A Message From Ceo Bruce Lakefield

[usairways_vote_NO]

A320:

I forgot another point......The ask kept going up....it didn't go up because the company was being punitive. They are not allowed to do that in BK. The ask went up because of the deterioration of the US airline revenue picture and skyrocketing fuel. If the employees of U ponied up the ask last summer, U management would just be back for more. Fact!

Boomer

[post="241497"][/post]​

Very true

 

[justaumechanic]

Well said..

 

[AgentOrange]

Management now has everything (even more according to 320) that they asked for. Now management will show you what they are made of. I already know what they are made of. They of the same mindset of 320 and constantly looking for excuses of why the airline can't fly. Now there are no excuses. The employees gave. Watch what happens.

Clearly you forget that not every variable determining company performance is management able to control. They cannot control oil prices, pricing moves by Delta, or the general lack of relief in RASM in the industry.

You need to quit blaming management for every shortcoming and work with them to make this a successful airline with good karma a la Jetblue or Southwest. Intransigence pretty much got these unions nowhere as they did not understand the power of liquidation leverage. The walkout bluff didn't work.

IAM added no value; all they can say is that they delayed inevitable wage cuts a few months, thereby having their members paid extra those few months. Those marginal gains will be reversed given their lower than otherwise pay rates going forward. Pride prevented them from negotiating rationally.

 

[700UW]

Did the employees do any of the following?

I don't think so, it was ALL Management!

Colodny’s Blunders:

· Mirror Image, imposing US Air’s business methods upon Piedmont and PSA, instead of looking at each respective airline and adapting their successful practices. Some examples would be dismantling of the Piedmont Shuttle which accounted for 32% of Piedmont’s Gross Revenue.

· Not furthering International Service and canceling the last three 767s on order from Boeing, then realizing how much money was made serving international destinations and paying Boeing a $30 million penalty to reorder the three planes.

Schofield’s Blunders:

· Business select, $50 million on wasted seats that never worked properly and we eventually removed from the 737-200 fleet. Operation Highground.

· The IAM Mechanic and Related Strike of 1992 in which US Air lost $35 million and agreeing to pay all the pilots during our strike regardless if they flew or not.

· The hiring of Joe Gorman from United Airlines. Gorman stayed a few months then went right back to United, then United started taking us on head to head in numerous markets where we did not compete before Gorman’s tenure.

· The alliance with British Airways to infuse quick cash, but not on favorable terms to US Air, BA got more out of the alliance then we did.

Wolf and Gangwal:

· Canceling all the Boeing orders and having to pay a substantial penalty to Boeing to this day the dollar amount is not known as it was a confidential out of court settlement after Boeing sued US Airways, but it is believed to be hundreds of millions of dollars.

· Closing of three maintenance bases and trying to accomplish all the work in just three bases, which caused a backlog of airplanes awaiting “Q†and “C†checks and Mod visits. At one point you could see numerous airplanes parked in Charlotte, Pittsburgh and Tampa awaiting maintenance.

· Buying back over $1.5 billon of US Airways stock instead of using the money as operating capital or paying down debt or just having it around for a downturn.

· Selling the company to United Airlines and then for the next 14 months having no direction and running the company into the ground.

· Overreacting to the September 11th tragedy and shrinking the airline by 23% and increasing costs by putting larger airplanes on shorter routes.

 

[USA320Pilot]

CaptainBoomer:

I agree that fundamentals deteriorated, but if ALPA's RC4 agreed to participate earlier, costs would have been lower and revenue higher. There would have been less bankruptcy expenses and more revenue with passengers not “booking awayâ€￾ from US Airways to other companies. Moreover, US Airways would have benefited from cost cuts earlier, saving more money.

In addition, there could have been more EMB-170s and CRJ-700s delivered, which would have created more feed and permitted more mainline aircraft route reallocation, further lowering unit costs.

I'm not exactly sure how this would have effected the balance sheet, but it's clear the "hardline" union approach badly hurt and nearly killed US Airways.

Regards,

USA320Pilot

 

[Phoenix]

...
 Common and restricted stock would likely remain in place.
.....

Regards,

USA320Pilot

[post="241383"][/post]​

ROFLMAO

 

[Phoenix]

Usairways_vote_NO:

I started this topic by simply posting comments by Bruce Lakefield and then the typical bitching and moaning started again. My point is simple: labor gave up more than the company's ask and even Randy Canale understands that labor had no, nada, zero leverage, but you sir, fail to understand the reality of the marketplace.

Truth hurts, doesn't it...

Regards,

USA320Pilot

[post="241450"][/post]​

Huh!?

You didn't "simply post" comments by Lakefield. You posted YOUR opinion that Labor had no one to blame but themselves for the new furolouhgs and wage reductions.

No one is taking acception to Lakefield, they are a bit confused why you are always cheering from his side of the bleachers. Put your finger away.

Best Regards,

Phoenix

 

[CaptianBoomer]

USA320 -

Again another post, but no answer.

You assume revenue would have been higher. You assume that they wouldn't have filed. You assume more rjs would have shown up.

