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CX has been sewing the seeds of their own destruction for years now. This pandemic has highlighted the companies problem of too many contracts. They would like to lay-off 1000 pilots, but the can’t because the D scale pilots are the first to go and those are the cheap pilots they want to keep. They are also mostly the locally hired pilots and the HK Government would not look kindly on a mass lay-off of local staff. CX would like to close the bases and try to get rid of the remaining A scale pilots, but due to collective agreements that would mean the potential return of some very expensive staff to HK making them more expensive. The company is stuck with a manning issue they created. So they come up with the same solution they always do, throw some money at the problem with an early retirement scheme. One years salary sounds pretty attractive, until one does some of the math and figures out it really isn’t much more than one would get through sickness and 3 months notice. No thanks, either sweeten the offer or stick to the contractual terms.
I think it's been made clear Cathay are restructuring. HK restructuring laws don't leave many options for employees, and applying "contractual terms" don't appear to be one of them.
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And NC happens to be right; pinning anyone’s hopes on future legal action in these straitened times assumes that there’ll be an entity left to sue for one thing. And is specious at best. Further, it hasn’t worked for Balpa, Unite, VC, SNPL, VNV etc.etc. all of whom are facing layoffs, despite their efforts. In most cases out of seniority and dictated by fleet, merit, supposed demerits and within countries that have allegedly superior contract “protections”.
The legal system here will be a shadow shortly of what it once was, and hamstrung by new interpretations of various laws, referred to a ‘ higher power’ just because they don’t like the result. We are ‘guest’ employees here. Always have been, always will be. Just dressed up to look slightly better than the ME3. And look how they’ve behaved.
The legal system here will be a shadow shortly of what it once was, and hamstrung by new interpretations of various laws, referred to a ‘ higher power’ just because they don’t like the result. We are ‘guest’ employees here. Always have been, always will be. Just dressed up to look slightly better than the ME3. And look how they’ve behaved.
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Court Cases
That's the fun part.10 years of gushing forth about the workers rights pretty much everywhere else but Hong Kong. Now that the difficult financial realities are enveloping airlines we're all finding out there aren't any workers rights in the face of Covid in Oz or the UK or a bunch of places. Anyone who thinks the company is going to lose a court case over who it employs and who it doesn't is completely clueless. As history repeatedly has shown.
The legal protections citizens and corporations "HAD" in HK were happily ceded to its Northern masters leaving you all with not a pot to piss in. Sadly.
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I am at heart an optimist- but then the joke goes that a pessimist is just an optimist with life experience. My views on the 'protections' on the base are coloured by my own personal union experiences with 'legal' protections in past union work.
Just because I don't think I will have a cargo fire or engine failure, doesn't mean I shouldn't be prepared for them. Hence my clarion call warning of relying on legal protection on bases - or anywhere for that matter. Anyway - enough of the pessimism.
My optimistic viewpoint.
Assumptions.
There are vaccines that work - they have not been approved. Maybe none will - but given the shear number of them, and the political and economic impetus to have them approved, we are likely to have them being administered by years end. I don't want to get into the nitty gritty on this - I just want to paint the landscape behind my predictions.
Training 4 SOs on the line is the same workload as upgrading one SO to FO, one FO to CN, or one DEFO. So I have factored the SO recruitment numbers by 4 to make the training load equivalent to upgrades.
We will have no problem recruiting pilots for the next 18months regardless of COS etc considerations.
With the vaccine assumption I assume we will be back to a significant percentage of flights by say December 2021.
For the sake of argument, let's assume we are back to 90% of schedule Dec 2021 (my personal view is closer to 100%).
Right now the 747 is about 25% of our pilots - the pax fleet is operating at say 5%-10% of normal - so overall we are probably doing say 30% of regular flying.
So August 2020 at 30% finishing this year at say, 35-40%, then increasing to say 90% by December 2021.
Now I have only done analysis of training for the last 10 years. The only year we ran at 100% training capacity was 2015. In that year our training rate was 13.6%. Two years later, thanks to moving some a/c over to KA, our training rate was 7.3% (Training captain numbers had fallen - by just over 10% I think - but training footprints had been rationalised, so I assume a theoretical max of around 12-13%).
(By Training rate I mean, in 2015, we can replace 13.6 out of every 100 pilots. This is via 4 SOs=1, or 1 DEFO, 1 SO-FO upgrade or 1 FO-CN upgrade) (The limiting factor being line training)
So if we need 90% of our workforce by end of 2021, we must have 77% of our workforce by 1/1/21 as it will take all year to train the 13.6/100.
Our training department is fully manned- in fact I was informed Dec last year it was actually over manned based on the pre covid training plan for 2020. Training Captain Numbers today are close to 2015 AFAICT (as far as I can tell).
Every 10% reduction of pilots saves, very roughly, $500m per year.
