Jazz to go after Rjs..

[Guest Dash eight]

There's talk of Jazz dropping the idea of getting mainlines Rjs and going after the rest of Midways RJs as they are 200s and are the same interior and configuration as the ones we are already flying..

[Guest V1V2Vgo]

D-8,

Heard the same, makes a lot of sense to me for a number of reasons.

[dozerboy]

The rumour going around mainline is that we are already in the process of securing those ex-Midway RJ's in a secret deal with Calin...

[Guest Operation Bomberclad]

Rumour has it that any secret deal does not include aircraft leasing, but which portion of the airline(Zip) to shut down with imminent layoffs of ACPA pilots.

Once the CL-65 goes to Jazz, that will mean 300 down, and 700-900 to go, so I guess Zip will be forfeit.

:[

NZ

[Guest Dash eight]

They are great jets and should have been in the ontario market years ago. It is too bad our Dash's werent fitted with leather seats like the RJ's

[Guest floatrr]

JAZZ has already been purchased by ONEX in a backroom deal with the major stakeholders and judges,and the press release will be at the end of the month along with the announcement of ZIP and TANGO to cease operations.

[Guest Dash eight]

True but the way i see it if Zip folds up then Jazz will become low cost carrier with RJ service. We all know the days of 737 service are numbered..!

[Super 80]

I suspect Air Canada could probably sell Zip, someone could use it as a jumping off point for a low-cost western Canada - USA service.

I can't imagine their creditors or the court would go along with them killing something they could potentially sell off.

although I believe that AC only actually owns a single 737 being opperated by Zip, so the actual value of Zip as a company probably isn't very much.

[Super 80]

How would that work?

Would Jazz become an entirely seperate airline opperating entirely soverign of Air Canada?

Or would Jazz opperate for Air Canada but opperated by a seperate company like Mesa opperates US Airways Express and United Express?

[Guest Patrick Bergen]

where did you hear this?

[Guest labtec]

Just got off the phone with a friend at HQ. There is a huge buzz in YUL. It would seem that a deal to sell JAZZ, in a much diminshed form, has been signed with a Canadian investor and a couple of U.S. partners. It doesn't look good. Jazz out west is dead. The smaller communities are going to be served by a tier 3 (not sure who, probably Pacific Coastal or CMA). Out east Jazz will concentrate on its YYZ and transborder routes. (sounds like they will keep a mix of some CL65's and DH8's) In the maritimes it is nothing short of carnage. The whole maritime operation is going to be contracted out to the guys currently running the SAAB 340's!!!! This makes no sense to me. The maritime operation always made money, the planes were always full and they did a great job out there.

The new investor is only interested in a much smaller central Canadian operation. Here we go again. Massive layoff's and upheaval at the connector. Does anyone have the number of pilots based out west and in the maritimes and Quebec? It sounds like those jobs are going to tier III. So it would seem the jobs aren't really disappearing people will just have to work for the new carrier for much much less. I think the Quebec operation was going to be contracted out to Val Air. I have never heard of this company. Does anyone have details?

Labtec

[wizard]

Would Jazz get AC's A-319's also. Who will get the new jets that AC orders?? And will Jazz be a all jet airline??

[Super 80]

It's a Quebec based start-up that is going to opperate a fleet of Q400's.

I THINK, repeat THINK, they were planning on flying out of Montreal to cities in Eastern Ontario and Quebec.

[Guest flyersclub]

do you realize how much this type of posting hurts a lot of people?? i think you have gone too far with your conjecture. IMO.

[DEFCON]

No, Jazz doesn't want the 319's. They're looking at the 744's.

[wizard]

HA,HA, 747-4 Service Toronto-Windsor What next Defcon A340 Service Toronto-London.

[Guest HPT-TOUR]

Hope your right Labtec, we`ll just amend our statement of claim to 600 million, you can fill yer boots and take my job.

[Guest labtec]

I think the time has long passed to amend your statement of claim. In any event, if these rumours prove true it isn't the Air Canada pilots taking your jobs they will be going to Tier III pilots. It won't be the senior boys from AO that will suffer it will be the junior pilots at Jazz that carry the burden.

I just can't figure out why AC would want to get rid of the former Air Nova operation out east. They did great work before their wagon was hitched to the AO, ABC, and Alliance horse.

There is a place for a connector airline. I think maybe AC is trying to mimick the US model and get very lo-cost contract companies to do the work as opposed to the relatively high cost wholly owned subsidary that it currently employs.

The great thing for you is that should this be the case CCAA or no CCAA you will have a successorship claim against the new operator and they may be forced to honour your original collective agreement. I don't see how this has any effect whatsoever against your lawsuit against the senior AC pilots.

That said you may want to forge a relationship with the junior AC group who have been shafted in a massive way by the ACPA MEC and particularly the Toronto LEC and its leadership. ACPA is a house divided and I think even the junior membership of that organization are starting to realize the unbridled greed of its senior members.

If Di Cintio and his followers were smart they would approach some of the junior pilots at AC whose concerns are falling on deaf ears at ACPA. Maybe once and for all we could sort out the mess that is Canadian aviation in so far as pilots are concerned.

Labtec

[MCDU]

unbridled greed of its senior members

You'll have to spell this one out for me.

I remember opening my wallet and signing on for a work-sharing package to save the bottom 170 a couple years ago.

I remember a TA being ratified earlier this year that attempted to mitigate a furlough as much as was possible. The other employee groups kept their wages and coughed-up junior bodies. ACPA gave more than 15% in cash and again did what it could for its junior pilots.

