Fred, I'm talking about the meltdown scenario for you, don't forget the American air-trafficers who thought they couldn't be locked out or replaced.
Whattime, I'm wouldn't join BA as an FO either, but LHS to replace an arrogant Nigel then yes. I gotta job now with no pension just gratuity and I fly what I'm given, no bidding, so it doesn't take much to be a better deal. You guys have just got to get real or you are going under. You compete in the same world market for pilots and passengers.

We do compete in the same world market. We do have to be realistic.

Stealing of pensions is realistically disgusting and we should stand up for ourselves.

Just because you are not as well off as some of us, doesn't mean we should all stoop to your level. Would you like to drive my 15 year old Ford Granada? I'll swap it for your horse and Cart. Is that what you are trying to say?

Better to swap your Horse for the current Ford Granada, rather than for an
Austin Allegro with a seized engine wouldn't you say?

Your naivety astounds me.

Comparing apples and pears.

BA does not have a 'no strike clause'.
BA can sack only the entire striking workforce, not selectively dismiss pilots for striking.
BA cannot do that until 8 weeks into the industrial action and BA has taken such procedural steps as are reasonable to try to resolve the dispute.
BA cannot selectively remploy strikers until 3 months have elapsed.

I can just see a flood of inbound, qualified pilots, being interviewed, employed, trained and online in no time at all, yeah right.

I can also just see this government standing by and letting it happen, one of the few reasons to be grateful for the Labour party I suppose.

With BA's peculiar SOPs (monitered approach etc) they would be VERY hard pressed to get hired help in. I suggest that the dispruption would have unacceptable safety consequences, and the CAA would become quickly involved.

Sacking all the striking Nigels and hiring Bulgarian desperados is a management wet dream.

Mick Stabilitiy,
Just like that 'safe' operation in Nigeria called 'Virgin Nigeria'!!:ok: .

WTDWL.

So its "arrogance" is it, to defend my contractual pension rights? That makes me "arrogant", does it? What a pathetic profession we have become. I am paid less than ANY of my peers - NHS GP's, Lawyers and business executives, FAR less, yet even this is not low enough for some, huh? Of course, I forget, its not a real job at all is it? Anyone with a PPL could do it for a quarter of the money, couldn't they? I am tired of all that Sh@t, for that is what it is. This is a profession worthy of respect AND decent remuneration - a position of trust and enormous responsibility. Just because the latest incumbant of the musical chair that is CEO of BA thinks he can enrich himself at our expense does not make it either inevitable or sensible.

And to all the "business consultants" who plague BA and readily describe professional aviation as a "non-job", a dead end to be ground-down ad- nauseam: you have hit the buffers this time. Type "I am an army of one" into your search engine on pprune and see what kind of response you will get if you keep this up. Actually, dont bother, most of my colleagues are so sick of the Kafkaesque farce that much of BA's operation has become that goodwill is absolutely gone already. AMP anyone?

We are defending our contractual pension rights here, right down to the "meltdown" of BA if that is what it takes. BA without a pension and bidline will not be worth spit, and wont be able to recruit much either - despite gung-ho 'gizz-us yer job' postings here.

Er...not at all easy to train replacements if all the trainers are striking as well!
Apart from the odd manager they are the only ones authorised by the CAA to train/check using BA sops. I think the insurers might also have some say over inexperienced crews flying BA aircraft.

I associate myself with those remarks very closely Fred.

I have many contemporaries from university who have gone on to become medicos and bankers, engineers and chemists. One thing that we share is a craft, a profession with awesome responsibility, a job well worth doing, peoples lives are better, safer, improved by things that we do everyday. We take pride in our professions and some of us are well respected and remunerated.

Except pilots. I earn a fraction of what some of my medical friends earn. A GP earns more than I do. Vets earn multiples of what I earn. If my anaesthetist friend cocks up his job, he could kill his patient and be sued by his family. If I cock my job up I could kill HUNDREDS and my family will be sued by the whole world and pilloried by what we laughingly refer to as ‘the press’ in this country.

