December '11 Bid's Award & Reason Report

Goodness Gracious!

I don't know what has changed but whatever it is, I love it. This is by far the best December line ever. I am completely shocked that my line solved by layer 2. I was sure it would solve by layer 5 or 6. That sure makes my day!

December '11 Bid's Nuts and Bolts

Rather than doing three posts this month as was my custom (Nuts and Bolts, Strategy, and Award), I'm going to combine the Nuts and Strategy and all that into one post. Hopefully, for the one person that might read this besides myself, this will create an easier flow of things. Of course, this is purely educational for me since a good bid and award can easily make or break my sanity.

We start off bidding for December coming off a great November. Lots of good flying, solid hours, and not too many trips on or over Thanksgiving. I imagine at least 75% of the FAs in COS will be enjoying turkey-day at home.

November '11 Bid's Award & Reason Report

Greetings,

Well, my strategy worked. Not only did it work, but it worked much better than I expected. My line consists of one layer 1 and three layers 2's. In layer 2 I was bidding for only 19 pairings! That makes me happy. I got the days off and some great credit. Looks like my seniority is finally starting to pay off.

November '11 Bid's Strategy in Bidding

Greetings,

So I have done a lot of work on my bid. I think it will pay off nicely for me come tomorrow evening sometime (maybe later) when the bids are awarded. In previous holiday months I have bid too restrictive. It sure does help to look back and see what I have done wrong.

I am really opening up my bid this time and bidding very conservatively. Hopefully, doing so will allow my bid solves at layer 4 or earlier. I wouldn't be thrilled with a bid that solved at layer 7, (especially with how wide open) it is but it does make for a nice safety net.

November '11 Bid's Nuts & Bolts and a Tri-anniversary-thingy.

Hiatus. It has been nice. Am I back? Well, at least for this month and quite possibly December.

Within this year IAH, MSP, SEA, and PDX have opened (or expanded respectfully) as crew domiciles and in just another month PHX will open. Every one of those have had an impact on COS flying. COS was the first into IAH, IAD, and MSP and while I don't think PHX will be a game changer, I do know that Mesa used to fly PHX-COS on the '50. Those flights were usually full more times than not, too.

As for my Hiatus? I have wanted to focus on my family and distance myself for the workplace. Maybe I have been a work-a-holic at times and so it has been nice to take a few steps back and enjoy the Fall, my favorite time of year.

By the way, the Arkansas Razorbacks are currently 5-1.

July '11 Bid's Award & Reason Report

Wow! My strategy for the July '11 bid worked out great! My bid was able to solve by layer 4. That had been my last layer of pairings before the descending credit layers. Layer 4 was only 18% of the pairings! That is pretty awesome considering my seniority. This is probably the best line I have ever had.

July '11 Bid's Strategy in Bidding

I was rather shocked on my last bid when I saw the impact my increased seniority has had. It is rather funny that only a couple of numbers can really make or break my bid. So it goes with a small domicile I suppose.

In July I have moved up two spots and with the retention of a few of our new hires in COS I am finally over the hill bidding 47%. I am bidding under 50% for the first time in my career. With that, I'm going to be rather bold for my July bid. I feel like I am bidding as though I am in the top 5% of the domicile in my first three layers. Before I started bidding this week, I asked myself what I would want to have if I could have any pairings. The answer has become weekends off recently. While it previously didn't bother me, my wife is now working and I need to have some weekends off. Especially in the summer! So that is where I have started.

July '11 Bid's Nuts and Bolts

July Nuts and Bolts:
In July we have 369 total pairings (FA and FF) just like June.

149 are on the CRJ 200
220 are on the CRJ 700

75 Locals
155 Two-day pairings
66 Three-day pairings
73 Four-day pairings


June Nuts and Bolts:
In June we had 369 total pairings (FA and FF)

133 are on the CRJ 200
236 are on the CRJ 700

98 Locals
135 Two-Day pairings
48 Three-Day pairings
88 Four-Day pairings

May Nuts and Bolts:
In May we had 418 total pairings (FA & FF)

148 were on the CRJ 200
270 were on the CRJ700

188 Locals
110 Two-Day pairings
38 Three-Day pairings
82 Four-Day pairings

June '11 Bid's Award

June '11 Bid's Nuts and Bolts

You'll notice the reduction by 49 pairings (mostly locals) compared to May, but COS will actually be flying more. I know it sounds a bit paradoxical, but it can be summed up by one word: efficiency. Here's the RSR's report that explains it a bit more detailed.

DEN/COS June 2011 Bid Information
For June 2011, DEN will fly fewer block hours than in May, while COS will fly more.
Apparently the schedules given to us by United and Delta have significant changes almost
every week, so the majority of pairings are probably single-occurrence, or perhaps repeat a few times only.

Here are the details for COS:
Total CRJ (200 and 700 combined) block hours for June are 3023 vs. 2894 block hours in
May—a 4.4% increase. There is a significant decrease in the number of local pairings this
month, but 2- and 3-day pairings are more plentiful, while 4-days stay about the same.
For the CRJ200, the highest credit per duty day is found in the 3-day trips—as was the casefor the past few months. Locals actually pay the least per day this month. On the CRJ700 also, 3-day pairings give the highest credit per day. Specific averages for all trip types are in the table below.

