Reflecting

Dilligas

Veteran
Sep 4, 2003
509
148
State of Perpetual Confusion
Reflecting on all the good byes and farewells recently... I'm saddened to see some really great folks leaving and taking the experience out the door with them. No doubt this will come around and bite U in the buttocks.

I was proud of the professionalism they displayed until the very end. Overall, some really good people.

The bean counters, in their zeal to outsource everything they can, have destroyed the product. Reports indicate severe shortages in parts and the MEL list is ridiculous. Costs are increasing due to the lack of planning.

It is ridiculous and getting worse every day.

I hope those that have departed U will check back in and share their experiences in the real world and what they decide to do.

Good luck to those still left at U also.
 
Dilligas, you are absolutely correct.

The company, as a course of business, has assigned some of it's stations a spare parts inventory. These parts, such as aircraft batteries, tires, and electronics components, are allocated to be at many stations to facilitate quick, simple repairs.

The company, through it's unionized work force, has been able to be successful in keeping these stations, and it's repair stations, stocked with the required components. The fill rate, usually measured as a percentage of actual inventory to the target inventory, has been kept in the 90s, to high 80s for decades.

In the middle of March, the company exercised its new contractual prerogative to outsource the repair and supply of these components to companies outside our own, and close the shops, in house, that have historically preformed that task.

In the few short weeks subsequent, allocations for many of the parts have fallen in the 60% range and lower.

Many flights a day are being cancelled because of this parts shortage, and most repairs are accomplished by robbing parts off of another aircraft.

Also the actual cost to supply each part is now higher on an average of double what the cost was to do it in house. Ask any of the line mechanics how his parts situation is, and he will answer that he can't see how this company can stay in business much longer.

This is just another example of where the management’s zeal to rid itself of labor has incurred a cost much above what it would have cost to keep it.
 
The examples of stupidity shared in another thread as the rush to outsource jobs is biting U in the buttocks and not letting go, and the best (worst) is on the near horizon. I've gotten quite an earful from my friends and contacts at U in the last few weeks... if it wasn't such a painful situation for many good people, it would be almost comical to sit back and watch the unfolding ineptness and stupidity.

It's warming up a bit folks, and Spring is upon us. Guess what U uses a ton of during warm weather... and what U doesn't have enough of.

The wheel and brake shop, formerly in CLT, was a state of the art facility with a professional crew that was very productive. Even so, at times U faced shortages of wheel assemblys during hot weather. Those warm runways and hot braking conditions just melt away the rubber!

Well, now instead of an unserviceable wheel being received in the shop in the morning, and being turned out as a serviceable wheel the same day or next, they are trucked to the west coast from CLT, (airbus), or trucked to Kentucky (boeing), the vendors are not up to the job, the turn time is weeks, and then wait for them to be trucked back to CLT, then as soon as they are received they must be inspected, a cluster ensues to ship them AOG around the system. Ludicrous. The transportation costs alone are astronomical, not to mention the courier charges for parts back and forth to Alabama. Another reason U is losing money like crazy and will not survive, in this writer's opinion.

Ask any of the folks in MCU what they face on a daily basis, robbing Peter to pay Paul to scrounge parts. The cost to borrow parts from other airlines, how many slides have been borrowed, these costs are mind boggling. Ask any mechanic if there is a parts shortage...

Sorry about your ruined business trip or family vacation, perhaps U doesn't have enough tires to put on your plane. But of course it may not matter as perhaps U doesn't have enough batteries either... or coffee makers, or functional seats...

Jethro Bodine ran a better airline, maybe it will come down to wooden benches on the plane, rope seat belts, granny serving possum sandwiches in a sack, and passing around the cider jug.

Good luck to the good folks still left at U. It's a shame what they did to your airline. Idiots.
 
Dilligas said:
The examples of stupidity shared in another thread as the rush to outsource jobs is Another reason U is losing money like crazy and will not survive, in this writer's opinion.
It's a shame what they did to your airline. Idiots.
[post="260933"][/post]​
I share you sentiments.

I was just talking to a furloughed employee who is selling his home and moving to FL this weekend saying the job brought him to pit and now that it's over there is no sense staying in pit. He added that he hopes U doesn't make it. I really don't feel that way knowing friends still there, but like you state, I can't believe they will make it. LUV is running tons of really great TV commercials luring in all the disgruntled public that is fed up with U.

Then once in a while people like Hawk and other morons come on here spouting all kinds of accolades about a management team who should be stoned and not praised.

I honestly feel for the ones remaining because I know what it’s like to wonder if you are going to be able to support your family from one month to the next working for such a unstable company. Glad my ride is over, but it's still sad watching the ill effects it has left on too many people.
 
repeet said:
The company, as a course of business, has assigned some of it's stations a spare parts inventory. These parts, such as aircraft batteries, tires, and electronics components, are allocated to be at many stations to facilitate quick, simple repairs.

[post="258884"][/post]​


Can anyone comment on the Airbus in FLL that busted a starter last week? How many spare do we have in the system and just where is IT? How much did that cost us? Canx flight, bussing to MIA (AA is loving us right now!) and associated costs and ill will. :down: :down:
My friend said after last week they cant pay her enough there to come in and work overtime.
 
tadjr said:
How many spare do we have in the system and just where is IT?
[post="260942"][/post]​


Sources indicate severe parts shortages, few if any spares of frequently needed parts... MEL list in the hundreds, and just you wait till the weather heats up.

Lots of "parts robbing" of aircraft in heavy maintenance. Lots of "borrowed parts" (an extremely expensive practice, where airline A loans airline B a designated part for a daily "rental"... costs can be in the tens of thousands per part. :shock:

Good luck to the good folks still at U.
 
tadjr said:
My friend said after last week they cant pay her enough there to come in and work overtime.
[post="260942"][/post]​

With broken airplanes, oversales, irate customers, and staff shortages, most agents feel the same...not for double or triple time.