The fact is that I don’t kill hundreds everyday, I spend my day salvaging the tattered image of this once great company. My crew and I put smiles back on faces when we do it right, frequently many choose to fly with us again because of what my friends and I do everyday.

Am I worth what I’m paid. Yes I bloody well am! Every pucking fenny!!

And for those of you who shed crocodile tears for our plight at Heathrow, just you try and do 3 or 4 sectors a day at the UK most badly run and poorly resourced airfield! It’s physically draining. While we try to keep some semblance of an operation on the rails, the company plays politics in their ivory towers. Waiting hours for passenger buses, deicing, tugs, stands, highlifts the list goes on and on and on. Despite our valiant efforts to coordinate all of these functions, we sit on the sidelines whilst the various silos work out who is to blame. You couldn’t make this stuff up for a sitcom.

And now in some grotesque parody of Robert Maxwell, the latest cleverdick tells me he’s going to steal my bloody pension!!

At least Maxwell had the modesty to try and hide his larceny!

No, this is it. This is the last straw. I’m sorry Joe Public, I’ve done my best for you over the years, but this is it. Someone is going to steal the bread from my childrens’ mouths whilst they laugh in my face and count their sordid bonus.

They just crossed the line.

http://www.80scartoons.8k.com/roobarb10wee.gif
I’ll take on the opposition anyday. It’s my management I can’t beat!

Roobarb
 

How can I follow that! Your post sums up my feelings perfectly. Crew's have been shoveling the s##t uphill at BA for years now. The management have cut the support structure and staff back to such an extent that it now, often as not, fails to adequately support the money making part of the Company. I am sick to death of standing at the aircraft door at oh-dark thirty in the morning, after a night flight, apologising to the people who pay our wages, trying to explain to them why we have no stands/buses/jetties. Knowing that in all probability there will be no crew transport back to the Car Park....Knowing that at the same time as the crew stand in the rain, abandoned on the tarmac, that the bean counters and cost cutters in Waterside, many of whom never actually visit the "real" airport, are rolling out of bed and making their first coffee, working out how they are going to find another way to make more my job more difficult..............
P*******d off? You bet I am. I no longer care what other people think or earn - I do care that our T&Cs are being bulldozed as we type. I apologise in advance to any of our customers we inconvenience this year, but will not stand by and watch these thieves continue to boost their personal wealth by destroying my lifestyle, my health and my pension.
Rant over...see you on the picket line.

I always used to maintain that a decent pilot saved more than his salary every day so the company got him for free.
As a matter of policy I always used to annotate all my Voyage Reports "Saved *** minutes and ***fuel on flight planned" . A F/O asked me once why I did it, I replied "how would the managers know how much we saved if I don't tell them".
I suggest that all pilots take the suggestion up.

BA pilots 'prepare to strike'

I`m new to this posting but i think that the pilots need to think really hard before they go on strike, if thats what they`re to do. All they need do is to look at last year and the year before when the ground staff at BA walked out. They didnt get what they wanted and caused a lot of grief and hassle to the people who pay their wages and mortgages, the CUSTOMERS.
WW arrived at BA with a pension defecit already happening, if anyones to blame lets blame Rod and his leadership team. WW has to try and amke the airline more profitable as so to keep staf in a job. Ba dont want to end up like some us airlines who are laying off staff left right and centre

I'd just like to say that I'm 100% behind you guys in BA. Fark the begrudgers - stand up for yourselves or you'll be walked on for the rest of your days.

And give Willy a big kick in the b@lls for me.:E

Sketty222 You have just registered today and are making your first post in this most powerful of threads. Did you read the preceeding 253 posts that tell the story? I thought not. In PPRuNe, it always pays to read and watch and listen, before you shout. I wonder why you did not?

Sketty - your post shows your ignorance rather well.

A wildcat strike because you are a bit pissed off with things is one thing.

A legal strike to save 40% of a pension that has been promised to you since day 1 is a different kettle of fish.

There will be absolutely no strike, nor a need for one, if BA come up with a good solution. None of us WANT to strike, and a strike has not been planned, what we are saying is we WILL strike if our pensions are stolen.

Now you tell me, is it right that the staff fund a new set of aircraft, or should the earnings of the company do that?