RJ's are NOT the answer. In fact, the main reason U's costs are stubbornly high is because they are now stuck with all these 50 seat RJ's clogging up the operation. Now if the company had been smart, and bought 70 and 90 seat jets from the beginning, and ALPA had had the foresight to put competitive payrates on the RJ's and the B-737's from the beginning, maybe some of this carnage could have been avoided. There is no cost decrease by adding RJ's to the fleet. However, these are all assumptions.

Facts are facts. Tell me about the CASS and commuter policy! When are you going to realize that the people you are dealing with have NO honor and will never hold up their end of the bargain.

I only have one more comment. The management of U has the ball in their court right now. They have gotten everything they wanted, not once, but twice. If there is no profit, then the blame is squarely on their shoulders.

Boomer

 

[Smartest Loser]

"When are you going to realize that the people you are dealing with have NO honor and will never hold up their end of the bargain."

The captain is correct....What makes you think mgt. will honor this agreement...?? If things go south....they come back for more...!!

Its an endless cycle, the guys at Eastern pulled their plug quick to prevent this exact thing from happening there.!!

SL

 

[bookmdano]

"When are you going to realize that the people you are dealing with have NO honor and will never hold up their end of the bargain."

The captain is correct....What makes you think mgt. will honor this agreement...?? If things go south....they come back for more...!!

Its an endless cycle, the guys at Eastern pulled their plug quick to prevent this exact thing from happening there.!!

SL

[post="241522"][/post]​

You are exactly, precisely correct. If everyone read the fine print in their new contracts, there was a clause giving the company the right to come back for more under dyer(sp?) circumstances. I believe dyer circumstances to u's mgt could be an increase in their green's fees at the local country club.

 

[supercruiser]

If the ALPA MEC would have sent out the company's September 6 proposal for membership ratifcation, as requested by management, the 279 aircraft fleet count would have been in the new ALPA LOA.

[post="241427"][/post]​

The Sep 6 proposal only included protections for 60 days after filing for bankruptcy, which everyone knew was going to happen. Are you saying that the company would not have come back for any more give backs after Nov 12 or whenever 60 days after filing would have been? If you truly believe that, and somehow think we would be anywhere else other than where we are today, you are delusional, which is probably a true statement in your case.

If US Airways fails, it will solely be the result of lousy management, just like it is for any company in any industry.

supercruiser

 

[bookmdano]

See Comments

Regards,

USA320Pilot

[post="241353"][/post]​

OMG, I just opened my email and read one version. Then I opened another email from someone else and here is what I read:

A Message from the CEO

Dear Customer:
FF#:

There has been a lot of bad press about us, and frankly it’s pretty much all-true. But we have made some significant accomplishments in screwing over our employees. As a valued customer we would like to listen to you. But we haven’t reached that point yet and have never hired VP's to figure that one out. So I’ll take a moment to update you on how well we have screwed our employees into signing contracts where their “backs were against the wallâ€. But we just can’t thank you enough for spending 3 days trying to figure out and find our hidden $49.00 ticket. You are definitely the all time winner of the Airline-trailer Award. Anyone that would spend 6 extra nights in a hotel to save $20.00 on an airline ticket deserves this award. We are so proud; we have convinced government agencies to defer our payments because we now sell $49 cheap-olas from 1 specific city to another specific city (READ THE FINE PRINT). We can go one step further, we have a judge and a consumer affairs department that will give you anything, isn’t that a kick in the shorts and enough to convince you that we know what we are doing? The judge is our friend and we pay him well, (thanks to our employee’s cutbacks) we have the money to do that. As long as we keep firing and laying off American citizen’s and outsourcing their jobs to people in foreign countries we’ll be able to keep paying those ridiculous fees for advertising bogus fares in the nations newspapers. And as long as customers are given carte blanc on complaints without evidence, they will be compensated in full.
What this means for customers like you is that it proves that you have no pride and will wait on hold for ½ hour to save $5.00. The only ones that support the survival of this company are the CEO’s, VP’s..Etc. because they are really too busy this week with manicures and masseuses to fill out job applications to other companies right now. One of the best ways to prove to you what a great CEO I am, I have instituted several new popular routes for our customers. From our hub cities in the US, you can now fly non-stop to Kosovo; Bangladesh; Bagdahd; Panama, and our sunny vacation destination: Ensenada. You can count on us. After you’ve counted on us to deliver you, we’ll eventually get your bags to you within: 1 day; 2 days; 3 days; 4; we won’t disappoint you, we’ll make sure your bags don’t arrive until you have spent 4 days at your destination. But you have to sign a release waiving liability for trying to ship your whole household goods into a check-in bag.
You can call our 800 number as much as you’d like, we are proud of our two operators manning the U.S. phones, (they might be on break or lunch (damned those unions, we’re trying to get rid of these two too) which might mean a longer holding time. And just for sport, we’re going to let you think you can use your frequent flyer mileage points to get you to someplace you think you really want to go. But seating is limited and we may only be able to get you ½ the way across the ocean.
We’ve screwed our employees so well that they just might have an attitude, please hang-up on them until you get one of our new outsourced agents in a foreign country. Please don’t ask the new employee if they are for the Pats or the Eagles, they won’t have a clue. As a thank you for continuing to support us, we are pleased to let you spend hours figuring out how to register for our bonus miles give-away. Thank you for taking the time to read this. Airlines R US CEO

 

[speedbird86]

LOL. That's some funny stuff.