aspaceman

Tristar - get a life and stop having a go at everyone. It is not BACONs fault all you lazy layabouts don't have a job. Remember when you scorned us because we were Plastic BA - well we are not now and neither are you.

Edi was the worst station in the BA network (plastic or not) You lot were the main reason for your own downfall. Needing to have a 3rd party do the headset because union rules blah blah. Where are the union now eh?

I have never met such a militant bunch in all my life - you have got what you deserved - Willie couldn't be arsed with your intransigence either - so he will employ Aviance or some other third party who are willing to do a fair days work for a fair wage.

I ddo not wish to tar everybody in the station with the same brush - there are some really good people in BA at EDI - if the cap fits.....

tristar2

spaceman you may think i'm alone but tristar500 is on my side.once again you seem to be ill informed about how hard we actually do work.EDI is a great station and thats not just me saying that its a number of pilots that tell us that.if you thought it was bad before you haven't seen anything yet. wait until wishy washy walsh annouces the completion of the sale tomorrow morning i can just imagine all the staff in the regions not willing to show any commitment to the company and justifyably working a lot slower.I think you tarred everyone with the same brush when you labelled all the regions "lazy,useless and overpaid".you may not be familiar with team work but we at edi and no doubt the rest of the regions operate as one whole not individuals.you probably aren't to familiar with that.You have mannaged to anger at least one station and once the others see your comments then it will no doubt anger them as well.no surprise that when someone stands up to a pilot they backtrack and try to hide.

transition its pilots thinking that they are better than anyone else that i have issues with.you had a big mouth until i pointed out a few home truths which quickly got you running back to one of your girlfriends.pilots at BA are slightly to blame because of your demands for your pensions BA is going to use the money it saves per year by laying us off to fund them.i suppose that may only happen if BA gets out of our contract cheaply which i cant see happening.the unions are going to get the so called worlds favourite airline to cough up big bucks .

RAFAT

remoak - whilst I can't deny that JF has done a good job at the helm, your misguided belief in the above is exactly what they wanted you to believe at the time, unfortunately though it's a long way from the truth. The Company did need to change (as many others did) in order to be competitive, but if you sincerely believe that the Company was "hours away from closing the doors", then you fell hook, line and sinker for the spin.

The planned changes inevitably meant a great deal of disruption for crews: base closures, wage freezes, extreme roster turbulence etc, and the easiest way to inflict such quality of life reductions on a generally happy workforce was to make them believe that the only alternative was that the airline went bust. Think about it, at the time the airline was charging pax (mainly of the Business variety) £200 - £300 for flights to destinations a little over an hour away from their departure point in a DHC8-200/300, 146 or CRJ. The DHC8 only needed filling by 1/3 of its capacity to start generating profit, (as the BACon guys will testify) but even at those prices the aircraft were full due to the large proportion of Business pax, there's just no way the airline was about to go under! Remember the launch of the BHD-LCY service when there were airline reps on the aircraft actually throwing piles of cash back at the pax and serving champagne?

As to any losses published at the time, one has to remember that the airline, although UK based, was (and still is) parented Offshore, so showing a profit was not best accounting practice. Remember if you will the huge leasing fees charged to the airline for the CRJs - by another part of the Company!!! Good one that! Saying that JF bought the airline some time is simply misguided, the Walker trust were the ones holding the strings of a very deep purse.

However, as I said before, JF has done a sterling job, just don't get sucked in by the spin, Jersey/Bristish European was never anywhere near to going bust!

yachtno1

Transitionlevel "The Professional Pilots Rumour Network (PPRuNe) is a community of professional pilots and people who work in aviation, both experienced and inexperienced." Verbatim from the forum rules ..

aspaceman

Tristar2

Well you should be ok then!

tristar2

yea i should be ok.i don't need back up but its great to have people on here that aren't narrow minded bawbags like you

brain fade

Hey Tristar

If you really think EDI is 'a great station' then I can only asume you mean great as in you like working there or you think your colleagues are great, both of which could be correct.