Would you pay many thousands of pounds from your own pocket to buy BA some new aircraft, so that the shareholders can get richer? Thought not. We don't want to either.

I'm wondering what people think of the "survey" results in today's Beano. I was reading this earlier today and my jaw was hitting the floor at the sheer brass neck of what "Pravda" was extrapolating from a 10% response.

Anything the Mori poll comes up with along those lines will be total spin. The questions were all about what you thought of the previous spin, er... I mean information campaign and presentations, not what you thought they should do about the deficit. You had to enter useful info like that in a box asking if you had anything else to tell them (or words to that effect)... Not quite the same as a direct question asking whether you felt the company was justified in robbing your pension.

BikerMark, did you used to live in a maisonette in Hanworth?

Maybe BA aren't the only ones conducting a survey. ;)

Very good point Biker Mark. I hope all staff understand how these Dirty Tricks are being fed to them. Only place for said newspaper is in the Dustybin !!!

Lets hope Drity Tricks 2 goes the same was as Dirty Tricks 1 ???

Ornithoptor, I take your point

Perhaps this might be a good time to remind everyone who might think that they are going to get huge support for their cause that history tends to lean towards the concept that sympathy is but a word between !!!!! and syphilis in the Oxford Concise Dictionary.

.... and Pension lies between Pay and Protect. What's your point?

A rare twopennorth from me.

If BA decide to abandon the FSS I WILL STRIKE UNTIL THE BASTARDS GO BANKRUPT! If my colleagues decide the same then it will be a short dispute, if they do not then it will be an acrimonious time, there will be no goodwill and there will be little co-operation between the warring factions. In short, there will probably not be any winners.

Despite that, I am not willing to let my future prosperity and the security of my family play second fiddle to the lies and spin of a bunch of grasping liars.

GET YOUR THIEVING, LYING HANDS OFF MY PENSION!

ok?

Bengermen,
Your post sums this thread up and straight from the heart.This is not just about an hourly rate pay increase/cut,working conditions nor any other issue.

This affects not only pilots but all BA staff,all other airline staff and people in other industries.

Gordon Brown has f***** up big time and it has been pointed out WW has taken on this problem.I signed up for final salary pension and that's what I want.Not a penny less or a penny more.

To say the pension issue will not get in the way of new aircraft orders only adds fuel to an already raging fire.I will have done 35 years when I leave and am entitled to go with the pension I signed up for when I'm put out to grass.
When we and others are constantly screwed by our employers in the airline industry we have to take it because of 9/11,oil price etc ,etc and any other excuse they can use.

When it comes to pensions they can **** right off.At the end of the day WW and Co will probably be on some 'super bonus' and share option to drive this pile of c*** through.You and I will be struggling and he'll be sat on his arse in the Caribean!!!.

Not off my pension.Talk is now very strong of one MASS action to send a clear message to WW and the leadership team(what a joke of a name)!!.

BA passengers have put up with a hell of a lot over the last two summers,so I hope if any action is taken maybe we should target elsewhere.I add I sincerely hope no industrial action comes but if that's what it takes then so be it.

I have served BA and it's loyal passengers for 20 years now and enjoy every day I come to work.This is now leaving a bitter taste and it is the first time I can say I support industrial action and feel very sad that I do.

After 35 years I feel I deserve reward for the service I have given to BA and before someone jumps in YES I know they and the passengers pay my wage's.THANK YOU,but you won't be paying my pension.

Downroute and from friends who work on the ground I have never heard so much angry talk about one subject.

Beware WW sit up and listen,do not break this still great company.

WTDWL.

If you have been with the company for 35 years then you would have been entitled to remain on the old scheme. Your pension would not then be effected. If you are on the scheme that is effected then you must have chosen to take a cash bung to join the now bankrupt NAP scheme. I and many others were perhaps able to see that to convert was a risk not worth taking for a few thousand pounds that were on offer. Your situation then is of your own making so stop bleating like a suffed pig.