The opportunity cost for being undermanned by say 10% is in excess of 10Billion. And given we have the same number of total aircraft that we are paying leases on/depreciating etc, that 10B would roughly translate into 5B of (marginal)profitability. This might not sound like it makes sense - think of a taxi fleet of 10 cars and 30 drivers. When work is down, you fire 3 of them. Then work picks up - you cant drive them all, for all the time. So you miss out on revenue- yet maintenance, lease payments etc are based on 10 cars. The extra 3 drivers cost you salary, extra fuel/tolls but the revenue, from those last 3 drivers, is highly profitable.
Conclusions
First one - garbage in, garbage out. Like all the mathematical covid models - reality has turned out very different as Sweden is testament to. They should have lost 100,000s of people - they have lost around 7,000 (vs the other 70,000 that have died from all other causes in the last 6 months)
If we need 90% by end of 2021, we have to start the year with at least 77% (so a max of 23% can be laid off between now and years end. Given 3 months pay in lieu, that means we save one months salary this year(Dec) or very roughly $100m. We start with 77% and end up with 90% so we average 84% next year - so we save 16% for the year which is roughly $800m.
So, if we KNEW we would be at 90% end of 2021, we would save close to $1billion. If we were wrong and things ramped up by say 30June21 to 100%, then we would be out of pocket about 10B in revenue(less say 5B in fuel/route operating costs) in the first half and say $6.5B(less say $3.2B in fuel/op costs) in the second half. So we would have saved $1B on pilot costs, and lost 16.5B in revenue (or $8.2profit after marginal costs).
That's a big gamble to take - save a penny, lose a dime. the ratio is 8 to 1 in my previous example.
So my belief, based on this type of thinking, is they will keep the 'team' together - there will be some trimming but that can be done through ERS/more SLS and RORO. And maybe some culling of some dead wood while the opportunity is there. But I do not believe Damocles sword will lop off an arm or leg - just a haircut at worst.
Or as financial analysts like to say, the risk is to the upside. It is asymmetric risk - a little extra cost (keeping pilots) is an order of magnitude less than the loss to profitability of the most pessimistic outcomes are wrong.
BTW, I have no inside knowledge - I am no longer in the union - I am not in management - I am just doing observational analysis.
So, no job/base is safe, but that doesn't mean anything is likely to happen either. Assume the worst, hope for the best!
(Did I mention I am an optimist? I hope my optimism isn't misplaced!)
Just because I don't think I will have a cargo fire or engine failure, doesn't mean I shouldn't be prepared for them. Hence my clarion call warning of relying on legal protection on bases - or anywhere for that matter. Anyway - enough of the pessimism.
My optimistic viewpoint.
Assumptions.
There are vaccines that work - they have not been approved. Maybe none will - but given the shear number of them, and the political and economic impetus to have them approved, we are likely to have them being administered by years end. I don't want to get into the nitty gritty on this - I just want to paint the landscape behind my predictions.
Training 4 SOs on the line is the same workload as upgrading one SO to FO, one FO to CN, or one DEFO. So I have factored the SO recruitment numbers by 4 to make the training load equivalent to upgrades.
We will have no problem recruiting pilots for the next 18months regardless of COS etc considerations.
With the vaccine assumption I assume we will be back to a significant percentage of flights by say December 2021.
For the sake of argument, let's assume we are back to 90% of schedule Dec 2021 (my personal view is closer to 100%).
Right now the 747 is about 25% of our pilots - the pax fleet is operating at say 5%-10% of normal - so overall we are probably doing say 30% of regular flying.
So August 2020 at 30% finishing this year at say, 35-40%, then increasing to say 90% by December 2021.
Now I have only done analysis of training for the last 10 years. The only year we ran at 100% training capacity was 2015. In that year our training rate was 13.6%. Two years later, thanks to moving some a/c over to KA, our training rate was 7.3% (Training captain numbers had fallen - by just over 10% I think - but training footprints had been rationalised, so I assume a theoretical max of around 12-13%).
(By Training rate I mean, in 2015, we can replace 13.6 out of every 100 pilots. This is via 4 SOs=1, or 1 DEFO, 1 SO-FO upgrade or 1 FO-CN upgrade) (The limiting factor being line training)
So if we need 90% of our workforce by end of 2021, we must have 77% of our workforce by 1/1/21 as it will take all year to train the 13.6/100.
Our training department is fully manned- in fact I was informed Dec last year it was actually over manned based on the pre covid training plan for 2020. Training Captain Numbers today are close to 2015 AFAICT (as far as I can tell).
Every 10% reduction of pilots saves, very roughly, $500m per year.
The opportunity cost for being undermanned by say 10% is in excess of 10Billion. And given we have the same number of total aircraft that we are paying leases on/depreciating etc, that 10B would roughly translate into 5B of (marginal)profitability. This might not sound like it makes sense - think of a taxi fleet of 10 cars and 30 drivers. When work is down, you fire 3 of them. Then work picks up - you cant drive them all, for all the time. So you miss out on revenue- yet maintenance, lease payments etc are based on 10 cars. The extra 3 drivers cost you salary, extra fuel/tolls but the revenue, from those last 3 drivers, is highly profitable.
