Polar/atlas Merger Unfair
 

Just got royaly hoesed in the merger and they call this fair?

You think it's fair that a Polar crewmember junior to an Atlas crewmember should move up on the seniority list 265 numbers ahead of the senior Atlas crewmember in a company with a combined pilot force of less than 800? Well that's what happened.

I never posted on this or any other Atlas/Polar thread and prefer to stay out of the politics and let those more inclined to have at it. But this is a major injustice. I was always a proponet of date of hire with a seat lock and think that is the only fair position. I never personally said any detromental remarks about Polar crewmembers and always thought things should be done failry since we will eventually end up working together, but this is crap.

Yes it does suck, but the "no bump, flush or system re-bid" in the condition's section may prove to resolve a lot of the injustice in the arbiters decision.

If you stay in this business long enough nothing will surprise you. It's a shame how this will affect the careers of alot of good Atlas crewmembers who may now never get the chance to upgrade after being here for so long. For the life of me i don't see how this could have gone this bad. Date of hire and seat lock was a fair due for all concerned but this blatantly hurst one pilot group while enhancing the other.

The feeling I get from reading the arbitrators ruling is that the transfer of flying from Polar to Atlas and the massive furloughs and F/E firings of the Polar pilots because of it had a bearing in the final list. Just my opinion though.

For what it is worth I have seen a previous merger at brand X and the combined list is about what you would expect for two carriers of about the same age but different sizes. Also as should be , all crews hired after the buyout were straight DOH, though there are Atlas advantages in that. From what I can see all dual classes, meaning all classes that were both Polar and Atlas, the Atlas crews were slotted above their Polar classmates regardless of age (the atlas way) or SS# (the Polar way)

The biggest difference I saw was the fact that the arbitrator ignored the fact that AAWW has shrunk Polar down in recent months. I got the feeling that he saw it for what it was, possibly JC's attempt to get back at the Polar crews for making him look bad during the strike. After all he swore that the Polar crews would cave and never go on strike. Which they might have until AAWW fired all the newhires with less than 1 year even before the strike had happened. In that one move AAWW showed their colors and finished solidifying what was left of the group. That was JCs doing as well.

My personal feeling is that the combined list would have gone much more in Atlas's favor if it had not been for the wholesale gutting that AAWW hammered Polar with this past year. People out of a job because their employer transferred their work to a sister company just to avoid legal contracts that the company signed normally does not sit well with arbitrator or legal types.

As I mentioned above this is simply my opinion from my point of view down in the trenches. And you know how opinions are..:E

Word is that it is a typo and being corrected by the arbiter. A "Not" was left out due to typing error. Which sounds correct due to the section at the beginning of the ruling that deals with the same subject but has the opposite stated.

Like i said i don't give a damn about the politics between the Polar and Atlas MEC's or anyone else. I do my job and expect my seniority to be respected and not shoved up my a&s. There is nothing anyone can say on either side which would justify a junior crewmember moving 265 places ahead of me. Date of hire was fair and seat locked the Polar captains that are junior to me. But to take away my chance for upgrade and elevate these guys at a ratio like that is absurd and criminal. The no bump and flush is insignificant, this is here to stay and will affect my future bidding and base awards with this company. Time to look for a job

DOH with seat locks is how I figured that it would go too. Like I said above, I think that the actions of management this past year had a bearing on it. I always knew everybody after the buyout would be DOH, that is the way it is always done. I think JC can be thanked for the rest of the list by cutting Polar in half and moving the flying. I think that the arbiter simply adjusted to remove his influence so to speak.

However the writing was already on the wall. Anyhope of upgrade is gone with the classics, which AAWW has publically stated many times will happen at Atlas in the near future. I always figured that we would be seeing mass furloughs at Atlas by the end of 07 anyhow.

At this point in the game it would probably be better for all involved for Polar to take their asia slots and contracts and go their own way and Atlas go their own way with the ACMI. As long as AAWW managment is controlling both and using them against one another neither wins.

In the end though both groups are going to have to find a way to get along. If not AAWW will eat both for lunch.

I thought the seniority list was very fair. Thats one arbitrators ruling. We at Polar have a couple more coming our way. "You aint seen nothing yet"!!

Figures. I bet you were one of those hired back when they shifted the Atlas flying and A/C to Polar during our negotiations.

Kind of different from what you said on another thread below >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
We Atlas guys would have been perfectly happy never seeing you. It would have solved many problems for us. Less pain and more gain for the Atlas pilot group instead of having another airline for the company to play off of us during our negotiations. Let alone the money wasted buying/maintaining Polar for their union busting attempt of the Atlas council.