HZ123 wake up and read WTDWL post correctly. Did you miss the bit where he/she said they will have served BA for 35 years by the time I leave and the bit where he/she says I have served BA for 20 years
Your posts on this forum before have shown you to be an out of touch muppet who does not get out of your windowless room in braincrank to often ,thank god for that, now who looks like a stuffed pig?:yuk: :yuk:
My twopeneth worth well bengerman sums it up:ok:

I remained in APS when the offer was made in 1984 to change over. I'm glad I did but I'm under no illusions that I'm in any way feather-bedded. What is happening to NAPS now could happen to APS later. After all, the company tried to make a raid on APS before. Those who are trying to protect NAPS have my full support.

If NAPS gets stuffed, obvious that APS will get some later, not as much as NAPS, but APS will be at the table.

My understanding is BA paid staff to change from APS to NAPS in 1984 to help the company plan for the future, so if BA want staff to leave leave/change NAPS now they will pay some more cash.

Must remember staff who changed back in 1984 were helping the company at the company request, if NAPS is changed with no cash for staff, will only be a matter of time before woolf is back knocking at the door 4 more.!!!

BA eases staff fears
A poll of British Airways staff finds the company is making progress in convincing them of the seriousness of its pension problem.. More than half those questioned by MORI saw it as a threat to BA's survival. Two-thirds agreed that changes are needed to the pension scheme, which has a £1.4bn net deficit under new accounting rules. Some 80 percent agreed that they need to take action to secure their pension. BA talked last week with 14,500 staff, nearly half the members of its main scheme. Talks with trustees and unions will follow.
The poll will give BA some encouragement. While less than half felt that options had been explained clear;y, 49 percent said BA had been 'open and honest', with 21 percent agreeing.
Friday, January 27, 2006
Daily Mail
Just a shame they dont mention only 10% of staff in NAPS were asked these questions, so Two-thirds of staff is less than 7% of staff in this pension agree change is reqd.
So more than 93% of staff do not want change in plain English.!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

HZ123,

Read before you let fire.I'm in NAPS so not the stuffed pig thank you!!.:ok: .

Keep taking the angry pills!!.

WTDWL.

well done, like no one else saves money each and every day.

Pilots need to begin to follow the business like every other group. BALPA, Seniorty, position of power all makes for a pilots ego and ensures market forces don't apply - try working for another profession and live with market forces, then you'll deserve your salery with everyone else. BA are giving alot at the moment, what exactly have the pilots given besides turing up for work for less than 900 hrs per year? Answers on a postcard...........

HZ123, pigs don't bleat, not sure about suffed pigs, though. ;)
Maybe they were sheep and the cat got their goat, or something
I love mixed metaphors.

Why are you so down on pilots?

On your $100 fare they get something between $5 and $8 depending on which side of the pond, and similar geographic distinctions. That is for BOTH pilots.
When the aircraft starts to shake rattle and roll, or funny noises, smoke, or flame and sparks start happening, and the cabin gets all hushed, it is astounding how quickly those "busdrivers" are upgraded. That is when they earn their pay.
And you begrudge them what is, in effect, less than your most miserly executives tip at any decent restaurant. Shame on you. :(

Swedish,

You seem to have made an amateurish mistake in saying that we 'only turn up for work for 900 hours per year', you are obviously not a pilot. The 900 hour limit is on flying hours, so actual time that the aircraft is moving, we work much longer than this. Briefings, turn-arounds, admin, positioning between airports or aircraft do not fall under this limit. In fact on a given day you may only work for 4-6 flying hours but may have worked 10.5 - 12 hours during the day.

I see how, the problem with pilots, unlike other forms of disputes (where members meet en mass) is the fact that most of you are all over the globe and cannot be brought together.

Granted you may chat in the f/d but does your F/O or Captain share the views of yourself?
Airlines are astute at splitting up union members on flights.
Taking action via union membership is comparatively new to pilots, unlike disputes of the past such as coal miners and building workers. This is new to you! And I fear BALPA haven’t the balls. Reps/shop stewards in the old days would stand your corner.