Conclusions
First one - garbage in, garbage out. Like all the mathematical covid models - reality has turned out very different as Sweden is testament to. They should have lost 100,000s of people - they have lost around 7,000 (vs the other 70,000 that have died from all other causes in the last 6 months)
If we need 90% by end of 2021, we have to start the year with at least 77% (so a max of 23% can be laid off between now and years end. Given 3 months pay in lieu, that means we save one months salary this year(Dec) or very roughly $100m. We start with 77% and end up with 90% so we average 84% next year - so we save 16% for the year which is roughly $800m.
So, if we KNEW we would be at 90% end of 2021, we would save close to $1billion. If we were wrong and things ramped up by say 30June21 to 100%, then we would be out of pocket about 10B in revenue(less say 5B in fuel/route operating costs) in the first half and say $6.5B(less say $3.2B in fuel/op costs) in the second half. So we would have saved $1B on pilot costs, and lost 16.5B in revenue (or $8.2profit after marginal costs).
That's a big gamble to take - save a penny, lose a dime. the ratio is 8 to 1 in my previous example.
So my belief, based on this type of thinking, is they will keep the 'team' together - there will be some trimming but that can be done through ERS/more SLS and RORO. And maybe some culling of some dead wood while the opportunity is there. But I do not believe Damocles sword will lop off an arm or leg - just a haircut at worst.
Or as financial analysts like to say, the risk is to the upside. It is asymmetric risk - a little extra cost (keeping pilots) is an order of magnitude less than the loss to profitability of the most pessimistic outcomes are wrong.
BTW, I have no inside knowledge - I am no longer in the union - I am not in management - I am just doing observational analysis.
So, no job/base is safe, but that doesn't mean anything is likely to happen either. Assume the worst, hope for the best!
(Did I mention I am an optimist? I hope my optimism isn't misplaced!)
Last edited by Numero Crunchero; 13th Aug 2020 at 06:55.
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I am at heart an optimist- but then the joke goes that a pessimist is just an optimist with life experience. My views on the 'protections' on the base are coloured by my own personal union experiences with 'legal' protections in past union work.
Just because I don't think I will have a cargo fire or engine failure, doesn't mean I shouldn't be prepared for them. Hence my clarion call warning of relying on legal protection on bases - or anywhere for that matter. Anyway - enough of the pessimism.
My optimistic viewpoint.
Assumptions.
There are vaccines that work - they have not been approved. Maybe none will - but given the shear number of them, and the political and economic impetus to have them approved, we are likely to have them being administered by years end. I don't want to get into the nitty gritty on this - I just want to paint the landscape behind my predictions.
Training 4 SOs on the line is the same workload as upgrading one SO to FO, one FO to CN, or one DEFO. So I have factored the SO recruitment numbers by 4 to make the training load equivalent to upgrades.
We will have no problem recruiting pilots for the next 18months regardless of COS etc considerations.
With the vaccine assumption I assume we will be back to a significant percentage of flights by say December 2021.
For the sake of argument, let's assume we are back to 90% of schedule Dec 2021 (my personal view is closer to 100%).
Right now the 747 is about 25% of our pilots - the pax fleet is operating at say 5%-10% of normal - so overall we are probably doing say 30% of regular flying.
So August 2020 at 30% finishing this year at say, 35-40%, then increasing to say 90% by December 2021.
Now I have only done analysis of training for the last 10 years. The only year we ran at 100% training capacity was 2015. In that year our training rate was 13.6%. Two years later, thanks to moving some a/c over to KA, our training rate was 7.3% (Training captain numbers had fallen - by just over 10% I think - but training footprints had been rationalised, so I assume a theoretical max of around 12-13%).
(By Training rate I mean, in 2015, we can replace 13.6 out of every 100 pilots. This is via 4 SOs=1, or 1 DEFO, 1 SO-FO upgrade or 1 FO-CN upgrade) (The limiting factor being line training)
So if we need 90% of our workforce by end of 2021, we must have 77% of our workforce by 1/1/21 as it will take all year to train the 13.6/100.
Our training department is fully manned- in fact I was informed Dec last year it was actually over manned based on the pre covid training plan for 2020. Training Captain Numbers today are close to 2015 AFAICT (as far as I can tell).
Every 10% reduction of pilots saves, very roughly, $500m per year.
The opportunity cost for being undermanned by say 10% is in excess of 10Billion. And given we have the same number of total aircraft that we are paying leases on/depreciating etc, that 10B would roughly translate into 5B of (marginal)profitability. This might not sound like it makes sense - think of a taxi fleet of 10 cars and 30 drivers. When work is down, you fire 3 of them. Then work picks up - you cant drive them all, for all the time. So you miss out on revenue- yet maintenance, lease payments etc are based on 10 cars. The extra 3 drivers cost you salary, extra fuel/tolls but the revenue, from those last 3 drivers, is highly profitable.
