Anna's Antics
 

Well it looks like the North Korean penchant for brinkmanship is catching on in the DFO's office.

I'll leave it to others to pull apart the bulk of the propaganda emailed tonight, save to say, I did have a giggle that she's sent out the best ad for opening the bases- complete with a little pie chart showing the cost saving.

If they actually believe that we believe this tale of doom, it must be bordering on negligence that they allow people they consider that dumb to fly their aircraft.

Dream on Anna! You get zero from me, i'll stay on my current contract!

Dream on Anna! You get zero from me, i'll stay on my current contract!

Dream on. Your AOA will sell you out.

Which part of "the ARAPA contract expires" don't you understand?

I bet that Anna's "assistance is very high and well above market rates for accommodation and rental assistance, so this is an area in which significant savings can be made"!!!

This entire letter is full of fancy graphs and contradictions.

Pilots might take this email seriously if she and her executive management team lead by example.

Anna.. my Ms's is with a major bank..

her salary is higher than mine.

Education.. 250K per child

Housing.. straight cash... (so we use Cx's and save hers-- F *U Swire)

I'm sorry.. Our package is far below the average expat in HK.


You will get nothing..

Looks like her email was only addressed to the Hong Kong officers. Seems like none of the based crew received it. Interesting ......

Plain and simple, stop the whipsaw, no concessions, no giving in, keep on doing what we are doing.

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/artic...o-living-trend

box

AOA, ffs, get the hell out of the room. How are you even entertaining this BS

Highest cost base in HKG. Hmmm. Now I wonder what the solution can be??

I guess you didn't learn much on that Clown course you took at Stanford Night college.

Titanic comes to mind. Combine this with an armed conflict between the USA and North Korea and our yields will be non existent. Time to Leave if you ask me.

I will address only the charts since AT's words are meaningless drivel. My assumption is that the charts have a chance at honesty.

Chart #1 Shows both gross and net yields falling but still positive. This is to be expected. Fuel prices are down and ticket prices, over time, are bound to follow. This chart does not share why CX has hemorrhaged cash over the past few years because the net yield is still in strongly positive territory. Translated, that means CX is still making money on its core business despite the poor management. It's fuel (and currency?) hedges that are depleting the balance sheet, not yours and my compensation packages. Without poor hedges, CX would not have lost a penny.

Charts A and B show an increase in cargo capacity of 17.5% against a correlating increase in crew costs of 29.2%. My question is this, is chart B corrected for inflation? I bet it's not. If not, then costs are likely very similar to the increase in ATKs.

Chart C again shows increasing crew costs by about 10%. Again, same question, is this corrected for inflation? If not, then it is a meaningless chart. In fact, this chart properly corrected for inflation may well show a decrease in crew costs. How else would all the cadets be accounted for? Are we to believe that crew costs more now with a much lower percentage of expats than in 2012?

The last chart seems to show the disparate costs associated with the HK based CX pilots. Another meaningless chart! Without knowing the portion of CX/KA flying that is crewed by these pilots, the graph tells us nothing other than HK based CX pilots are more numerous than their bases colleagues or KA. No duh! In fact KA pilots are on better contracts than CX pilots and are far less efficient in terms of block hours flown. This chart says nothing more than HK based CX pilots have the biggest targets on their back purely by the fact that we are the largest demographic.

This whole update is pure drivel supported by meaningless charts.

Is the only reason Crew costs have gone up because we employed MORE Crew?

Shock horror.....we certainly didn't get paid more......

You couldn't make this stuff up.

Pretty bullish!t is still bullish!t -- even with 27 8x10 color glossy pictures with circles and arrows and a paragraph on the back of each one.

Well worded bullish!t is still bullish!t

Bullsh!t is great when used for its intended purpose but isn't so great when used where it doesn't belong. And it all smells the same.

Here's a (true) story where some interesting parallels might be made and lessons learned. It's not unique and there are many similar sagas within the airline industry.

G. Heileman Brewing company was an up and coming US brewing company in the late 70s and through the 80s. During this time it made decent beer (i.e. had a decent product) and enjoyed stellar growth; coming to within striking distance of Anheuser Busch and Phillip Morris (Miller)--the company being the US's 4th largest brewer behind these two and Schlitz-Stroh. It enjoyed a (mostly) good working relationship with the TU's operating the plants and incorporated incentives and profit sharing within its pay structure so that all profited from productivity and increases in sales. Overall, the beer market within the US would be very competitive and increasing but somewhat flat (no pun intended) -- largely due to societal changes and anti-drink driving legislation (as well as other shifting attitudes toward drinking). And the gains in the Heileman empire would largely be due to acquisitions and exploitations of strong brands in regional markets.

In order to continue growth, a large amount of capital (cash) was accumulated and a plan devised to buy Schlitz-Stroh. This would make the company the US's 3rd largest brewer and nipping at the heels of Phillip Morris (and potentially able to gain market share from the big two through strong brand alliance to a multitude of regional brands and the associated growth from this).