As to date, the divide of bases in the loco brings to mind the working practises of bus companies such as ‘Stagecoach’ (take notice) wages and working times were ‘singular’ to each depot, no collective agreements.. Be warned.

swedish
 

Pilots should be following the business "like every other group" - don't make me laugh - would you care to name these "other groups" within BA who set such a wonderful example that the pilots should be following them?

you really have to ignore poster such as swedish:8
They are soooo out of touch, I might start feeling sorry soon, although part of me thinks it might be LCG:yuk: :yuk: :yuk: :yuk:

The problem with pilot unions is that they are not unions.
You only have to look at the names to realise that. Nowhere is the word union mentioned.
Many "associations" see themselves as proxies for management and try to take the "reasonable" approach to industrial relations.
Unions are not about reasonable, they are about power and the perception of power.
You will only achieve what you are willing to fight for. It will not be given to you on a plate simply because you make a reasonable argument, and real unions understand that and work on that basis.
Management fully realise this. Hence Leo H-C.
And the constant downward pressure on T&Cs industry wide.
On a $100 fare we are only talking a few dollars, but it comes out of the workers pocket, not the customer's. This is because divide and rule has pitted airlines against airlines in predatory and sometimes financially suicidal behaviour with ridiculous fares, sometimes at below cost, yet the respective pilots stand by and watch their mutual positions erode without a wimper.
Not long ago I saw a graph of the real value of an air ticket over a 30 year period (from Quantas, I think) as compared to a house, car, loaf of bread, and the airfare had sunk by 90% compared to a car, more than that against a house.
A significant portion of that has come out of the employees pockets.
Until the pilots ( and other airline workers) realise they are cutting each others throats and devise a plan to counter this, the trend will continue.
:(

edited because finger is quicker than brain

Blueprint
 

I have read this thread with interest.
Having been involved with the BA pension some years ago, there is a lot of uncertainty being aired. The fact is BA can, with 6 months notice close, both NAPS & APS. However they are contractually bound to honour existing committments earned to that point. This is their problem. At that point they have a fixed liability (approx £2B in NAPS) which has to be set aside. At the moment they are allowed to pay it off in annual installments (Approx £225pa).
This is their problem. They are between a rock & a hard place.
The Balpa team have a strong hand, I suggest you back them to the hilt, although the future accural rates looks uncertain, what is banked is safe.
After all those very close to retirement could do just that & retire with a deferred pension (& go to SIA etc, for a short period). I really do not think BA could cope with a large number of early retirements.

I think a dose of reality would not go a miss here!!

Firstly, fighting for your "rights" is perfectly acceptable as long as the means justify the end.

History can teach us many things and we have already seen today people who paid their "stamp" throughout their lives being given nothing for it. In short, things change, nothing is for certain.

I myself am 40, have built up a very nice pension pot both from an ex final salary scheme and in a current AVC and money purchase arrangement. I have 20 years to go and certain things have to happen if I am to collect:

1) For my final scheme, my (previous) employer has to remain in business or else I get almost nothing. There are supposed to be rules and reserves, but in reality I would get maybe 20% of what I am currently entitled to

2) The money purchase scheme is in stocks/shares/bonds etc. I am a baby boomer and do you really think there will be enough going around to pay us all when I retire. All that money being cashed in from the government bonds or a sharp fall as we sell stocks to pay the pension. I doubt it will be worth that much in 20 years, and even if it is, a recession or a period of inflation above 4% will quickly reduce my pension to peanuts.

We were all promised pensions and a happy retirement in return for paying in. We now know those sums don't add up for all but the current few and maybe those to retire in the next few years. The outgoings together with health, longer life etc make the promises false.

So, we can bury our head in the sands, bang our drum and scream that its not fair, but we have to lower the expectations and accept what is affordable.

Moving forward, there needs to be a complete rethink on pensions to make them much more meaningful and less risky. Payouts will be that much lower but be reasonable.

Then you can make a decision on whether to invest in a pension, a house, gold or whatever.

I’m with DaveOleary on this one…. I sincerely doubt BA pilots & BALPA have the balls to unite and strike! “BIG” Willie’s going to steal your pensions and piss all over you in the process.

Just 'cos you got shafted at BACX doesn't mean we're as weak willed as you BAlite.