Hand

Debunking myths is all well and good. I personally have no axe to grind here and have respectfully read some of your earlier posts on other threads and agree with a lot of what you say. I am an ex-mil chap in his mid-forties and concur that BA is no place for the likes of me anymore. That's history. But to you, do you think you will get the pension you signed up for when you joined? And if they take it away, or try to reduce it, what are you going to do?
Ages ago I said that the new joiners would not support NAPS guys and a two tier system was being created. Those close to retirement have loyalty only to themselves and their families. The new joiners have no loyalty to those who failed to protect the new joiners. Unpleasant, but you reap what you sow.

Having said all that, all around me, everyday, I see those less fortunate than me.

So I put it in perspective. Wasn't Narnia bloody crap?

Sorry, cr@p. But cracking visuals, Grommit.

Monty77

Well said. I am genuinely ashamed and aghast that the new joiners pension vote went that way but some people are just plain myopic. This needs to be rectified and is part of our demands - that the BARP contributions are upped.

BB

Bucking - You're spot on, he is a 'junior' Houseman and is studying to become an ENT specialist, but has to work the hours to become established and obviously become a 'specialist'. We were together at Christmas and discussing the pro and cons of both being FC and a DR, to be honest there aren't too many cons with an office at M0.85 except the usual Bidline gripes and of course the pension debate, but I felt a little contrite after he dozed off through exhaustion (rather than being bored rigid about some crap hotac in EWR).

I accept the Pension is a serious issue, but I'm not blinkered enough to see that the general public perceive BA FC and CC to be overpaid and underused, personally, I can see little, if any, public support.

I hope I'm wrong though....:rolleyes:

Stop comparing apples with oranges. Just imagine if my GP worked 70 hours a week, plus he is on call, and screws up. He's only going to kill one person instead of a couple of hundred, plus himself, plus whoever the wreckage lands on.

You obviously don't know too many long haul pilots.

Get a grip.

What a bunch of spoilt babies the BA pilots, cabin crew and engineers are! (With some notable exceptions). As soon as they come across something they don't like, they threaten to go on strike! Pathetic.

Nearly everyone in the world has problems,few of them as minor as BA staff's problems. Strike if you want, but you will have to accept the consequences, which are that you'll be tarred with the same brush as others you probably don't respect that much. The public will think you are a bunch of wasters, and the management will be CERTAIN that you are a bunch of wasters.

As you are NOT a bunch of wasters (which is sincerely what I hope and believe), for heavens sake stop being stupid and cut out the strike threat. It makes you look like spoilt brats.

Riverboat you show an understanding of the issues way beyond your 5 years of age, if you manage to give up your dummy then one day you will be king.

Tar comes off with white spirit, Riverboat. I'll take the chance of insults like yours to protect my investment in my family's future.

Your posting says more about you than you might have realised!

Jet A1 We Shamrock pilots went on strike because 7 of our colleagues were suspended for refusing to operate to newly imposed (NOT negotiated) working conditions. We went on strike for one day (a Friday) and were subsequently locked out when we reported for work on Saturday. We returned to work the following Tuesday following a negotiated settlement. We lost one days pay, got the June bank holiday weekend off, the magnificent 7 were reinstated and we kept the vast majority of our conditions in the negotiations. Willie on the other hand cost the company about 8 million, did not get to "club us like baby seals" (Willie`s view of dealing with IALPA) and lost serious face as he had advised the Chairman that we would not strike.

Do you still think Willie won ?

Stick to your guns boys and girls - an airline can operate without a CX as we have proved - but it wont if its pilots are on strike.:ok:

900 hours 'work' is SUCH DISINFORMATION & MISLEADING. If you do not understand the differnece between FTLs, Flying hours, duty hours etc

On average we (both SH & LH) work about 2,500 hours at work, away from home, per annum. Do you think we get teleported into and out of the flightdeck ..?

PS 2,500 hrs pa divded by 48 weeks at work = 52 hrs/week. Anybody in Waterworld work that ?

Then add onto that: multiple & compouding time zone changes, time away from your home, your wife, your children your life can be awkward at times.

Please dont compare a GPs home every night 'extended office' hours to mine.

I have been following this with interest for a while, as I will be a Nigel next month. I find the comparisons with lawyers interesting, as Mrs P-T-G is a lawyer in a big London law firm, whose renumeration package is up there with the best.
1. Pensions
The BARP is not great, but having crunched the numbers, I come up with a pension of @£35000 at 60. The company contribution from my wifes firm is less than that on BARP, so all the "Fantastic Lawyer Pension" stuff is tripe.
2. Lifestyle
She leaves the house at 7.30 and returns between 7 & 9 every night, working weekends when required. She is expected to work unpaid overtime when required by the company, and not doing so would be career ending. She is constantly knackered. and would swap for my lifestyle in a second.
3. Strike
Striking should be a weapon of desperation, not a stick to beat employers with. I want to have a job with BA for the foreseeable future, and a strike ridden airline will not be around then. This applies to managers as well, who need not to push people into corners where they feel they have no other choice.