If you think it is a great operating station or a great place to get turned round you have a very tenuous grip on reality.

The place is, was and always has been a freakin nightmare of a place to work. I've never really understood why it was so poor when GLA was so good. I guess the station chief must take responsibility for the continual staff shortage which is definately part of the problem.

Whatever the reason, and I know some of the staff are great, if there was ever a BA station that made them think of third party handling, it must be EDI.

And for the life of me I can't blame them for trying to sort it.

remoak

Or it could just be that I know more about it than you do. I didn't just pick that up in the crew room, you know.

Sadly I can't offer you proof without compromising myself, but suffice it to say that I was commanding the flight that took the management team to the meeting, and I was later told by two directors what had happened. They told me because of a project I was involved in at the time, that involved knowing a bit more than others did. More than that, I can't say! Of course it's up to you what you believe.

Your rationale for telling crews that they had nearly been out of a job, is complete nonsense. There has been a desire to reduce disruption for years, but it required a great deal of investment in infrastructure, which simply wasn't possible. The money had to go on other things. To say that we were charging a lot and running full is also overly simplistic - in fact, our yields weren't that good for the fares we were charging, and our costs were very high. For example, on the EDI-LCY route, when we had the 146 on it, a large proportion of our monthly pax load was Royal Bank of Scotland employees... but the RBS had negotiated a corporate rate, which was a lot lower than the fares that you were suggesting, whilst still providing a full Business Class service. That was what eventually killed that route (well, one of the things, the other was the money we got from ScotAirways).

If we had been doing as well as you suggest, we would never have gone LoCo, there would have been no need. You don't change the entire commercial structure of an airline unless you absolutely have to.

As far as the relationship with the Walker family goes, they do indeed have very deep pockets, but they had also been swallowing losses for years. As soon as Jack died, the will to continue funding those losses dried up, and it was precisely that refusal to continue funding losses that brought about the crisis that we are talking about. It was also the reason for the repeated attempts to get to a flotation. Since then, the company has been diligent in paying the Walker Trust back the money they have lent us, as soon as we possibly could. As I understand it, the relationship is pretty good now.

CheekyVisual

The deal must be done I just had a text message from Fly Be welcoming me ! That's more communication than I had from BACON in a year ! At least someone in Exeter is thinking about it, it was a nice touch.

I didn't have the heart to reply "sorry but I'm not coming".

Good luck everyone.

Right Way Up

From Flybe website:

News
Completion of acquisition by Flybe of BA connect.
05 March 2007
Flybe announces that it has completed the acquisition of BA Connect, the regional airline business of British Airways.
Flybe’s acquisition of BA Connect (which does not include BA Connect’s London City or Manchester / JFK routes) creates a business with over £500m in revenues and which will fly nearly 10 million passengers once the transition is complete. The airline will operate 152 routes, flying from 22 UK and 34 European airports with new routes to key European commercial centres including Paris, Düsseldorf, Frankfurt and Milan. Through the merger of these two networks, Flybe will become Europe’s largest regional airline with a network that has a unique balance between business and leisure passengers.

Flybe plans to increase its current commitment to invest $1.2bn in new aircraft to over $2Billion by increasing the fleet to over 80 Bombardier Q400 and Embraer 195 aircraft by 2010. Flybe plans to retire the BA Connect fleet of 50 seat jet aircraft as soon as possible to drive maximum fleet efficiency. Flybe will have one of the youngest and most environmentally sensitive fleets in the world. In line with its environment policy Flybe will by then have reduced fuel consumption by over 50% per seat.

The deal has been structured to ensure Flybe is protected financially during the transition period with sufficient funding to cover the inefficiencies of operating 50 seat jets and a degree of protection over future values of these aircraft until they are retired. To achieve this BA is providing Flybe with cash funding of £96m.