CaptainSlappy,

What does the "no bump, flush or system re-bid" mean to the Polar side? What is your MEC telling your side about it? I noticed that the Polar VARS is silent on the recent award by the arbiter.

http://cptaudio.com/cgi-bin/merger/logs.pl

You show me a merger list that makes eveyone happy and I will kiss your butt in Times Square on New Years Eve. I went through it at TWA, US Air guys got hosed, the list goes on and on. No one likes merger lists.
Now as for who's side won, how many people forgot the testimonies at the arbitration? If you want to read it you can. It didn't make Atlas look exactly good. Polar in the black and making money, Atlas transferring assets,and flying using Polar as an ACMI customer, the list goes on and on. Your (Atlas) MEC dismissed it as an arbitrator's bias against ACMI flying instead of admitting they were in trouuble and better regroup Instead they gave a lot of b.s. to the union instead of admitting they screwed up. I think you had better take a good hard look at your council. They seem awfully close to J.C.. In fact if Cato made a sudden hard right turn Caputo would probably break his nose.
Lastly, the list is just that, a list and may not even see the light of day. Lighten up and wait to see what happens down the road. I seriously doubt you guys will ever merge. It is Cato's way of keeping things stirred up. Don't you think he didn't know this would happen. He may be evil but he is not stupid.

Well in the first place the Atlas MEC proposed nothing - it was the merger committee that proposed the list and it was NOT a staple job. The Merger committee simply said that Polar was only bringing 5 airplanes to the mix thus they only deserved 123 pilots to be "integrated" on the meat of the list. The staple job you are talking about was due to the fact that in their failed experiment to create value in Polar, Atlas sent a bunch of their airplanes over to Polar and hired a bunch of people. So yea - it might seem like the got stapled but they were hired for an airline that had ZERO prospects of keeping them employed as there is/was ZERO profitable work for them to do - so using logic (which harris obviously does not have an abundance of) you would think that their continued career prospects were nil - and they were.

Huh? What hearing were you at? The Polar business model sucks! It always has and it always will. You have never made a profit and I doubt you ever would have. Why do you think Atlas has changed you to an ACMI carrier. Cuz that is where the money is.
You do not know what you are talking about. The NEGOTIATING committee and some on this board said that Dr. Campbell has a bias against ACMI - and he does. If you have read ANY of his other testimony you will see that. NO ONE, even on this board has said that the arbitrator has any bias (although now it looks like he is biased to 'roids)

Once again a 'roid who does not know what he is talking about. John C. does not even talk to Cato. That falls to Bourne. It is a division of responsibility and leadership that you would not understand.

Are you that clueless that you somehow think Cato had anything to do with this list? That is typical of a 'roid. You know nothing yet you spout it at the top of your lungs.

I agree on both counts.

Doesn't really answer what "no bump no flush no system re-bid" means to the average Polar/Atlas guy though. I'm curious what the Polar MEC is saying to the masses. Depending on future events, the award may have little effect on Atlas crewmembers. While the list hurts looking at it up front, it seems the conditions placed in the award leave us an out of sorts.

The Atlas MEC did screw the pooch. It was the Amussen and Weiss MEC 2001 that did it with the secret agreement back in 2002 when Atlas A/C were being moved to Polar and they made the secret agreement and seniority list which created the now called "Red-Blue" list of seniority Polar submitted in the arbitration. That shot us square in the balls. No if's - ands - or - buts about it. I'm just glad they were not re-elected. God knows what other damage they could have done on top of the other things they already did. Secret Agreement in PDF.

I see that is the latest mantra from the Polar MEC to his underground communications committee. To say and do anything to get rid of the Bourne and Caputo MEC. I can understand this since the Amussen and Weiss Atlas MEC gave Polar everything they ever wanted and effectively shot every Atlas crewmember in the head. I new Amussen and Fell were buddies, but I didn't know at the time it was going to cost all the Atlas crews upgrades and continued employment from their friendship.

You better get used to Bourne and Caputo. They have been the only one's to actually try to mend fences, work with Polar without giving everything away, and all they have recieved from Polar is complete disappointment and attacks at the prompting of the Polar MEC. Those BTW can be reiviewed under the "who is the buyer for Polar" thread.

The same is said of the Polar MEC and more importantly of those running the show from the shadows. Those like Robin Hair and Bob Fell (Funny how he is on medical leave from Polar, but flying helicopters in Homer AK speaking of medical guys and still conducting union business. Bet he is getting paid by the union also.)

