TSS From United States of America, joined Dec 2006, 2870 posts, RR: 5 Posted (6 years 1 month 2 days 17 hours ago) and read 2581 times:
It occurred to me that although I take pretty much the same flights with the same airline roughly every three months (BHM-DFW-RNO morning and RNO-DFW-BHM afternoon on AA, to be specific), I've never seen the same F/A twice.
How often do y'all switch routes, or how do your route assignments work? Does this vary by carrier? Or am I just on a "purgatory" route that everyone gets off of as soon as possible?
Able to kill active threads stone dead with a single post!
Aloha73G From United States of America, joined Jul 2003, 2301 posts, RR: 5 Reply 1, posted (6 years 1 month 2 days 13 hours ago) and read 2561 times:
We get our schedules by seniority. People put in trip requests into a "Preferential Bidding System" or PBS each month, for the next months trips. People can request specific lines (a series of flights), trips last a certain number of days, international/domestic only, no international/domestic, or both, layovers in certain cities, days off, etc.
The PBS system then grants peoples requests as best it can from the top of the seniority list on down. At a big airline like American, I am guessing that the flights you take may be staffed by different bases each month as the lines are built (DFW one month, ORD the next, etc.)
At a small airline like Hawaiian you are likely to see the same F/As on the same flights because, for instance, the people who do interisland in the morning do it all the time, and get to know the "regulars."
As far as more senior F/As go, they all have their own niches....at HA, some do turns (PPT, PPG, ANC), some like SEA and LAS because they have longer block times, some like to do hub-turns (back to back mainland flights), some like the interisland reserve desk (sit and wait for someone to not show up for an interisland flight) because they dont want to fly, some like SYD because its like a paid vacation.
-Aloha!
Aloha Airlines - The Spirit Moves Us. Gone but NEVER Forgotten. Aloha, A Hui Hou!
EWRCabincrew From United States of America, joined May 2006, 5522 posts, RR: 57 Reply 2, posted (6 years 1 month 2 days 9 hours ago) and read 2538 times:
At CO, we have a monthly bid, also done by seniority (i.e. the most senior person gets their choice of destination and postition on the aircraft and the rest follow suit).
I like to fly the 757 and as an ISM I like longer routes. So I will fly destinations like Berlin, Copenhagen, Hamburg and Stockholm. I like to fly weekdays and 3 day trips only. I tend to see the same business people on my flights because I fly those flights so much. It is a treat to see them again. Makes my day go by a little faster, too.
Like Aloha73G said, it is all on what the individual likes. Flexibility is a big reason why people stay doing this job so long.
CO7e7 From United States of America, joined Dec 2004, 2848 posts, RR: 2 Reply 3, posted (6 years 1 month 1 day 13 hours ago) and read 2510 times:
Quoting EWRCabincrew (Reply 2): At CO, we have a monthly bid, also done by seniority (i.e. the most senior person gets their choice of destination and postition on the aircraft and the rest follow suit).
What about F/As who speak certain languages.. for example... and young F/A who speaks Hebrew.. would he/she automatically get to fly to COs flights to TLV???
FlyboyOz From Australia, joined Nov 2000, 1893 posts, RR: 28 Reply 4, posted (6 years 1 month 1 day 9 hours ago) and read 2496 times:
Only small airlines such as Alaska Airlines, Hawaiian, Ansett Australia and Air New Zealand, there would be same cabin crews on their routes. It's so strange that I met same cabin crews in July 2001 and August 2003 when i flew AS twice.
Aloha73G From United States of America, joined Jul 2003, 2301 posts, RR: 5 Reply 5, posted (6 years 1 month 1 day 4 hours ago) and read 2484 times:
Quoting CO7e7 (Reply 3): What about F/As who speak certain languages.. for example... and young F/A who speaks Hebrew.. would he/she automatically get to fly to COs flights to TLV???
Not exactly sure how CO does it, but at HA, the language positions (in our case French for PPT and Samoan for PPG) are put out to bid among language qualified F/As. They put in their requests, which are awarded by seniority. If not enough people bid for these positions, they are assigned to language qualified F/As in inverse seniority (from the bottom up).
So, it is very possible for a junior F/A who is language qualified to get on a "good" route....ita also happens alot due to sick calls....thats how I ended up going to Sydney last month.
-Aloha!
Aloha Airlines - The Spirit Moves Us. Gone but NEVER Forgotten. Aloha, A Hui Hou!
StarGuy From United Kingdom, joined Dec 2005, 308 posts, RR: 0 Reply 7, posted (6 years 1 month 20 hours ago) and read 2467 times:
At Virgin Atlantic, all of the crew are given a random roster every month taking into account FTL. We get one trip/days off request for the month and it goes on seniority and availability. Aside from that we have an online trip swapping system that allows us to swap a trip with someone of the same rank as long as it falls in line with our other trips for the month. It's pretty good, we are able to get specific days of when we need them because of this system.
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