Disappointed
Thread Starter
Joined: Mar 2018
Posts: 16
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From: London
Disappointed
To all that voted for 50/50 in European CMP award mechanism, I’m highly disappointed at your selfishness and utter disregard for the seniority system. It shows your true colours and the disrespect you have for your more senior colleagues.
I for one will now change my 25/75 vote to 0/100 because it will afford anyone halfway or above on the seniority list an equal or higher satisfaction rate than under a 25/75.
I for one will now change my 25/75 vote to 0/100 because it will afford anyone halfway or above on the seniority list an equal or higher satisfaction rate than under a 25/75.
Joined: Apr 2009
Posts: 898
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From: No where
I'm not sure this isn't a wind-up, but on the subject itself I have to agree. If a person is willing to compromise seniority on this issue, then they will suffer a career where other aspects of seniority are also compromised. The problem with that reality is overall it compromises the eventual value and viability of the career itself. An own goal for certain. That is why it's usually best to have the grown ups making these decisions. The peasants will always vote for free bread. Sad by predictable fact of life. 
Joined: Aug 2008
Posts: 0
Likes: 1
From: Polar Route
I’m afraid there is a fair amount of ignorance amongst the pilot group on this subject. Straight seniority (100/0) produces very low satisfaction rates in a PBS system, which is much different and worse than bidding hard lines. The nuances of why that is the case are not necessarily intuitive but I will attempt an explanation.
A 100/0 system essentially has, within the confines of training and previous month crossover patterns, the most senior pilot building his own roster. #2 builds from what is leftover and so on... This gives seniority far more control than bidding hard lines within a traditional system. Therefore, more pilots in the middle of the list (let’s call it the middle 70%) get even less of what they want than they would in a hard line system because the most desirable patterns have been cherry-picked and stacked together.
If straight seniority is truly the democratically chosen preference, then the AOAs should be pursuing a hard line bidding system, which the Company will never agree to because of the potential to run trips into leave, carryover patterns, etc. So we have a complex PBS (JCR) program, we should use it as it is designed to run, which is to get the greatest number of pilots their greatest number of preferences filled as much as possible.
I don’t know if 75/25 is the answer, but I believe it is in the ballpark. We should be looking at other airlines’ pilot groups (with similar route structures) using PBS to make this determination. Transparency is not gained by 100/0 but by having a proper pilot oversight committee imbedded within the PBS process to ensure things are being done correctly. Will this be a challenge at CX because of their decades long inclinations to manually interfere? Yes, I suppose it will. Therefore, the power of the oversight committee needs to be clearly defined from the outset.
A 100/0 system essentially has, within the confines of training and previous month crossover patterns, the most senior pilot building his own roster. #2 builds from what is leftover and so on... This gives seniority far more control than bidding hard lines within a traditional system. Therefore, more pilots in the middle of the list (let’s call it the middle 70%) get even less of what they want than they would in a hard line system because the most desirable patterns have been cherry-picked and stacked together.
If straight seniority is truly the democratically chosen preference, then the AOAs should be pursuing a hard line bidding system, which the Company will never agree to because of the potential to run trips into leave, carryover patterns, etc. So we have a complex PBS (JCR) program, we should use it as it is designed to run, which is to get the greatest number of pilots their greatest number of preferences filled as much as possible.
I don’t know if 75/25 is the answer, but I believe it is in the ballpark. We should be looking at other airlines’ pilot groups (with similar route structures) using PBS to make this determination. Transparency is not gained by 100/0 but by having a proper pilot oversight committee imbedded within the PBS process to ensure things are being done correctly. Will this be a challenge at CX because of their decades long inclinations to manually interfere? Yes, I suppose it will. Therefore, the power of the oversight committee needs to be clearly defined from the outset.
Joined: Nov 2015
Posts: 748
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From: HK-CRoC
CMP & Seniority
Sorry, being a tad cynical, I think this is all a waste of time on everyones part. Flight crew are the last CX group able to have functional input into the design/functioning of the system which means that are the lowest priority and as that's the case, will benefit the least in what it's capable of providing. Just the way it works at CX.
As long as they have ½ a floor full of clerks responding to Training Control, Crew Control, GMA, Rostering + 100's of spiteful middle and upper managers and the unabashed use of "Manual Input" is available, nothing will change.
As long as they have ½ a floor full of clerks responding to Training Control, Crew Control, GMA, Rostering + 100's of spiteful middle and upper managers and the unabashed use of "Manual Input" is available, nothing will change.
