JCBA Negotiations and updates for AA Fleet

[Jester]

For someone who won't come and talk to me or any other Union rep to get your proof but will listen to the negative crap from people stirring the pot, that's your problem. I don't know who CL or PB are by initials only.

Like I said before, reach out to 10 Union reps of your choosing and I know you'll then realize that you got BS info. Or, you can believe somebody not involved.

P. Rez

 
I got the information DIRECTLY from C.L, and P.B., and I doubt any union rep would speak to me about any particular person and their issues due it being a privacy matter, so your "solution" is immediately suspect.
 
Furthermore, a few years ago I asked you about working unsafe and having to scan off bags and pull them at the same time.  And you were going to work on a solution... still waiting.
 
You want C.L. phone number?  I just found it.  He would love to get his job back (or even get retirement flight benefits) after the Management screwing he got and the union wasn't even willing to provide the lubrication.

 

[P. REZ]

I got the information DIRECTLY from C.L, and P.B., and I doubt any union rep would speak to be about any particular person and their issues due it being a privacy matter, so your "solution" is immediately suspect.
 
Furthermore, a few years ago I asked you about working unsafe and having to scan off bags and pull them at the same time.  And you were going to work on a solution... still waiting.
 
You want C.L. phone number?  I just found it.  He would love to get his job back (or even get retirement flight benefits) after the Management screwing he got and the union wasn't even willing to provide the lubrication.

I will do you one better, I will meet with both of you if they agree and show you the proof. I mean seriously, what do you think someone is going to tell you, they were guilty or they were screwed?

Go to 10 Union reps and ask them if people are wrongfully termed for attendance. I am sure it will be 100% no.

P. Rez

 

[P. REZ]

Deleted

 

[charlie Brown]

Not sure the NC wants the attendance policy written into the contract. Maybe we could get a comment from CB or P. Rez. As a union representative for most of my career; I can attest that 90% of your time and effort are spent on about 5% of the membership. The bad apples so to speak. The attendance policy puts all the apples in one basket. Insulting. Another issue that needs attention.

Even though we don't negotiate for what we personally feel, but rather what the membership wants us to negotiate, but my personal opinion on the attendance policy being contractual is heck no. Don't get me wrong, I think some tweaks should be done to improve the policy, like a deduction of a point after perfect attendance after a certain time period. But the union just like the company has to sign off on everything contractual. IMO as a union rep and one that has argued probably hundreds of attendance cases, if I agree to something in the contract, then It takes our ability to argue for individuals based on their circumstances. We do a pretty good job of arguing people's cases now based on their circumstances. But if we agree to it contractual, then how can we turn around and argue that we now disagree with it? Which we now can do since we haven't agreed and signed off on it. And while I'm not sure system wide issues on this. We have always done pretty good in my stations with attendance and arguing people's issues. So no, I'm not personally for it. But again, we are there for the members and what everyone wants as a whole. I just think it will take a lot of the unions argument away if it's contractual.

 

[Jester]

I will do you one better, I will meet with both of you if they agree and show you the proof. I mean seriously, what do you think someone is going to tell you, they were guilty or they were screwed?

Go to 10 Union reps and ask them if people are wrongfully termed for attendance. I am sure it will be 100% no.

P. Rez

 
Let me turn the question upon you.... "I mean seriously what do you think someone (Union reps) is going to tell you, they were guilty" of incompetency or just claim the termination was justified?
 
As for us all meeting, he left town the last I heard barely getting by in life.

 

[P. REZ]

Let me turn the question upon you.... "I mean seriously what do you think someone (Union reps) is going to tell you, they were guilty" of incompetency or just claim the termination was justified?
 
As for us all meeting, he left town the last I heard barely getting by in life.

I am always willing to discuss this with you or anyone else, but you really have been given bad information and if you only have one side of a story, then it would be hard to know the truth. I see every termination write up and I can only recall a handful of terms in the last few years and they were bad and most of them are back to work.

P. Rez

 

[robbedagain]

in our station  our station mgr is a stickler for attendance     a lot of folks in our station went from no levels to and up to level 3    So a lot of the folks  did the next thing and applied for FMLA    even mgmt. pressures people to get it bec of the attendance policy    But with FMLA you must have a pre existing conditions for either yourself or a family member    But AA ARC medical board will approve it   or deny it.    A lot of the folks  feel this sick policy needs to be addressed better

 

[WeAAsles]

in our station  our station mgr is a stickler for attendance     a lot of folks in our station went from no levels to and up to level 3    So a lot of the folks  did the next thing and applied for FMLA    even mgmt. pressures people to get it bec of the attendance policy    But with FMLA you must have a pre existing conditions for either yourself or a family member    But AA ARC medical board will approve it   or deny it.    A lot of the folks  feel this sick policy needs to be addressed better

Robbed for the most part attendance is something that only we can control and sometimes it does happen unfortunately that people go over the line and push it too far. In my career and every time I've stepped into that office with a member they have been warned. So it's not as if they don't know that they have to do something to make sure they secure their job. Your job is what pays your bills and many times you're not going to get better than this one.