Politics and business have always been intertwined and despite a largely free-market approach by the Reagan administration his regime was no different in this regard (not to detract from what was a largely successful presidency just that there are no objective politicians anywhere). Not surprisingly, Augie Busch wasn't really happy about the potential merger (as wasn't PM) and both entities had quite a bit of political clout. So favors were called in at the Reagan justice department to block the sale on anti-trust grounds (which is hard to fathom in that if anything it would have made the industry more competitive). A line of BS called the "herfindahl index" was referenced to justify blocking the merger on anti-trust grounds.

So Heileman wouldn't get the merger and would find itself sitting on a whole bunch of cash.

Which was a bad thing in the 80s. Outside folks looking in at a company would sometimes see cash sitting in a company and play Larry the liquidator to leverage it (getting financing based on equity in a company), make things great for themselves, cash out, and trash the company. Even folks who weren't Larry could leverage equity to take over companies they wanted for whatever reasons.

Now, an Australian named Alan Bond (who would much later be jailed for fraud due his dealings and siphoning off money) would see this huge amount of cash sitting in the company and, wanting a brewing chain in the US, began a hostile takeover attempt (financing it by using junk bonds to leverage the cash within the company).

Helieman stock was selling for around USD $25 a share prior to the takeover bid. Bond would offer around 32 in his initial bid. Now, beer sales were relatively flat so while stock had done well in the past it was unlikely to jump this far in the near future.

Circling the wagons, the then management of the company would get then governor Tommy Thompson to block the sale on some grounds or another while they figured out what to do. Up to that point they'd operated a relatively successful company with strong brand loyalty and increasing sales employing thousands of workers. But they also had a fiduciary responsibility to shareholders (of whom many of the employees themselves were). Their only real sin was holding too much cash on hand and equity from the failed merger attempt.

It would be a moot point; Bond would come back with an offer in the mid-40s (to a stock that'd been selling in the mid 20's a week or two prior). Not much you can do at that point but say to shareholders "Take it" -- you're not going to double your money that quickly anywhere.

Obviously, paying twice what a company's worth can have its problems (as can gambling on fuel or currency, etc); especially when financed with junk bonds requiring a huge debt service. And there's not a sales model on the planet which could fix this, nor is there a cost cutting model which could fix this (and you can't shrink your way into trying to service huge debt anyway--in a very rapidly growing industry you MIGHT be able to grow your way out of it but this wasn't that kind of industry).

As far as I know (to Bond's credit), there was never an attempt to con the workers into belt tightening in an attempt to stop the bleeding. Wouldn't have done much anyway--a fart in a hurricane (sound familiar ?). Over the objections of what experts remained, premium labels were discounted in an attempt to generate sales and market share. This simply resulted in trashing out the premium brands (once you go down that road you don't find your way back) and wrecking revenue.

And today G. Helieman Brewing Co. is a footnote in history. Plants would be shuttered and workers lost their jobs; the labels and plants would eventually be sold. In a (somewhat) happy note their flagship plant would be resurrected by a few former employees (from before the original buyout) and would be doing quite well; albeit at a fraction of what the former empire was.

So what's the point ?

There is absolutely NOTHING -- repeat NOTHING -- the workers at the plants could have done to prevent the chain of events from happening once the company was bought by Bond and the path chosen by his management team. Even if they HAD agreed concessions, the amount saved would have been trivial and they'd just have wound up poorer when laid off. The blunders at the top were too damn big and too damn arrogant. Productivity gains, concessions in pay, etc. paled into insignificance compared with the course set in motion--and continued in motion--at the top.

Bond would continue to live high on the hog until going bankrupt in 1992. His accounts would (reportedly) be settled for around one half cent on the dollar. He would serve four years of a seven year prison sentence for siphoning off cash from an entity he held controlling interest in toward his own corporation--which would then collapse leaving the siphonee holding the bag.

So's I'd take a page or two from history when folks come up with graphs of woe.

Good story Shep. I enjoyed reading that, honestly.

I'm not sure it's a direct parallel to CX unless the conspiracy theory that the Swires (and presumably Air China) are backing money out of the Company intentionally with bad hedges. If so, they are weakening the balance sheet on purpose, presumably to get the cash out and make the Company more saleable. This scenario is certainly possible, but it gives our directors a whole lot of credit for seeing the falling fuel prices which I'm not sure they were capable of seeing. Maybe the Swires (UK) knew, but almost certainly not the CX clowns. Are they pawns in this game?

I did hear a rumour once that the final decision for the fuel hedges came directly from Merlin Swire. True? I have no idea.

Every CX "manager" you've ever seen is a pawn. The entire Swire empire is a puppet show run by the Swires from smoky rooms at those places you only see in movies.

Where do you run to, Dan?

Are you that afraid of life STW?

Let me guess. You are not on ARAPA.

I just wonder how you can "run away" from an expiring contract, that is all.

Can you explain me how to do that?

On the contrary, I am on ARAPA with a mortgage, but I choose not to succumb to scare tactics that's been used over and over again. What part of "housing is contractual" do you not understand? Sure they can change the amount once it expires, but they have to pay me something reasonable.