June Nuts and Bots:
In June we have 369 total pairings (FA and FF)

133 are on the CRJ 200
236 are on the CRJ 700

98 Locals
135 Two-Day pairings
48 Three-Day pairings
88 Four-Day pairings

May Nuts and Bolts:
In May we had 418 total pairings (FA and FF)

148 were on the CRJ 200
270 were on the CRJ700

188 Locals
110 Two-Day pairings
38 Three-Day pairings
82 Four-Day pairings

May '11 Bid's Award & Reason Report

I am very pleased with my award. That has been rare the last few months and dare I say, this is the best line I have had in a long, long, long, time. I was awarded three layer one trips, three! It has rarely happened that I have been awarded even one pairing in my first layer. It makes me wonder if some error occurred and the bids would need to be re-ran. 

Sixteen days off! That is the most I have had in a long while, but with so little flying on the 1-15, I will probably end up picking a trip on the 10-13th. Who knows, maybe I'll allow myself to be lazy if there isn't anything good to pick up. Bailey wouldn't mind all the daddy-daughter time. We might even take a trip somewhere. Either way, life seems to be getting better and better. I hope the trend continues.

May '11 Bid's Strategy in Bidding and The Christmas Tree

This post comes after the fact of the lines being published. So instead of telling you how it goes down, I'll tell you my strategy and show you the Christmas tree for reference as I typically do with my series of posts.

As you can see, I have moved up a few spots in the last few months but the best part of the May bid has been the addition of some five or six new hire FAs in COS! It makes me 34 out of 68. So, for the first time I have broken 60% and am now at the half way mark. That really helps out my bidding.

The "Christmas Tree"

With being more senior this month, I knew I could bid more restrictive but I didn't want to change what I was doing since I had been awarded a layer 7 pairing in April (which I was able it drop).

For May I was able to use a couple golden days for my birthday which is, coincidentally, on Mother's day this year. The carry-in pairings don't really matter since they still make me legal for a four-day trip. This month I really wanted to get as many weekend days off as possible, but with my seniority I would sacrifice all the best paying trips I could hold for having weekends off. That is why I came up with a strategy to bid for the best credit trips in layers 1-3 and weekends off in 4-6. That gives me access to the best trips available while holding the max weekend days off. 

As always layer seven becomes my safety net that will prevent me from being awarded a CN or PN. I have layer seven at plus 10% of my domicile rank percentage and while that could be too slim, for the multi-day pairings, it does its job.

This month I left off Max credit and 1 day off between work blocks. Neither were doing me much good so I kept it simple and even added target line credit range.

May '11 Bid's Nuts and Bolts

Now that I'm back doing my PBS journal I don't have a place to start the Nuts and Bolts post. Previously, I would try to give a brief overview of the changes seen compared to the previous month in the Nuts and Bolts post. In this case I didn't document April so I'll just overview where we're at.

I am so glad I wasn't blogging during the "bid re-run" fiasco. My head was spinning during that process, I still don't understand why the bid had to be re-run, it's not like we had new flying inserted to the bid package. Either way, my line didn't turn out very good for April but much to my pleasant surprise, I have had the honor of flying with some great crews! I have always said the worst trip with the best crew is better than the best trip with the worst crew. That has certainly been a relief.

The new pin pad seems to be giving us some trouble. It is just complicated enough with the separation of half-weights in their respective zones and the total count reformat that it throws a wrench in the process. Rather than counting once and being right once, I have found myself counting three times plus, just to make sure I am correct. That doesn't do us any help for expediting performance, but I think with practice we'll slowly get better.

In COS we have some new FAs!!! I'm not talking about some transfers either! I'm talking about some 40,000-straight-off-of-ioe-FAs. That makes me happy. It is good to see some new blood and hear their take on everything.

On to the May Nuts and Bolts:

In May we have 418 total pairings (FA &FF)

148 are on the CRJ 200
270 are on the CRJ700

188 Locals
110 Two-Day pairings
38 Three-Day pairings
82 Four-Day pairings

It is interesting to see that even with the transition to MSP and IAH we are very similar to May 2010.

The Come Back. April 10th, 2011

After the January bid I decided to take a break from the blog and responsibilities that I had taken. I resigned from SIA in February for the sole reason of devoting more time to my wife and daughter since I'd been every bit of a work-aholic since 2008. Now with my wife working and the return to a bit of normalcy, I am going to start blogging again. Along with the increased need for me to refine my bidding I've also been inspired to continue my journal thanks to the newest additions to the seniority list, which I'm glad to see a few have come to COS. So this week I'll continue the "nuts and bolts - reason report" posts.

Welcome to bidding for Summer!

January '11 Bid's Award & Reason Report

This was one tough month. The flying was pretty nasty looking. My damage control worked, but not as well as I had hoped.

January '11 Bid's Strategy in Bidding and Christmas Tree

This post is coming a little late, sorry. I bid damage control since the flying looked so bad, plus, I need to bid around my wife's schedule now too so my bidding strategy is a little more delicate now.