This job has it all. It’s got the good, the bad, and the ugly. On these
pages have been accounts of some of the good. This is the story of the bad
and the ugly.
The line I bid this month started with a commercial (deadhead) to Frankfurt.
Based on everything I have experienced and assumed to be true, I was
expecting to go to work on the 1st. As a result, I was both surprised and
unprepared for the news I received on the 30th from Scheduling. They
informed me I had to leave the very next day (the 31st), a day before I was
expecting. I would commercial to Atlanta, layover for an entire day, and
then ride one of our airplanes over to Frankfurt. Naturally, that was
designed to save money (at my expense).
Now, sometimes that might not be that big of a deal, but in this case it was.
I had packed so much work into my days off that I was truly unprepared to go
back to work. I wound up sleeping a whopping 30 minutes that night.
As I was working through the scheduling issues, I explored the possibility
that they may be scheduling me in violation of our working agreement. Now
before I get to the punchline, I should explain a couple of things.
First of all, in the aviation world, we have a sort of standard way we handle
disagreements about the ‘legality’ of flying assignments (or other
procedures). If something clearly violates the Federal Aviation Regulations
(FAR’s), we simply refuse to do it. If something clearly violates the
contract, we normally voice that and are not required to do it. However, on
occasion there is disagreement about how the contract applies. Under those
circumstances, we may be ‘ordered’ to take the assignment. We’re told by our
Union to take the assignment even though we disagree with it and if there
really is a violation it can later be grieved (there’s a whole procedure with
that, too). That’s what I did in this case.
Secondly, our Union has created a bulliten board (a Yahoo group actually) for
the use of our non-management pilots to discuss, well, pretty much anything
we want. Management pilots are not allowed on the list supposedly to foster
more open communication. I’ve learned in the past that management *does*
read those emails (at least sometimes).
So as a result of beign told I had to leave a day early (even after I
objected), I decided to write an email to the list exploring the legality of
my somewhat unusual circumstances (the details are not terribly important
here). Often, this results in a good variety of feedback from Union
Representatives as well as other line pilots. It also serves to educate all
of us as to how to apply the rules in various sitautions. I was careful to
write it ‘nicely’ and was honstly looking for information about whether or
not there was a contract violation that took place and what I should do about
it.
Within 24 hours, I had an email in my inbox from a particular management pilot
(essentially, one of my bosses) who was involved in the situation the
previous evening. He was not particularly pleased with the fact that I had
discussed the issue on the ‘public’ forum of our email list (nevermind the
fact he’s not supposed to be on it at all). Among other things, he accused
me of poor judgement and made some other not-so-flattering remarks. There
was definitely some sarcasm in there, too, but not the friendly kind.
So not only have I lost a day off I was expecting (and still believe I was
entitled to), but I’ve irritated my boss by trying to find out if I was
really entitled to that day or not. All this blah-ness while I head out on a
17-day trip that I’m not entirely thrilled about flying in the first place
(three round trips to the middle-east).
Well, I guess it can’t all be perfect, can it???
V-