Conclusions
First one - garbage in, garbage out. Like all the mathematical covid models - reality has turned out very different as Sweden is testament to. They should have lost 100,000s of people - they have lost around 7,000 (vs the other 70,000 that have died from all other course in the last 6 months)
If we need 90% by end of 2021, we have to start the year with at least 77% (so a max of 23% can be laid off between now and years end. Given 3 months pay in lieu, that means we save one months salary this year(Dec) or very roughly $100m. We start with 77% and end up with 90% so we average 84% next year - so we save 16% for the year which is roughly $800m.
So, if we KNEW we would be at 90% end of 2021, we would save close to $1billion. If we were wrong and things ramped up by say 30June21 to 100%, then we would be out of pocket about 10B in revenue(less say 5B in fuel/route operating costs) in the first half and say $6.5B(less say $3.2B in fuel/op costs) in the second half. So we would have saved $1B on pilot costs, and lost 16.5B in revenue (or $8.2profit after marginal costs).
That's a big gamble to take - save a penny, lose a dime. the ratio is 8 to 1 in my previous example.
So my belief, based on this type of thinking, is they will keep the 'team' together - there will be some trimming but that can be done through ERS/more SLS and RORO. And maybe some culling of some dead wood while the opportunity is there. But I do not believe Damocles sword will lop off an arm or leg - just a haircut at worst.
Or as financial analysts like to say, the risk is to the upside. It is asymmetric risk - a little extra cost (keeping pilots) is an order of magnitude less than the loss to profitability of the most pessimistic outcomes are wrong.
BTW, I have no inside knowledge - I am no longer in the union - I am not in management - I am just doing observational analysis.
So, no job/base is safe, but that doesn't mean anything is likely to happen either. Assume the worst, hope for the best!
(Did I mention I am an optimist? I hope my optimism isn't misplaced!)
Just because I don't think I will have a cargo fire or engine failure, doesn't mean I shouldn't be prepared for them. Hence my clarion call warning of relying on legal protection on bases - or anywhere for that matter. Anyway - enough of the pessimism.
My optimistic viewpoint.
Assumptions.
There are vaccines that work - they have not been approved. Maybe none will - but given the shear number of them, and the political and economic impetus to have them approved, we are likely to have them being administered by years end. I don't want to get into the nitty gritty on this - I just want to paint the landscape behind my predictions.
Training 4 SOs on the line is the same workload as upgrading one SO to FO, one FO to CN, or one DEFO. So I have factored the SO recruitment numbers by 4 to make the training load equivalent to upgrades.
We will have no problem recruiting pilots for the next 18months regardless of COS etc considerations.
With the vaccine assumption I assume we will be back to a significant percentage of flights by say December 2021.
For the sake of argument, let's assume we are back to 90% of schedule Dec 2021 (my personal view is closer to 100%).
Right now the 747 is about 25% of our pilots - the pax fleet is operating at say 5%-10% of normal - so overall we are probably doing say 30% of regular flying.
So August 2020 at 30% finishing this year at say, 35-40%, then increasing to say 90% by December 2021.
Now I have only done analysis of training for the last 10 years. The only year we ran at 100% training capacity was 2015. In that year our training rate was 13.6%. Two years later, thanks to moving some a/c over to KA, our training rate was 7.3% (Training captain numbers had fallen - by just over 10% I think - but training footprints had been rationalised, so I assume a theoretical max of around 12-13%).
(By Training rate I mean, in 2015, we can replace 13.6 out of every 100 pilots. This is via 4 SOs=1, or 1 DEFO, 1 SO-FO upgrade or 1 FO-CN upgrade) (The limiting factor being line training)
So if we need 90% of our workforce by end of 2021, we must have 77% of our workforce by 1/1/21 as it will take all year to train the 13.6/100.
Our training department is fully manned- in fact I was informed Dec last year it was actually over manned based on the pre covid training plan for 2020. Training Captain Numbers today are close to 2015 AFAICT (as far as I can tell).
Every 10% reduction of pilots saves, very roughly, $500m per year.
The opportunity cost for being undermanned by say 10% is in excess of 10Billion. And given we have the same number of total aircraft that we are paying leases on/depreciating etc, that 10B would roughly translate into 5B of (marginal)profitability. This might not sound like it makes sense - think of a taxi fleet of 10 cars and 30 drivers. When work is down, you fire 3 of them. Then work picks up - you cant drive them all, for all the time. So you miss out on revenue- yet maintenance, lease payments etc are based on 10 cars. The extra 3 drivers cost you salary, extra fuel/tolls but the revenue, from those last 3 drivers, is highly profitable.
Conclusions
First one - garbage in, garbage out. Like all the mathematical covid models - reality has turned out very different as Sweden is testament to. They should have lost 100,000s of people - they have lost around 7,000 (vs the other 70,000 that have died from all other course in the last 6 months)
If we need 90% by end of 2021, we have to start the year with at least 77% (so a max of 23% can be laid off between now and years end. Given 3 months pay in lieu, that means we save one months salary this year(Dec) or very roughly $100m. We start with 77% and end up with 90% so we average 84% next year - so we save 16% for the year which is roughly $800m.