So... where is the greed?

[Guest dwb yyc]

Why would AC give up on the only part that is making money. Jazz in the west. Loads are up and the paxs really do like us. But this is AC and they don't make alot of good business decisions. Taking the biggest monopoly and bankrupting it.

[Guest Hawkeye]

One can only hope, however too Good to be True!!!

[Guest labtec]

One thing of interest is that everyone seems to know which part of AC is making money. How do you know this? The annual report showed JAZZ losing a princely sum last year. How is that JAZZ out west is making money, and how is it that you have particular knowledge of a geographic region and its economic impact on the corporations bottom line? Until AC starts reporting its profit and loss route by route this kind of statement is of little value. (Unless you happen to be VP marketing and have that information on your desk every morning, in which case call me and we can have coffee, i'll buy.)

If you are going to suggest, as some have done here, that the numbers last year for JAZZ were less than accurate that is another issue altogether. If you believe that and have evidence, the regulators are becoming very interested in balance sheet manipulations on the part of senior executives in the wake of Enron and others. If you can make the charge and have a case that AC has misled the public call the OSC and file a complaint.

The foregoing posts are unconfirmed rumours and not done deals. In the wake of the labour strife of the last few years it makes sense to cut out a perceived cancer. Another common employer row that went the other way this time would surely sink the ship. Our CMSC director has indicated that the training bill from the downbid coupled with Keller is likely to be nearly 90 million dollars. Throw a successful CE application by Di Cintio and his rabble and you could probably double it. The Mothership simply doesn't have that kind of cash.

There is tremendous dis-satisfaction with ACPA by the bottom third of the mainline. The original CAIL boys would love to toss ACPA into the boneyard. Add those two groups up and you have a situation primed for an ALPA union drive. If the MEC and the LEC's at ACPA do not start listening to their bottom third they may find themselves in the fight of their life. ACPA's raison d'etre was Piche. In my view they had better start listening to the pleas from those suffering at the bottom or they may end up illegitmate and without purpose. Many of the junior members don't give a wit about the lawsuit. They are to busy losing their homes.

ACPA is on a JETS-R-US campaign. They are chasing fins at any cost. They have made it impossible to live in YYZ on the salary they have negotiated for the planes that should properly be at the connector anyway. Why? A scorched earth policy that goes back to a fight between a bunch of old CALPA hacks. Who is suffering in this battle of the witless? The junior members from both sides. I had a pilot jump seat the other day and he showed me his salary statement for the previous month. The I/C's now earns more than the bottom 150 or so pilots at Air Canada not showing a furlough!!!

Why? Greed. The greed of those controlling the unions in a play to screw over their mutual adversaries at the connector and mainline. The senior pilots in Canada that control both trade unions are literally destroying the profession at the airlines. It is ironic that two organizations whose reason for being is the advancement of wages and working conditions have, through their own short sighted policies, undermined the whole profession in Canada. Just remember that the guys we are screwing are going to control my pension when I retire in a few years. I hope they aren't as vindicitive and short sighted as some of you occupying union positions have been.

Labtec

[RussD]

Whadda a putz

[Guest HPT-TOUR]

Making friends whereever you go eh labtec, you have always thrown mud at the Regionals, and now your pissing on your own union members who have taken a pay cut to save jobs. And you want the bottom of acpa to get together with alpa.

It`s been posted many times on this forum that acpa will not return calls from alpa. Yes it is sad that someone with 3-5 yrs at the regionals is getting laid off at the mainline, but there are acpa types that would rather give up millions in wages for scope. Ask any senior acpa type how they feel about being the lowest paid in the Star Alliance, with the lawsuit around their neck in the twilight of their careers planning a retirement. And right now the scope clause that they gave up for wages is in the air to be settled by a judge. (atta boy Phillip).

As for the lawsuit the statement of claim can be amended anytime.

I`d say Picher looks pretty good right now.

[Wolfhunter]

While difficult to hear and freely acknowledged as rumour, Labtec may well be closer to the truth than many currently believe.

The circumstances leading up to the present state of the union at Jazz have many of us without an MBA scratching our heads. Jazz previously did not report a statement of profit and loss. Why now? Assuming the intent of AC is/was to sell off Jazz or portions thereof surely it would have to be attractive to potential investors. What did AC charge Jazz in the past for such things as publications, deicing, ground handling, deadheading and a myriad of other services? I am just cynical enough to believe that the price has gone up in the last year or so. Along comes a significant loss…generating a crisis of sorts and the evolution of a leaner trimmer Jazz; portions of it are now probably more attractive to potential suitors. Analysts as far back as April had speculated that if sold, Jazz would be broken up into components to facilitate sale of the Central Canada operation. So what does happen to the east/west portions of the puzzle? Is the loss of Newfoundland flying and concentration of the 146 operation in YYZ a hint of things to come?

Despite protestations to the contrary, Jazz was not a low cost airline. Given the wage structure and fleet constraints it was actually rather pricey. So what about the promise of newer and bigger RJs? Surely any arbitrator would be forced to look at current labour contracts, existing scope clauses (they don’t die on 02 April), and past business practices; would he not? The “signed contract” entered into in good faith may very well fall victim to unforeseen circumstances – LIKE ARBITRATION OR SALE. Creditors want a reasonable plan to return AC profitability and I suspect little more. How this is done remains to be seen and the creditors will do what is in their best interest… this may not take the form we hope or expect.