Another suitor for AC ??

[Kip Powick]

From todays Toronto Star

http://www.torontostar.com/NASApp/cs/ContentServer?pagename=thestar/Layout/Article_Type1&c=Article&cid=1064097010640&call_pageid=968332188492&col=968793972154

[Guest Patrick Bergen]

There is obviously some interest in the investment community given the successes with previous airline resturings. It is looking like Air Canada will have the resources needed to emerge from CCAA.

[Guest pitstacker]

Although AC will emerge from CCAA, what have they done to ensure profitability in the future?? I thought in Milton's words "the model is broken". What's the new model??? Seems like the same old thing to me, just less employees.

[zipped]

Lets hope the new suitors dump the little B***ard.

[Maranatha]

Yeah, and you're privy to all the confidential negotiations that are ongoing, you've spoken to Mr. Milton about the final post-CCAA business plan, you're in on all this stuff that no one else is. "Seems to me" that you're just blowing smoke, like 90% of all the other posts on this forum. "Seems to me" that you and some of your other name-calling colleagues, like Zipped, should take a pill, preferably 2.

[Guest George]

Another brillian insightful remark by a disgruntled employee.

What have you done to make AC better, other than collect your paycheck?

[Guest George]

Another brilliant, insightful remark by a disgruntled employee.

What have you done to make AC better, other than collect your paycheck?

[zipped]

It has been said that insecure people feel better when they are hacking people down. If you don't share my opinion about Robert Milton than just say so. As you probably know, many many many employees and customers share my opinion of Milton.

[Guest GDR]

From everything I read, from people that actually know what they are talking about, this restructuring is getting done more quickly and more efficiently than anyone thought possible. I would suggest that the number of knowledgeable financial people that want to put money into a restructured Air Canada is testimony to that. I would suggest that Robert Milton has a lot to do with that.

Milton realized well back that we would have to respond to the challenge provided by well run low cost carriers such as WJ. He was pro active in starting Tango and Zip. Just now United, Delta and AA are starting a low cost arm two years later than AC under Robert Milton.

It's easy to keep blaming everything on Milton and no doubt he isn't always right, but fortunately he seems to have been right a lot more often than not. Personally, I hate to think where we would have been now wothout him.

JMHO

Greg Robinson

[dagger]

It seems you do more hacking than most, what does that say about you?

I don't know what the customers feel. I imagine a lot of employees don't like him, but someone has to administer the cod-liver oil and they are never popular with the recipient.

I do know that I flew to Ottawa and back last week and had zero complaints. Absolutely full flights both ways. My step-daughter came back from London this afternoon, a half hour early no less as were most North Atlantic flights due, no doubt, to favorable winds. That's just the way it seems to go most days.

It may be unremarkable stuff, but that's what most people want in a flight. Safe, secure, comfortable, on-time. Oh, and very well priced, which my Ottawa flight was... $261 return, all taxes and surcharges included.

[Guest George]

Dagger

Please don't confuse Mr/Ms Zipped with honest opinions and facts cause their mind is made up. A bitter and dsigruntled xCAI employee. Too bad, cause they always calimed how much better their service was than AC, I guess Zipper was one of those exceptions to the rule.

Its funny how some people can pin point the source of a problem with laser like accuracy. Its too bad they don't look in the mirror once in a while.

As for your comments about Mr Milton, you're quite correct in assuming that I don't share your opinion of Mr Milton. Please tell us who would have done a better job, don't worry about being too specific and backing up your choice with some facts.

[Guest Airmail]

Seems to me that the only reason why the suitors are lining up is because of the business plan which Milton has authored and has shown them.

You may not like it but that's reality.

[Stickle]

Come on now Airmail. You place Milton on a pedestal because you seem to think that he has done this whole thing himself. You sound terribly like the rest of the senior team in management. I, I, I.

Robert is no dummy but do you really believe that he did this whole thing by himself. What about the thousands of employees that have pitched in, oh yeah, they don't count. You take away our vacation and then you offer to sell it back to us. When is the senior team going to realize that there are more people in this company than them. There is no compassion whatsoever being shown from management towards the rest of employees that it makes one wonder even if we do emerge from bankruptcy will the employees really care enough to make the customers happy.

Since when did UA become the employment agency for Air Canada management! The management employees see little opportunity for advancement while this continues. It is a slap in the face and no wonder the shining stars are bailing out to other companies. People have to want to work at Air Canada because they feel it is a career not a job. The only way to make it a career is for the employees to see some sort of future chance for them.