So, if we KNEW we would be at 90% end of 2021, we would save close to $1billion. If we were wrong and things ramped up by say 30June21 to 100%, then we would be out of pocket about 10B in revenue(less say 5B in fuel/route operating costs) in the first half and say $6.5B(less say $3.2B in fuel/op costs) in the second half. So we would have saved $1B on pilot costs, and lost 16.5B in revenue (or $8.2profit after marginal costs).
That's a big gamble to take - save a penny, lose a dime. the ratio is 8 to 1 in my previous example.
So my belief, based on this type of thinking, is they will keep the 'team' together - there will be some trimming but that can be done through ERS/more SLS and RORO. And maybe some culling of some dead wood while the opportunity is there. But I do not believe Damocles sword will lop off an arm or leg - just a haircut at worst.
Or as financial analysts like to say, the risk is to the upside. It is asymmetric risk - a little extra cost (keeping pilots) is an order of magnitude less than the loss to profitability of the most pessimistic outcomes are wrong.
BTW, I have no inside knowledge - I am no longer in the union - I am not in management - I am just doing observational analysis.
So, no job/base is safe, but that doesn't mean anything is likely to happen either. Assume the worst, hope for the best!
(Did I mention I am an optimist? I hope my optimism isn't misplaced!)
So what is Emirates thinking laying off ( not furlough- laid off permanently) about 1500 to 1800 of their 4500 pilots???
If the above applies to major airlines in general what are they thinking?
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What I will say - they had over 10% attrition a couple of years ago. Plus they were growing. So I suspect their training 'machine' might be 15-20% not 13% like ours. And if they haven't been laying off trainers then that means they can train 450-900 pilots per year. So - will anyone be 'voluntarily' leaving an airline any time soon? No jobs to go to. So they can ramp up 900+ pilots per year (assuming their training was at max capacity when I last looked). Looks like they think they will be at say 80% by end of 2021 and maybe close to 100% end of 2022.
It all comes down to the assumptions. Which is why, IMHO, there is no plan for us at the moment. Who knows what will happen 6 months from now let alone 18 months from now. That lack of knowledge doesn't stop people making predictions (myself included)
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NC,
I’ve always respected your opinion and do this time too. But any good pilot solves a problem by clarifying what the problem is. While a vaccine will undoubtedly save many lives, the problem the airline industry faces is the same problem every business and family is facing. A financial one, and the virus has let the debt bubble genie out of the bottle. Putting the cork back in won’t help.
With respect you’ve spent virtually your entire working life as either a public servant or at an airline that has run itself like a good government bureaucracy. Your above calculations could have come straight from Canberra. Back in the real world in a major recession most people get hurt badly. Those that are fortunate enough to keep their jobs do so on a lowered remuneration package while watching their perceived wealth vanish as asset prices drop, leading to banks issuing margin calls and the spiral dive begins.
It takes a few years for a recession to be reflected in unemployment numbers and the negative influence this has on expiring EBA’s. (Only public servants get their 2 to 3% a year regardless of what’s happening in the real world).
The belt tightening hasn’t really started as it generally doesn’t until the pay check falls or disappears, but when it does then aviation, tourism, business spending etc drops off dramatically.
This pandemic hasn’t occurred in a vacuum. There was a very good reason the world entered 2020 with money being virtually free for anyone who wanted it. The world economy was completely broken. Once the virus is controlled the world economy will still be broken, just even more so. Believing we can simply reset to a previous date like resetting a computer is overly simplistic. Even if we could do that, why pick a date when it was broken anyway? Why not pick a date when things were semi normal. Pre-GFC would be a good start. And that would be my guess as to the size of most airlines post-virus.
I’ve always respected your opinion and do this time too. But any good pilot solves a problem by clarifying what the problem is. While a vaccine will undoubtedly save many lives, the problem the airline industry faces is the same problem every business and family is facing. A financial one, and the virus has let the debt bubble genie out of the bottle. Putting the cork back in won’t help.
With respect you’ve spent virtually your entire working life as either a public servant or at an airline that has run itself like a good government bureaucracy. Your above calculations could have come straight from Canberra. Back in the real world in a major recession most people get hurt badly. Those that are fortunate enough to keep their jobs do so on a lowered remuneration package while watching their perceived wealth vanish as asset prices drop, leading to banks issuing margin calls and the spiral dive begins.
It takes a few years for a recession to be reflected in unemployment numbers and the negative influence this has on expiring EBA’s. (Only public servants get their 2 to 3% a year regardless of what’s happening in the real world).
The belt tightening hasn’t really started as it generally doesn’t until the pay check falls or disappears, but when it does then aviation, tourism, business spending etc drops off dramatically.