All in all, I am joining BA with my eyes wide open. Yes, the pension is a big issue, but to the "You knew the deal when you joined" brigade, I was not able to negotiate my own T's & C's, as that is down to Balpa. The company has issues, but in my view, it is still the best deal in the marketplace. Would I strike over the pension? Probably not, if the changes requested were fair and balanced.

BALPA v IALPA
 

An interesting excercise might be to compare the performance of BALPA and IALPA in dealing with the Walshe agenda/style.
Note: there was a Walshe attack on the IALPA - Aer Lingus pilot pension agreement, but it failed.

Exactly, BALPA can learn alot from IALPA on how they restricted the wrath of WW. :ok:

I think if BA are foolish enough to let it get that far, you've hit the nail on the head.

It's time to sit this one out and wait to see what actually happens, especially as a strike will not prevent a certain degree of changes happening anyway! I see a lot of shortsightedness on this forum and am amazed at the number of flight crews who cannot see the changing face of air travel;I'm sorry to burst your bubble world. In a recent meeting the overall consensus was that the flight and cabin crew pay and productivity really needs to be monitored - and no, crews don't like the thought of working harder for their allowances.

WW has major plans for BA ( I work "inside") - much to the disdain of the workers - and it means middle management cuts and flight/cabin crews facing up to slow, but needed pay and conditions restructuring.Pay itself will not mean a crew member having a change in their basic, for example, but it will mean certain generous "extras" will be phased out.
As we all know the LGW plan is Chapter 1, but Chapter 2 is only a few pages away.
The underlining issue that all BA staff should not lose sight of the company's worringly poor (actually, out of control) pension deficit and all hands are needed to rectify it for the company's future success.

WW did indeed attempt to attack both the pilots pension fund and that of the general employees (which is also lumped in with that of the Irish airport operaters and SR Technics - formerly known as Team Aer Lingus). Both of these funds are Defined Benefit. WW tried to change them to Target Defined Benefit. The Chair of the Pensions Board of Ireland requested a definition as they had never heard of this type of pension. WW failed to give a definition, surprise surprise !

You must be referring to the Cabin Crew, purr777, as no such things appear on my pay statement.

BA pilots no longer have a complicated allowance structure. All extra pay is structured the same, regardless of trip length. This represents a cost saving to BA compared with the more complicated structure it replaced.

BALPA, I believe, wanted everything to go on basic pay, but it was BA itself which insisted on having some variable elements.

All BA staff 'hands' are not needed to rectify BA's pension deficit, that's BA's job. The purpose of this thread is to help de-bunk the misinformation being put about by BA. Enjoy the latte whilst it lasts! ;)

At the risk of being shot down in a flaming inferno, I would like to raise a few points. I am a member of BARP and BALPA. I have the utmost sympathy for my colleagues in NAPS. As a member of BARP I would gladly look forward to any of the 'career-averaged' pensions as outlined in a recent BALPA newsletter.Why did BALPA and the BALPA membership allow the BARP, in its present pitiful form, to be brought in? Anything to do with a very confusing ballot paper combined with a poor membership response? BARP membership is growing for obvious reasons. Union solidarity is vitally inportant to maintain a strong negotiating position. But there seems very little mention/publicitly of the plight of the BARP membership. Why then, should the BARP members be so thoroughly and unconditionally supportive of the union on this issue????

Dons flack vest......

You don't need to be and most likely are not really interested in the plight of NAPS. It was completely unrealistic to expect NAPS members to go down the path of industrial action to bring yet to be employed people into NAPS. It just wasn't going to happen, short sighted, as that could possibly be argued, that it was.

At the moment the support or otherwise of BARPS members will be inconsequential. That will obviously change in years to come but by then robber Brown will probably have finished screwing private pensions completely anyway.


From a previous post saying that much will be changing in other areas, that I can understand. I agree it is probably inevitable but I am at a loss to see anywhere within the FC arena where anything truly dramatic could change (I can see some areas but nothing that would stop me wanting to do the job for BA).

I am not convinced that other departments could say the same.

Sid - If you watch the BALPA DVD, they tell you again and again that this is about BARP too - they want a good pension for you guys as well - as indeed do I and all our colleagues.

When it came to voting about a strike, there wasn't much we could do realistically. Most big companies have closed their final salary schemes and striking would have made more trouble than it solved. We were quite horribly short of pilots even if the management don't agree. We were at risk of losing slots if things got any worse.

That's not to say I don't support you - BA lied when they employed you by saying that you would get an "industry leading pension". THAT is worth striking over, but the fact that the pension changed is an unfortunate product of the current climate.

In the same respect, the fact that NAPS will change too, is a product of the current environment. We will have to do <something> to change NAPS to get rid of the shortfall. In fact we will be forced to by the pensions regulator. A strike would be valuable to make those changes fair, reversible and sensible. If BA's solution was those things, there would be no need to strike, as in the situation above. If BA's solution is unfair (career average, money purchase etc) then striking is a fair and reasonable thing to do.

I think that is what this is really all about. Comparing us to doctors, lawyers etc is moot. Making a descision about NAPS that is fair and realistic and reversible is important and if it takes a strike, that is what it takes. Hopefully it won't come to that. Watch this space.