Regardless whether or not the AoA sells our souls, at the end of the day they cannot change your CoS without your consent. If they choose to fire people for not signing so be it, if enough don't sign they going to find themselves in a bind.

You can run STW or you can make stand. One thing is for sure there is life after Cathay.

I'm sure that's what you've been fed and you can sense the divisions have been masterfully whipped up by management from over our way ( KA ) .

It's far more complex than that and every command at KA is C scale as is every new joining F/O. Some one can correct me too, but is the cadet scheme been driven towards a tokenism with direct entry expatriates offering bigger savings?

Our management lobbyists within the DPA brought industrial peace for the outgoing KA GMO. The peace was already there anyways I sensed. However, typically, though anecdotally, the outgoing GMO's message to the KA pilot group was that Contract Compliance was inevitable- by next year !

CX pilots have been around long enough to see more clarity in the current environment and not fall for the divisive plays I would have hoped? What might help though is, I haven't met a KA pilot who has any desire to be part of your group. You have a miserable, ugly and toxic aviation environment loaded with bullies. I doubt if KA pilots can avoid the inevitable but being drawn closer and closer to CX city is not the least bit desirable, which probably surprises your legacy mindsets?

Putting both pilot groups in contract compliance will be a disaster from every angle. Health and sanity of KA pilots will be a sadly interesting undertone - KA pilot sick leave is the same as CX's at the moment and that's with industrial peace ! Management is so detached from our operation they probably don't realise its genuine and only going to get worse with chronic operational delays and hotel standards.

I think you guys misread the email.
The DFO was complaining that Airbus and Boeing were producing too many aircraft and that the Swire Directors bonus has only risen 681% in recent times.
TAT-Times Are Tough

Ah yes....individual letters in mailboxes. Rolling back the years to 1994 when GMT's father did exactly the same thing. The playbook never changes so the next step is obvious.

Hmm. I guess she thinks the market in HK is HKA and HKE. Hmm I wonder what their directors get paid?

Gnad,

That KA is on a superior contract is 100% true. Expats and cadets both out-earn their like contract colleagues at CX. It's not a point for division between the two groups. It's just a fact. Highlighting that fact merely serves to counter efforts by management to make it appear that CX pilots are the problem. We are not. Neither are KA's pilots. The problem is billions of dollars of upside down fuel and currency hedges. The other problem is extremely poor management. The old adage that they "step over dollars to pick up pennies" could not be more true than it is at CX.

I am already feeling stressed
Two months of rest will do it....

Stolen from the Friday Jokes thread on Jet Blast. Imagine the Woman as our DFO....

It's all about market timing
 

http://www.bbc.com/news/business-40756834

BBC report yesterday stating that analysis of HMRC (tax return) figures showed UK pilots enjoyed a 26% increase in pay between 2011 and 2016. Obviously that was in the UK and us humble beings in HK received nothing like that.

Success in business is all about market timing, when oil prices are falling, you hedge heavily against higher oil prices. When the market for pilots is tight and salaries are rising globally, slash your pilot's salaries and benefits.

Airlines don't need fuel and pilots, they need graphs and cheesy slogans. Time to win!!

Pretty darn good--but the writer did forget one important tidbit.

The manager was making the entire trip (including being totally lost) using someone elses' money.

Then again, perhaps that goes without saying these days........

It is time we ALL resolved to stand against our immoral and dishonest management.

ANNA,

my decades old COS is a signed contract that in 90's dollars is worth half of what I earn today. Every other major carrier is increasing pay. You want to pay me less of my 1990's dollars.

INFLATION is real. The flat I was renting in 04' now rents for 3 times that amount. Has my housing gone up 3X? No.. it hasn't really moved other than to some HKG peg which in no way represents the real cost.

SCHOOLING has gone up.. What I get covers less each year.

_

Shall i make a large pie chart that shows the cost of the crew vs the fines that were levied against us?

You want to lower housing? Open up bases. Problem solved.

Lower pay?
Start with the board.. ZERO pay. If they don't like, I'm sure we can fine some more competent directors happy to take over on zero money as they made their money elsewhere.

Directors like you.. 1/2 your packages. Money where your mouth is. Do it.

This is it. There's nothing more to say really. We draw the line here or there is nothing left to stay for in HK. Want cheaper pilots? BASES!!! Most of us (expats) are willing to work for less, IN OUR HOME COUNTRIES!!! What is so hard to understand about that? I don't get it. Resolve rostering as part of CMP negotiations, put HKPA up to livable wages, end the training ban/CC, and get the bases growing. Any sensible company would utilize a win/win like based pilots, but not CX. They are different and special. "You just don't understand..." That's right AT and DP, we don't understand because IT MAKES NO SENSE!!!

Here's the real chart that should have been published!
https://ibb.co/e7turv

Bases? No, you see, it's a 'control' thing old chap. They've realised they've lost their beloved control of the bases with the emergence of first world onshoring.

Scares the :mad: out of them.

Well, their financial problems must not be that bad then.

Can we all agree, it's incompetence, not control. Of late, they couldn't organise a beer in a brothel.

Or even a screw in a hardware store..