Yes, I'm sure you want someone like Weiss in there. Someone willing to give away everything to Polar and recieve nothing positive in return let alone the betrayals we did get.

You might as well get over it, if we do merge, the Atlas group knows that anything or anyone supported by Polar will cost them dearly. If nothing else, we do have solidarity enough to make sure no one ends up on the combined company MEC from Polar or any committee. That has been guaranteed by Polar's actions and not by the standing Atlas MEC.

Mods - HELP !!!
 

Mods;

Can't you merge ALL the Atlas/Polar union slanging threads into one, PLEASE, so that the FREIGHT DOGS area can get back to discussing operational air freight issues without every new thread turning into the same old BORING slanging match between three or four individuals?:ugh: :ugh: :ugh:

Thank you.:zzz: :zzz: :zzz:

Oh! And I have ONE HELL OF A LOT more than 62 posts to my credit over the years. Don't know where that one came from!

May the Matatu be with you:cool:

Close ALL Atlas / Polar Threads!
 

What about all the Polaroids who live on this forum also????


MODS do us all a favour and close these threads!

Here you go:

Atlas is now 570 crewmembers (not counting AACS) and Polar is 170 crewmembers,,,,looks like Polar lost

Polar has downgraded,,,,looks like Polar lost

Polar will NOT be the surviving carrier,,,,,looks like Polar lost

Polar will NOT get to bring their furloughs back in bump and roll........looks like Polar lost

Polar has lost all 200s while we still have ours,,,,,,,,,looks like Polar lost

Polar will cease to exist at the end of 2007.....looks like Polar lost

Polar F/E's will get to come back, then immed furloughed,,,,,,looks like Polar won but lost

Polar will not ever be getting new aircraft.....looks like Polar lost.

Polar will not get their wish to have Atlas crews SHARE the furlough in the new merged list
looks like Polar lost.

That's all I have at the moment.

As a note to the MODS. I would be perfectly happy to have these threads closed down and even have myself and the other Polar posters banned. I realize that would be impossible with your current system. They will just pop up again under a different name and thread.

I never would have been here if it wasn't for the Atlas bashing going on as an anonymous forum for the Polar MEC hate campaign.

merc,

Polar will "not be the surviving carrier"?
"Will cease to exist after 07"
"will not be getting new aircraft"?

Is all that an arbitrators ruling or just an opinion???

Just asking

Management has said that all the pilots will be "Atlas" Pilots.
<see the Atlas employee exchange archives>

Polar Air Cargo will be gone - the certificate will be owned by Polar Worldwide.
<see the DHL announcement>

Some of the announcements of the 747-8 purchase said "Atlas Air Inc, a subsidiary of Atlas Air World Wide Holdings has placed orders for ....."

The DHL deal is for Polar Worldwide (essentially the routes and access to the US markets). The flying will all be accomplished by the Atlas pilots (remember the Polar pilots will be known as Atlas Pilots) who will be able to fly either the Atlas ACMI flights or the Polar Worldwide flights on whichever aircraft AAWH decides to populate the particular certificate with.

So really it all doesn't matter as essentially we will all be one big happy familiy just like NWA and Republic, Delta and Western, American and Reno, Alaska and Jet America, US Air and America West (and Delta?) etc etc

I can hardly wait to see Bobb, Bobbin, and HomerBob in an Atlas uniform.

Ain't this fun.

Your transparent attempt to undermine your new leadership is as childish as your strike and most of your posts on this thread. :D

I'm confused. Didn't you, along with the other underground communications committee, say that the Atlas MEC and management are sleeping together? You better call back and get the right posting Bobb or better yet Robin wants posted.

Whether the MEC had a hand in it or not, Atlas crews have won compared to Polar. Still not enough in my opinion.

Guess you didn't get the memo and it's not from the arbiter. WhaleFR8 referenced a number of the documents and releases.

If you want the truth, you need to seek it out. Do not wait for it to be presented to you by someone that wants to tell you what they want you to hear such as Bobb H., Robin Hair or on these threads. Verify it via an independent source with nothing to gain from it. Of course, if you like what Bobb and Co. is telling you don't bother. I wouldn't want to interfere with the dream.

I find it kind of funny that Bobb H. has not made a new VARS to crow about the seniority list award. He has been quick to claim victory in the past.

http://cptaudio.com/cgi-bin/merger/logs.pl

That is one fine piece of fiction there merc. Flies in the face of everything I read. It seems Polar has out argued you several times. Now I suggest you read the Polar scope clause before you write anything else. This one is in the hands of the arbitrator and we are awaiting a much delayed answer. And, as I wrote earlier, the longer it is delayed the more the chances are that the decision went against the company. It happened on the last two grievances and I belive it will on this one too. If that happens, o-o-o-o-ey, that will really shake things up!