This pandemic hasn’t occurred in a vacuum. There was a very good reason the world entered 2020 with money being virtually free for anyone who wanted it. The world economy was completely broken. Once the virus is controlled the world economy will still be broken, just even more so. Believing we can simply reset to a previous date like resetting a computer is overly simplistic. Even if we could do that, why pick a date when it was broken anyway? Why not pick a date when things were semi normal. Pre-GFC would be a good start. And that would be my guess as to the size of most airlines post-virus.
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Nice work, NC.
If only we had had that kind of analysis during the "commitment days" instead of airy-fairy non-dimensional graphs showing costs intersecting with revenue at some point in the future...........
How much commercial risk would there be for a company like CX to be transparent with this type of planning? ie, how commercially sensitive could it be, and how would a (potential) competitor use this info?
If only we had had that kind of analysis during the "commitment days" instead of airy-fairy non-dimensional graphs showing costs intersecting with revenue at some point in the future...........
How much commercial risk would there be for a company like CX to be transparent with this type of planning? ie, how commercially sensitive could it be, and how would a (potential) competitor use this info?
With the vaccine assumption I assume we will be back to a significant percentage of flights by say December 2021. For the sake of argument, let's assume we are back to 90% of schedule Dec 2021 (my personal view is closer to 100%).
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Good point Dan - but I think that was already factored by Dec 2019. Hence the reason for us having too many trainers for the plan for 2020 onwards - I assume that was in response to the political situation. Though it is arguable whether it is now better, worse or the same as it looked in Dec 2019 with all the travel disrupting protests going on at the time.
Meanwhile ICAO, and other major airlines, predicting a return to preCOVID air travel levels in 2022, then 2023, and now 2024.
On what real basis can NC make the assumption that CX will return to 90% preCOVID levels by end of 2021?
Is this solely based on an effective vaccination program for billions of people in the first few months of 2021?
“Keep the team together” concept is a great excuse for unilateral imposition of lower contracts. Never miss the opportunity of a crisis.....
On what real basis can NC make the assumption that CX will return to 90% preCOVID levels by end of 2021?
Is this solely based on an effective vaccination program for billions of people in the first few months of 2021?
“Keep the team together” concept is a great excuse for unilateral imposition of lower contracts. Never miss the opportunity of a crisis.....
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Icao put out a report yesterday - with many predictions going out to Mar2021.
On 12Aug20, overall, the industry is down 60% on 2019 seat capacity (btw, as pilots, we care about ASK because they pay us to fly not make revenue - RPK/yield is profitability - profitable or not, we will be flying more).
For December 2020 there are a range of scenarios predicting 56-89% of 2019 levels. (the high level assumes V shaped recovery etc)
For end of March 2021, their range of scenarios predict 66-89% of flights (seat capacity - actual figures are 63-85% when compared to what was originally planned for 2021 pre covid - so taking off that 2019-2021 growth gives you comparison to 2019 numbers).
US domestic and Asia Pacific flying has been far more resilient than just international according to them(reduction of 20-25% less than international).
Interesting other figures from their report yesterday - China was flying 85% in July 2020 vs July 2019.
Middle East flying is down by about 75% vs last year - Asia Pacific is down 50% vs last year. That might explain EK's more draconian actions.
And just for fun, and to fill in my SLS2 time, I went back and looked at air travel post 9/11. It took 6 months for ASK to recover 90% of pre 9/11 numbers - it took 3 years for it to recover 100%.
TLDR - ICAO predict 66-89% flying end of March 2021. I am assuming they will pick up another 1-24% in the following 9 months to make my 90% assumption accurate.
So yeah - I am pretty happy with my 90%+ prediction for 17months from now.
PS Farman yes it might be several years longer to get to 100% 2019 levels - just like it took 6months to get to 90% post 9/11 but another 2.5 years to get back to 100%. But hardly a reason to be so pessimistic.
On 12Aug20, overall, the industry is down 60% on 2019 seat capacity (btw, as pilots, we care about ASK because they pay us to fly not make revenue - RPK/yield is profitability - profitable or not, we will be flying more).
For December 2020 there are a range of scenarios predicting 56-89% of 2019 levels. (the high level assumes V shaped recovery etc)
For end of March 2021, their range of scenarios predict 66-89% of flights (seat capacity - actual figures are 63-85% when compared to what was originally planned for 2021 pre covid - so taking off that 2019-2021 growth gives you comparison to 2019 numbers).
US domestic and Asia Pacific flying has been far more resilient than just international according to them(reduction of 20-25% less than international).
Interesting other figures from their report yesterday - China was flying 85% in July 2020 vs July 2019.
Middle East flying is down by about 75% vs last year - Asia Pacific is down 50% vs last year. That might explain EK's more draconian actions.
And just for fun, and to fill in my SLS2 time, I went back and looked at air travel post 9/11. It took 6 months for ASK to recover 90% of pre 9/11 numbers - it took 3 years for it to recover 100%.
TLDR - ICAO predict 66-89% flying end of March 2021. I am assuming they will pick up another 1-24% in the following 9 months to make my 90% assumption accurate.