I even had a guy one time that I said if you have to to save your job you need to sleep in your car. Sometimes that person who gets fired for attendance has something going on that he just doesn't want to tell you and if he doesn't then how can any rep help him? I've had a few with drinking and drug problems that I've thankfully been able to get to admit they have a problem and get into an EAP program and I've even had a few guys who just liked being with the girl they had more than coming to work.

And P Rez is 100% right that no you don't always get the real story from the guy who got fired. Find me anyone these days who will readily admit that they just F'd up. And a guy being fired for attendance is probably the Union Reps worst nightmare. It's the one thing they deal with that 99% of the time they're not going to be able to bring the guy back. Now imagine you like the guy and beat your own head against the wall to get him to straighten out and he wouldn't. You wind up kicking yourself because you wonder if there was something more you could have done? That's why when I had a guy with really bad attendance I'd read the guy the riot act. I'm really trying to help that guy as most Stewards are I'm positive. The reality is simple though.

Some people are just beyond help.

 

[WeAAsles]

I will agree there is too much of the "AW mentality" but after speaking with former AW from other stations, it appears to be more of "PHX mentality".  In terms of No Call/No Show, usually it relates back to a doubling partner who forgets to pick-up a shift while attempting to trade it to another person while the eventual victim is out of town... seen that a few times.  Or someone who says they will pick-up the shift and changes their mind.  I knew one guy who read Workbrain wrong as the first day column on the Workbrain calendar was different than the first day column on standard calendar and made a mental mistake after picking-up someone's shift-- thankfully, he wasn't on a Level 2 or higher, else he would have been gone.

Jester I had to come back to this one. It sounds like you're making excuses for other people's carelessness? When we trade away or take a shift there is a responsibility for both those members to make sure it's covered. If I'm taking off and someone says they're going to work my shift I don't take anyone on their word until I see it gone in the computer. If it's not gone by that morning and I can't get a hold of the guy, that's it I'm working. I'd have to go into work. And if I'm going out of town I'll make sure well in advance that my hours are gone.

I had a guy one time that was 2 inches from being fired and another guy was supposed to work a shift of his. The other guy never put it in and the first guy had a no call. I had to tell the first guy that he might be fired if he couldn't get that other guy to admit that he said he would work for him? And even then there were no guarantees because it was his shift and his responsibility. Lucky the other guy was honorable and took on the responsibility and the CSM accepted it. And I was able to get them both off with no occurance because the second guy manned up.

But I see these things happen all the time. Is it the company's responsibility to make sure someone comes to work? No. Some people take this benefit we have way too lightly. They think they're made of Teflon and the Union will get them off the hook if they go too far. Again no. Being in a Union doesn't mean 100% job protection if you're the one who doesn't ultimately care about your own job.

 

[robbedagain]

i do agree WeAA  but I definitely went in as a rep for a good number of the folks in my station   But what angers everyone is the fact it is now back dated 12 months and thats really pissed offf the peeps     I do know SWA has a much better system than ours bec we have talked with a number of their people pretty much on a weekly or daily basis      I would hope that our negoiating team can negoiate a better sick attendance policy better than what we currently have.   But for the time being at least 60% of the peeps in my station has FMLA and uses that instead of sick bec it as someone pointed out  all u need is out sick 2 or 3 times and its a coaching  unless of course they bring up the past 12 months    not to mention though if your out more than 3 days  our station manager will FEDEX and MAIL the same letter demanding medical records and medical conditions etc     It happened to both me and a lot of the folks bec the change of seasons and people coming to work sick translates into other agents getting sick   yet our sta mgr blasted peeps myself included for coming in with coughing and sore throats etc

 

[WeAAsles]

i do agree WeAA  but I definitely went in as a rep for a good number of the folks in my station   But what angers everyone is the fact it is now back dated 12 months and thats really pissed offf the peeps     I do know SWA has a much better system than ours bec we have talked with a number of their people pretty much on a weekly or daily basis      I would hope that our negoiating team can negoiate a better sick attendance policy better than what we currently have.   But for the time being at least 60% of the peeps in my station has FMLA and uses that instead of sick bec it as someone pointed out  all u need is out sick 2 or 3 times and its a coaching  unless of course they bring up the past 12 months    not to mention though if your out more than 3 days  our station manager will FEDEX and MAIL the same letter demanding medical records and medical conditions etc     It happened to both me and a lot of the folks bec the change of seasons and people coming to work sick translates into other agents getting sick   yet our sta mgr blasted peeps myself included for coming in with coughing and sore throats etc