Tiger Guy
 

MercP:
Do you have a little trouble counting? The Polar pilot list shows 269 pilots not 170 as you say. Then there are about 60-70 PF/E's. Good spin on who's fault the list is. Not only the arbitrator against you. looks like the two pilots on the board as well. Whoops! I forgot Amundsen and Weiss. Dam those guys, they did it in 2001. Any chance you could have then taken out and shot? A least have then tarred and feathered.
So Bourne and Caputo were too busy to get involved with anything as minor as the seniority list merger. Nice going let your merger committee carry the can.

The company told us that the Polar pilots were going to number 190 after the furloughs - of those, there were just shy of 170 who were line pilots due to 20 or so who are full time union, military and/or LTM. I believe that is where merc's number came from.

The 60-70 PFEs are on the list as you say but will be re-furloughed and will most probably never come back due to the no-bump/no-flush clause and the fact that the classics are on the way out.

WhaleFR8 covered the 170 thing. The FE's may be back on the payroll, but that will only be for a short time until they are properly furloughed instead of terminated.

As far as Amussen and Weiss, they were trying to keep things together while everything Atlas crews had was being moved to Polar and AACS as leverage against us and furlough crews. They just showed poor judgement in their negotiation skills on that secret agreement in 2001 which tied our hands in 2006 somewhat and on a number of other things in our current CBA. My beef with Weiss is that he flat out lied in several ways about the seniority merger LOI. Was kept secret at first, then later said it never happened, then later said it was only a rough draft, and then some other BS technicality thing later. Then we finally see the hard document signed by them all. That left us open to getting sandbagged out of his petty pride over the mistake he wanted hidden.

I think under section 45, the merger committee is required to work independent of the MEC during the merger process. Of course, they communicate I'm sure. Tell the truth, after listening to what some third party people said, we were lucky to not get stuck with the Red-Blue (Polar) list.

We did get the "no bump, flush, or system rebid." Without that, as in the Red-blue list, we would have had many Atlas guys on the street instead of Polar guys . We got a little bit better list integration than the Reb-blue list also. If you compare relative seniority and taking into account the "no bump, flush, or system rebid", we didn't do all that bad after dissecting the award from the arbiter. Still sucks, but not all that bad considering Polar originally had a signed agreement to essentially kill us until Bourne withdrew from it when he found out about it. That also helped in the arbitration BTW.

So, for whatever spin you want to count that as.

Tiger Guy
 

MercP
You have to be kidding me you were going to leave out the guys who are over in Iraq and those doing their military duty? I know the military would have something to say about that. What were you doing going to the company for information? The company is to have NO imput whatsoever.
Why did you think you could leave out furloughed pilots? If I were a pilot neutral I would also take a negative view of any group that would have the gaul to try that. Possibly that is why the list came out the way it did.
What I understand about the F/E's is J.C. tried to terminate them because he could not furlough them. You seem to relish that fact they may be furloughed. Personally I never want to see anyone loose their job.

Lost numbers are somewhat relative when 5 to 6 A/C are added to the equation.

Tried the math and couldn't duplicate it the way you stated a couple of different ways. Maybe you or I miscounted.

Maybe your just fishing on who I am. Why don't you just pull that trigger and lets see what happens? I'm really used to guns going off in close proximity to me and I still have the marks from the last couple of times. Rhetorical and physical.

This is a little off subject, but it didn't seem to bother the Polar guys to list guys on military leave in Iraq and medical leave as SCABS during your strike.

Maybe I missed something? Where did I say anything about "going to the company for information?" In general, they won't talk to me any more. I might publish some of their public releases at best.

As far as "Why did you think you could leave out furloughed pilots?" The "no bump, flush or system rebid" part of the arbitration award did and the fact that Polar does not have any -200's for FE's thus allowing for their furlough. I can get into the potential awards of the Alliance grievance if you want, but Bobb might not like that. Especially since we have a clue on how it will come out.

I don't relish anyone getting furloughed or fired. It is contrary to my being and many Atlas guys will vouch for me on this. I just have less sympathy for those at Polar considering how they sh!t on us in a number of ways unity wise.

Sure they were meant to be left out - the company staffing model cannot include them until they come back. There are actually only about 5 MIL if I remember right - the rest are like Homerbob - on long term medical. How do you suppose the company can include them in a staffing model.