So yeah - I am pretty happy with my 90%+ prediction for 17months from now.
PS Farman yes it might be several years longer to get to 100% 2019 levels - just like it took 6months to get to 90% post 9/11 but another 2.5 years to get back to 100%. But hardly a reason to be so pessimistic.
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NC, as always an interesting post.
I would argue there is one major difference to any of the previous scenarios however.
There is no solution yet, and nobody knows if and when we will have one. It is not a singular shock as 911, it is a constantly present suppression.
Which makes prediction pure guess work.
PS 85% of Chinese domestical (!) traffic returned, not 85 % of the total
I would argue there is one major difference to any of the previous scenarios however.
There is no solution yet, and nobody knows if and when we will have one. It is not a singular shock as 911, it is a constantly present suppression.
Which makes prediction pure guess work.
PS 85% of Chinese domestical (!) traffic returned, not 85 % of the total
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Icao put out a report yesterday - with many predictions going out to Mar2021.
On 12Aug20, overall, the industry is down 60% on 2019 seat capacity (btw, as pilots, we care about ASK because they pay us to fly not make revenue - RPK/yield is profitability - profitable or not, we will be flying more).
For December 2020 there are a range of scenarios predicting 56-89% of 2019 levels. (the high level assumes V shaped recovery etc)
For end of March 2021, their range of scenarios predict 66-89% of flights (seat capacity - actual figures are 63-85% when compared to what was originally planned for 2021 pre covid - so taking off that 2019-2021 growth gives you comparison to 2019 numbers).
US domestic and Asia Pacific flying has been far more resilient than just international according to them(reduction of 20-25% less than international).
Interesting other figures from their report yesterday - China was flying 85% in July 2020 vs July 2019.
Middle East flying is down by about 75% vs last year - Asia Pacific is down 50% vs last year. That might explain EK's more draconian actions.
And just for fun, and to fill in my SLS2 time, I went back and looked at air travel post 9/11. It took 6 months for ASK to recover 90% of pre 9/11 numbers - it took 3 years for it to recover 100%.
TLDR - ICAO predict 66-89% flying end of March 2021. I am assuming they will pick up another 1-24% in the following 9 months to make my 90% assumption accurate.
So yeah - I am pretty happy with my 90%+ prediction for 17months from now.
PS Farman yes it might be several years longer to get to 100% 2019 levels - just like it took 6months to get to 90% post 9/11 but another 2.5 years to get back to 100%. But hardly a reason to be so pessimistic.
On 12Aug20, overall, the industry is down 60% on 2019 seat capacity (btw, as pilots, we care about ASK because they pay us to fly not make revenue - RPK/yield is profitability - profitable or not, we will be flying more).
For December 2020 there are a range of scenarios predicting 56-89% of 2019 levels. (the high level assumes V shaped recovery etc)
For end of March 2021, their range of scenarios predict 66-89% of flights (seat capacity - actual figures are 63-85% when compared to what was originally planned for 2021 pre covid - so taking off that 2019-2021 growth gives you comparison to 2019 numbers).
US domestic and Asia Pacific flying has been far more resilient than just international according to them(reduction of 20-25% less than international).
Interesting other figures from their report yesterday - China was flying 85% in July 2020 vs July 2019.
Middle East flying is down by about 75% vs last year - Asia Pacific is down 50% vs last year. That might explain EK's more draconian actions.
And just for fun, and to fill in my SLS2 time, I went back and looked at air travel post 9/11. It took 6 months for ASK to recover 90% of pre 9/11 numbers - it took 3 years for it to recover 100%.
TLDR - ICAO predict 66-89% flying end of March 2021. I am assuming they will pick up another 1-24% in the following 9 months to make my 90% assumption accurate.
So yeah - I am pretty happy with my 90%+ prediction for 17months from now.
PS Farman yes it might be several years longer to get to 100% 2019 levels - just like it took 6months to get to 90% post 9/11 but another 2.5 years to get back to 100%. But hardly a reason to be so pessimistic.
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Ha ha ha.
Ok you guys win - either ICAO is too pessimistic or too optimistic. Farman - you are right - ICAO is pessimistic enough - Progress Wanchai you are also right - ICAO are too optimistic ;-)
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A pre-GFC sized airline would be about a 30% to 40% reduction on current size. Broadly inline with the adjustment other international airlines are making. Hardly an unreasonable stab in the dark.
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Missing Pieces
In all the above posts most every note and response is made or predicted entirely on the ebbing of this #ChinaVirus apocalypse and that, on its demise, spending, travel and populations thoughts processes will magically pop back to pre #WuhanVirus days.
CX sits bleeding cash micro managing these events, events that cannot be "managed' , hoping and betting (CX has a spectacular history in losing BILLIONS on bets) that when the virus is under control, "most' of pre virus business will return.
If this is the case, then why have many very large airlines already announced or affected massive layoffs? Has CX missed something or is the 9th floor Prince brigade stuck in a wishful thought vortex ?