I'm not a huge fan of Family Leave but if someone has real serious problems it's a good thing to be able to keep your job. But some people use it to liberally if they qualify for it and the company then rips us off with it. Family Leave is an insurance that the company pays into and from what I've read in the past they get compensated back around 60% of those lost wages for people who use it? So you get charged a ful day worth of your sick time and it only actually costs the company 40% until your bank is exhausted. And then in the future if you no longer need or qualify for FMLA you have zero sick hours in the bank if something happens to you.

When FMLA first came out managers were trying to pimp it to people like some cheap drug.

https://www.congress.gov/bill/113th-congress/house-bill/3712

And it sounds like you guys do have some problems there. For us if you're out more than 3 days they want you to bring in a Doctors note. But if say you only have that one occurance for the entire year there's not much they can do to you if you don't. Now if you have multiple occurances they can put you on a 90 day Doctors note which means you're "supposed" to bring in a note if you call in sick 90 days after your last occurance.

What I don't like is that there's no continuity to the sick calls and its up to managements discretion. I've represented guys that they want to put on the note after 3 occurances and guys who have 5 that don't get it. Sometimes it seems like it's a popularity contest?

I can get what CB has to say about it but for me I would rather it's in writing in our contract so everyone gets the same treatment. (Including myself BTW, I was the 5 guy) I just don't like things being left in the company's hands. And if it was in the contract we wouldn't read about Union reps like P. Rez supposedly screwing a guy (cough) because here's your contract man. Read it and follow it and if you don't it's on you now.

 

[Tim Nelson]

I'm not a huge fan of Family Leave but if someone has real serious problems it's a good thing to be able to keep your job. But some people use it to liberally if they qualify for it and the company then rips us off with it. Family Leave is an insurance that the company pays into and from what I've read in the past they get compensated back around 60% of those lost wages for people who use it? So you get charged a ful day worth of your sick time and it only actually costs the company 40% until your bank is exhausted. And then in the future if you no longer need or qualify for FMLA you have zero sick hours in the bank if something happens to you.
When FMLA first came out managers were trying to pimp it to people like some cheap drug. https://www.congress.gov/bill/113th-congress/house-bill/3712
And it sounds like you guys do have some problems there. For us if you're out more than 3 days they want you to bring in a Doctors note. But if say you only have that one occurance for the entire year there's not much they can do to you if you don't. Now if you have multiple occurances they can put you on a 90 day Doctors note which means you're "supposed" to bring in a note if you call in sick 90 days after your last occurance.
What I don't like is that there's no continuity to the sick calls and its up to managements discretion. I've represented guys that they want to put on the note after 3 occurances and guys who have 5 that don't get it. Sometimes it seems like it's a popularity contest?
I can get what CB has to say about it but for me I would rather it's in writing in our contract so everyone gets the same treatment. (Including myself BTW, I was the 5 guy) I just don't like things being left in the company's hands. And if it was in the contract we wouldn't read about Union reps like P. Rez supposedly screwing a guy (cough) because here's your contract man. Read it and follow it and if you don't it's on you now.

the attendance program forces people to use fmla. More importantly, i wouldnt be surprised if Trump wins and a Republican congress does away with fmla. Robbed is right, we should have something fixed in the policy and make more elements of it contractual.

 

[Tim Nelson]

Industry happenings:
The Piedmont MX just signed a new deal with the IBT. This is an AA regional airline.

They received a 7% bonus although their refional wages prolly arent the greatest.
Only a 15% pay increase initially and the disappointing mid term bonus' instead of wage hikes. Increased job protection (havent seen the language), increase in company 401k contribution.

again, havent seen the actual language. I just post this as a matter of info.

 

[WeAAsles]

SWA Ramp agreement. Article 23 page 48.

http://www.twu.org/Portals/0/AirContracts/sw_RampCBA.pdf

 

[WeAAsles]

Industry happenings:
The Piedmont MX just signed a new deal with the IBT. This is an AA regional airline.
They received a 7% bonus although their refional wages prolly arent the greatest.
Only a 15% pay increase initially and the disappointing mid term bonus' instead of wage hikes. Increased job protection (havent seen the language), increase in company 401k contribution.
again, havent seen the actual language. I just post this as a matter of info.

Yea I don't think we'd want to even consider comparing ourselves to any regional airline contracts. The paper they use to write the contract on is probably worth more than any improvements.

Not even going to try to search for it Tim.