Point of fact is that J.C. under oath said he wanted to furlough your FE's and Bobb, bob,a nd bobbin would not hear of it - they actually insisted that the FE's be kept on or terminated. - Go figure!

Tiger Guy
 

J.C. said WHAT under oath, now that IS funny. That SOB can't remember the last time he told the truth. I can't tell you how little credit I give to that statement.
The "No bump, NO flush " Merc seems so proud of, is standard merger policy. No big deal. All mergers should have that.
Only five military, were you planning to leave them out? A crewmember can not loose seniority while on military service. He has to be given a number and that is his on return. A furloughed crew member should gets his number and can't bump working crew but if he is the most senior on furlough he is the first recalled and slots into his number.
From what I hear those F/E's are collecting their pay. Go Figure
I don't want to see anyone furloughed or terminated. I have no respect for a person who wishes that on any crewmember at any airline.

Take a breather. Soak up some O2 and rejoin the formation.

Yes, JC probably did want to furlough the FE's, but he was heavy handed in the way he went about it. JC, (in his typical style) dictated to the FE's an insulting choice with no options, then gave them a slim time line to collectively decide. The insulted FE's thus voted (in effect allowing JC to fire them, gambling that their injustice would eventually be righted).. . . . Bobb, bob, and bobbin had nothing to do with it other than to humbly transmit the FE's decision back to JC.

Today, the FE's arbitrated win was simply the result of poor (JC) management technique.


http://www.pprune.org/forums/images/buttons/quote.gif

Right now they are not sure how many aircraft, if any, could be forced back onto Polar's certificate. I said it once and I will say it again, the arbitrator's ruling is way over due and conventional wisdom is that it probably went against the company again, and it takes a lot longer to arbitrate a decision against a company than it is against a union. It is gonna get interesting that is for sure. By the way, every flight from ICN to ANC done by Atlas is a Polar classic flight. I checked it out on the company web site. And Polaroids have no work! You gotta be kidding!!!!

For those interested that do not know the Polar contract. For Cato to furlough the FE's as suggested by a few atlas types, let me educate you to the contract.
In order to furlough the FE's they have to furlough all the FO's and even some Captains to get to the number 1 FE. Then the company has to send out letter to everyone and reinstating those who are FO qualified, and there are a few FEs that fill that bill. The furloughee has 7 days in which to respond. Then whomever is called back will have to have a sim ride and a line check before qualification. That effectively will shut the company down for a while. That is why Cato tried what he tried. This is irrespective of the scope grievance which like I said, is indicating the company lost a gain, at least I hope so. Although I will never grace AAWH's property again as an employee, I take great pride in making them toe the line in regards to the CBA, thereby sticking it to them.

As I understand it, an arbitor is not empowered to make business decisions. He may be able to make it so painful that they change a business decision on their own.

Fer sure!
 

Wr8 has it correct; an arbitrator cannot force a company's hand and make it change its business plan. The 'painful' part is where the arbitrator has authority. While having no idea how many of the 57 terminated FE's decided to take the offer to return to the payroll (and the uncertain future that accompanies that decision), AAWH is on the hook for somewhere in the neighborhood of $400k a month if 50 or so of them returned. (A rather expensive neighborhood, considering you don't even get to live in the house you're paying for...) That seems to be a rather hefty price to pay for JC's poor business decision, not that I'm a business major, but...

It seems to me that if Atlas Air is still flying Classics full of Polar (even if it's disputedly Polar's freight or not), the wise thing to do would be to return those FE's to work and at least get some work for the money AAWH is paying them. But then we are talking about AAWH after all, aren't we?

But it also seems that many of them (if not all) are perfectly happy to collect a paycheck while allowing Atlas Air to reap all the 'glory'. Working for a living is a real drag, eh? :-)

Fr8_hound

Wow.!! drink that coolaide. Is that the reason Atlas bought Polar? Because Polar was losing money?. Let's get it together. This kind of conversation is exactly what mngmnt wants to hear.

No Atlas didn't buy Polar just because it was loosing money, but because they could do it for $80 Mil. Them loosing money was just a bonus!

Merry Christmas to all Atlas and Polar crewmembers, lets make 2007 a great year, and stand together against managment!

And to all the other Freight Haulers here on the forums, Happy Holidays!

Unity is Our Strength in '07!
 

Ditto again! Lets join forces not just for the good of our company, but for the good our industry! GO FRIEGHT DOGS!:D :D :D :D :D :D :D :D :D :D :D :D