[Altech]

All Milton did with Tango was to help destroy the competition (C3), just like AC has been doing for the past 15 years, even with the government's blessing. With Zip he wasn't so successful, was he? I guess WJ has proven to be more than a formidable competitor. Let's just see what's going to happen to the two AC "great" saviours after the restructuring is complete. Oh, pardon me, are they still around?

And the reason Dagger can fly to YOW for such a reasonable rate is due to the competition on that sector, namely Jetsgo and Canjet. I wonder how much Dagger paid on AC to YOW prior to these two upstarts. Maybe he can enlighten us.

[Maranatha]

Well, Mr/Mrs/Ms. Zipped, I don't know if you're an AC employee, original or otherwise, but if you are I would respectfully suggest that it is time to make a visit to the personnel office with your resignation. Milton's the man until the new board of directors decides otherwise. Don't like it? Resign? Can't/won't work for him? You guessed it. There are hundreds of furloughed AC employees who'd love to take your place. Other than anecdotal evidence, you wouldn't happen to have any hard, objective numbers to back up your petulant claims, would you? I thought not!

[dagger]

Let me rephrase your point for you ... Air Canada has spent 15 years responding to increased levels of competition from various sources, some of whom have not had sound business plans, deep pockets or fortuitous timing (like launching just before Sept 11). These airlines wanted to eat Air Canada's lunch - taking away its clientele and jobs - and so it responded in kind more or less as the capitalist system demands of dominant market players. And the lot of these new competitors was exacerbated by war, economic recession and terrorism.

However, some competitors had good business plans, deep pockets, good timing, etc. like Westjet and some, like Jetsgo and Canjet, learned lessons from earlier failed ventures and now seem to have a better plan and better timing. They are reshaping the marketplace and Air Canada is forced to respond differently - it must cut costs to the bone, painfully so, or the competition will continue to eat its lunch.

So that's where we stand.

Yes, competition has lowered fares, as it has wages, benefits, working conditions, passenger amenities, etc. But that is what the public wants and is ready to sustain, and most people don't seem to miss the meals or the other perks so long as they get a good fare, travel more or less on time, and get there in one piece.

On the Toronto-Ottawa route, only one other airline competes with Air Canada: Jetsgo. (Westjet flies Hamilton-Ottawa but you have to live in the western suburbs of Toronto to even contemplate a trip to Hamilton. ). Jetsgo has three flights a day. Tango has three flights a day at just about the same times. Air Canada has Rapidair's frequent schedule. Tango fares are analogous to Jetsgo fares, slightly higher actually. On Rapidair, the cheapest one-way fares are indeed lower than the unresticted fares of years gone by but the full unrestricted fare remains about the same. What's really different is that these restrictive one-way fares exist now, which they didn't before. In the pre-Jetsgo days, for a same day return, you would pay, say $600-$650 plus taxes for a round trip, but the fare was completely refundable or flexible and you could change reservations any number of times if your meeting ended early or ran late. That full fare, unrestricted option still exists but has been supplemented with fares carrying various restrictions, available in different quantities on more or less all flights. The cheapest one-way restricted fare is a couple of hundred dollars cheaper than the full Y - but still more expensive than Tango and Jetsgo. On these restricted fares, one cannot stand by for other flights, which means the customer flies exactly as booked or pays a change fee. Perhaps the best perk of Rapidair is the frequency of flights combined with ability to keep changing your reservation as many times as you want as your day evolves. So yes, competition has led to the creation of budget options. They have not lowered AC fares across the board.

[Mitch Cronin]

Stickle,

I've learned this about Airmail... If you hit him with truth that he can't counter, he shuts up... If you hit him with truth that hurts and he can't counter, the phone rings.

He's an army of one.

Upper management at AC aren't interested in their employees, and until they're replaced with people who are, the bleeding will continue.

The lower managers are powerless to do anything to change what really needs changing, because anything that approaches the serious change that needs to take place will have serious growing pains, and those growing pains will get them fired, and they all know it... So, they maintain the status quo... Until things are changed from the top down, we'll keep plundering along in the same old manner.

[zipped]

Milton as head of a big and very visible corporation has set himself in the limelight,and so,is subject to criticism. Try telling people on this board to quite hacking Beddoe and watch the fur fly. It comes with the territory and to be honest Milton and Beddoe handle it well.

[zipped]

Milton will resign or be fired long before I leave. Bet on it.

[Stickle]

Well Mitch I guess his silence speaks volumes now doesn't it. I'm not sure who he is and don't really care but it would be apparent that he is very close to RM.