One thing not mentioned is the global drop in GDP. The US for example will lose ~ 5% GDP in 2020 equating to 1.07 TRILLION dollars. This is money that will not be manufactured, sold, invested, earned as salary etc. it simply evaporates from the economy and its population.
The US accounts for ~ 15% of world GDP making the loss of world GDP at ~ 7.14 TRILLION dollars
Mind numbing numbers to be sure however this estimate is on the absolute low side as many countries may be near a 20% drop (as is the UK).
What does this mean?
Many economists posit that these drops in GDP will take 4 > 10 years to recover to pre virus days due to the fundamental damage the virus is wreaking on global economies and it's not hard to extrapolate the above numbers over a longer term while of course (hopefully) decreasing over time.
Economists are also speculating that this virus driven armageddon may cause "permanent" changes to a populations spending habits.. ??
The UK's 20% 2nd quarter drop in GDP was, as quoted, a result of a 70% drop in "Private Consumption" e.g. travel and vacation i.e. DISCRETIONAL SPENDING
I am sure each and every one of you have already had thoughts or family talks on cutting Discretional Spending AS HAVE every other person and corporation in the world.. Consider how this will affect travel, both personal AND corporate, and vacation spending over the next 5 > 10 years and perhaps forever ?
Also consider how this virus has eviscerated personal and corporate savings/balance sheets worldwide and the cumulative effect this will have on all types of travel !!
Thoughts ?
CX sits bleeding cash micro managing these events, events that cannot be "managed' , hoping and betting (CX has a spectacular history in losing BILLIONS on bets) that when the virus is under control, "most' of pre virus business will return.
If this is the case, then why have many very large airlines already announced or affected massive layoffs? Has CX missed something or is the 9th floor Prince brigade stuck in a wishful thought vortex ?
One thing not mentioned is the global drop in GDP. The US for example will lose ~ 5% GDP in 2020 equating to 1.07 TRILLION dollars. This is money that will not be manufactured, sold, invested, earned as salary etc. it simply evaporates from the economy and its population.
The US accounts for ~ 15% of world GDP making the loss of world GDP at ~ 7.14 TRILLION dollars
Mind numbing numbers to be sure however this estimate is on the absolute low side as many countries may be near a 20% drop (as is the UK).What does this mean?
Many economists posit that these drops in GDP will take 4 > 10 years to recover to pre virus days due to the fundamental damage the virus is wreaking on global economies and it's not hard to extrapolate the above numbers over a longer term while of course (hopefully) decreasing over time.
Economists are also speculating that this virus driven armageddon may cause "permanent" changes to a populations spending habits.. ??
The UK's 20% 2nd quarter drop in GDP was, as quoted, a result of a 70% drop in "Private Consumption" e.g. travel and vacation i.e. DISCRETIONAL SPENDING
I am sure each and every one of you have already had thoughts or family talks on cutting Discretional Spending AS HAVE every other person and corporation in the world.. Consider how this will affect travel, both personal AND corporate, and vacation spending over the next 5 > 10 years and perhaps forever ?
Also consider how this virus has eviscerated personal and corporate savings/balance sheets worldwide and the cumulative effect this will have on all types of travel !!
Thoughts ?
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Not quite sure where this would fit in the forums but I received this one early this morning. Doing its rounds by the looks of it.
All cockpit crews on COS99, COS08 & COS18 will sign COS20, COS20 will be roughly the same as COS18, and both are based on productivity, but the basic pay will be 10% less than COS18. All COS99 or COS08 ghost expat Housing will be the same as the LEP, and the new HKPA will add 15% to all ranks. As for the education allowance, HKD50,000 will be given to each child, up to 3. In terms of P-fund, everyone will be maxed by 15%. Reduced to 8%. Annual leave captain 36 days; FO 24 days; SO 18 days. After the company is summoned, it will be given two weeks to consider whether to sign over, and those who refuse will be compensated for three months of labor in accordance with the labor law. On long term service payment.
As for KA cockpit, the company will streamline 40% of its staff. In other words, it will be based on seniority to cut, and the other 60% will sign COS20. If the other 60% of the employees choose to leave, it will be reduced by 40%. If seniority makes up, if you cannot join back, employees will be compensated in accordance with labor laws. 40% of colleagues who leave will also be given priority in the future.
UO cockpit crew also needs to sign COS20, but there is no need for reduction.
All CX, KA & UO cockpit crew companies have the final decision to be assigned to any company.
As for KA cockpit, the company will streamline 40% of its staff. In other words, it will be based on seniority to cut, and the other 60% will sign COS20. If the other 60% of the employees choose to leave, it will be reduced by 40%. If seniority makes up, if you cannot join back, employees will be compensated in accordance with labor laws. 40% of colleagues who leave will also be given priority in the future.
UO cockpit crew also needs to sign COS20, but there is no need for reduction.
All CX, KA & UO cockpit crew companies have the final decision to be assigned to any company.