Additionally BA is providing Flybe with Commercial support by entering into a one way codeshare agreement on all previous BA Connect routes, allowing for a smooth consumer transition to the Flybe brand.

As part of this acquisition, British Airways will receive a 15% interest in Flybe.

The immediate priority for Flybe will be to ensure that the transition is managed effectively and once this has been achieved, it remains the Groups intention to seek an IPO at the appropriate time.

Commenting on the acquisition, Jim French, Chairman and Chief Executive of Flybe, said:

“This is a proud day for Flybe, now Europe’s largest regional airline. The acquisition of BA Connect gives us critical mass across our domestic and European city markets and, with valuable slots at congested European airports, brings our growth plans forward by two years. Flybe is now firmly established as one of the UK’s largest airlines.

“Flybe is above all a regional airline and the new routes this acquisition brings to our network reinforces our commitment to serving the whole of the UK. We are playing our part in supporting the regional economies of the UK in line with the Government’s own ambitions.

“This is fantastic news for air travellers across the UK and Europe where more consumers will now be able to benefit from Flybe’s efficient and friendly service, all at a price which provides outstanding value. Millions of BA Connect travellers will now benefit from increased service and frequency at substantially lower prices whilst flying on the most environmentally friendly aircraft available in the Regional Air Travel maket..

Flybe will employ over 3500 staff in the new combined business. We are confident the new airline will offer exciting and continued career opportunities. During the last four months Flybe has worked closely with all Unions and Staff Associations to ensure that all staff would be working on the same terms and conditions from the commencement of the new, combined business.

We are all looking forward to working together to ensure Flybe will be a success.

biddedout

The thing that worried me is that David Evans also boasted about BACX (the original Bacon) being the largest Regional Rirline in Europe when he announced that he was integrating British airways Regional (BAR) into BACX. From then on, it was all downhill into oblivion. Routes and fleets were cut, but costs went up and HQ buildings and empires got bigger.

bermudatriangle

I hope Jim realises,the £96 million from BA won,t last long in this business....enjoy being a major player in the european lo cost market,cos you won,t be their for ever !

Dashette

Did anyone else get a text message 'welcoming us' to Flybe?!? ...... Rubbing salt into the wounds!!

lord mash

to everyone i ever worked with at bacx/ bacon rest in peace

oldandskint

Dear Jim

Thanks for the kind text you woke me up with this morning. Thanks also for the offer of a job in your 'empire'. Quite frankly I would rather work for ASDA.

Kind Regards
A N Other Rasher

Dashette

The only way now is down!!!! Good luck to everyone jumping ship.... Its been nice working with you all


P.s Oldandskint - Don't blame you for wanting to go to Asda.. the pay's better and you get a nicer uniform!

Dash-7 lover

In the midst of all this can we just spare a thought to all those in BACON ops control and crewing in BHX. Some of people are facing their 3rd relocation in 6 years or redundancy and have spent a lot of time busting their arses trying to keep the thing afloat. Begging crew to fly on their days off and offering disruption payments left, right and centre.

It's all part of the journey but here's to the future.

Pilot Paul

Well speaking as a BACONer staying with flyBe, I for one feel it is time to stop the moaning and to embrace the new airline with open arms. Its future success rests with many people, not least with ourselves as professional pilots doing a job, and hopefully doing it well and taking pride in that.
Looking forward to working with new colleagues and types (prop or jet!)..."The King is dead..Long Live the King!"

G-FLYB

Pilot Paul

Totally agree - really pleased about my new job!

More pleased to be rid of BA - onwards and upwards eh!

remoak

So if the deal is done...

1) Did you get the Scheduling Agreement that all the rashers were sure they would get?

2) How are they going to work the blending of the two pilot groups - will the rashers come in at the bottom?

3) Is there an improvement in the salary package?

I'm assuming the answer to (1) and (3) is no, and that the answer to (2) is yes... anybody know?

BTW I am not suggesting that those answers are the ideal ones... just wondering...