http://static.pprune.org/images/stat...ser_online.gif An increase in life expectancy has continued since time began, so no surprises here.

http://static.pprune.org/images/stat...ser_online.gif Forecast inflation rates always vary, and the worst case scenario should have been factored in to future plans, or at least they should have erred on the side of caution.

http://static.pprune.org/images/stat...ser_online.gif Investments should be wise with little risk attached.

I still feel things have been badly managed, and it is wrong for all the staff to be penalised for their incompetence.

Eglynt:So are you saying that if NATS did not take a contribution break and paid full contribution levels when the fund was in surplus, the deficit would be the same as it is today?

Of course it wouldn't, the deficit would be smaller - therefore:

The size of the deficit is directly related to the contribution break and reduced contribution levels!

Are they obvious ? Given the size of the financial industry that relies on these figures it seems pretty unlikely that somebody wouldn't have noticed if it was. Remember the only way to measure life expectancy is to see when people die. That unfortunately tells you when that cohort died and until the end of the 80s was a pretty good guide to the next cohort but the figures suddenly shot up after that. There are a number of imponderables here. For example is some of this increased lifespan due to the fact that much of this cohort had quite an austere lifestyle at the start of their lives and if it is what will be the effect of the less austere beginning on the cohorts to come ? Remember also that a fair proportion of the fitter members of some recent cohorts never made it out of their twenties.

But until very recently shares were giving high returns with seemingly little risk so why wouldn't you invest in them. If it was as obvious as you think how come so many people had shares in the banks when they went into freefall ? Now it is clear that shares aren't so risk free pension funds are moving to less risky investments but these have lower returns so the underlying rate goes up.

Pension
 

Having studied Maths, I am struggling to see the arguement about the NATS management pension break. Yes it will have affected the pension but not on the scale some people are saying.

If however you have proof that the pension holiday has led to the huge defecit we now seem to have then please post it on NATSNET for all to see. As yet no one has shown me numbers that seem to add up.

Also everyone seems to forget all the nice pay rises that have been negotiated that all add to the underlying cost of the pension. Our own greed it would seem has also contributed to the current situation.

We also seem to have the odd rant about our T& C's, compared to nurses/police/armed forces and hundreds of other lower paid workers out there, we have got a pretty good deal overall. Perhaps some of the people who only work 18 days a month (me included) and work in a very controlled environment that ensures you are not overworked and get more than enough time off should swap places with some of the boys and girls in Afghanistan or Iraq. You might then appreciate how good a deal you have.

As for the comments about Barron and his Aston/bonuses. I hate the bonus culture NATS has for management, but until someone provides me with proof that Barron has these written into his contract I think we should refrain from making comment. It is after all a free country and he can buy whatever car he wants with his salary/allowances.

We have a well paid job with plenty of time off and you can hardly complain about being overworked for 8 hours a day. How many people think we will get public sympathy for going on strike over a reasonably good pension deal. Sure we all stand to lose a little but I personally think it is better than losing the lot.

I am not management or involved with the union, just someone who would like a pot to P$$$ in when I retire. I think we should vote on the issue not Barrons bonus/car or whether we like him as a CEO.

eglnyt

I'm sorry,I feel you are trying to defend the indefensible.