Delta Virtual Airlines Water Cooler | Airline Operations |
Monthly Schedrule Bidding / Bid System |
DVA1662
First Officer, B757-200
Joined on May 01 2004
"Real World Flightsimmer" NY USA
59 legs, 118.9 hours
9 legs,
19.3 hours online 27 legs,
65.0 hours ACARS 4 legs,
6.7 hours event
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Posted onPost created on
February 26 2005 20:14 ET by Adam Warsama
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Before I begin, I just wanted to say that the ACARS thing is real good, and makes PIREPing easy.
But you see, to go and search a schedrule of online flights, and to search right before each flight, makes the whole realism of it just swirm away, leaving your imagination to work.
Imagination is great, but even Imagination itself will lead to desire for realism.
By making a Bidding System for Delta Virtual Airlines, you will not only be ranked number 1 for realism... but for frequency of flights as well... you see, a monthly bid sheet will encourage a pilot to do more flights, more often... which will definitly INCREASE the hours to the Statitics of this VA... however when you have to make a pilot BROWSE or SEARCH schedrules, or FIND-A-FLIGHT, you sort of lose somewhat of the feel of being in a VA... but however more of a Free Flying group that happen to fly Delta aircraft.
For those of you who dont know how monthly bidding works... heres a basic breifing from an airline pilot that works with Delta as an MD-80 First Officer....
http://www.jetcareers.com/sched.htm
This one is also from the same person, however he explains it a bit more technically and personally
http://www.jetcareers.com/bids.htm
The picture at the bottom is an excerpt from the article of the second URL, showing the top 160 lines of that pilot's personal prefrence.
Adam WarsamaFirst Officer, B757-200
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DVA2161
Captain, B767-300
Joined on February 19 2005
"If it ain't Boeing, I ain't going" Midwestern United States
35 legs, 45.9 hours
21 legs,
26.9 hours online 17 legs,
21.5 hours ACARS
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Posted onPost created on
February 27 2005 11:10 ET by Marc Gibson
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I personally would also love to see a bidding system in place. One of the other VA's I've flown with is probably currently the most realistic available on the net (http://www.midconair.com/). We have all of our flights dispatched by FAA certified dispatchers and are given FAR121 compliant releases, however even we haven't managed to get a bidding system yet (all flights are just assigned by management, although we can make requests). It's something I and other pilots are pushing for, but haven't seen yet. I know some VA's do bidding--mainly through the individual hubs, not the airline as a whole. I think it would be a great idea here, especially because of the detailed seniority system. If it worked out right, we could actually have seniority make a difference, and your bids could be approved/rejected based on that as well. I know most VA's don't do this (they just have you fill out something like 10 or so flights at a time and it's automatically approved), but they don't actually have a "bidding" system, because by definition that would take into account seniority...
Anyway, it's something to think about...
Marc
Marc GibsonCaptain, B767-300
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DVA1267
Senior Captain, B777-200
Joined on July 09 2003
Triple Century Club
"Tactless, Understood, Right" Colorado Springs, CO USA
368 legs, 1,943.8 hours
47 legs,
192.9 hours online 54 legs,
217.2 hours ACARS
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Posted onPost created on
March 01 2005 13:51 ET by Matt Reamy
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While DVA doesn't have bidding exactly, if you want flight assignments, there's a section for that in the pilot center. This VA affords the greatest amount of flexibility, in that we are allowed to do as we find time. Good Luck.
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DVA938
Senior Captain, MD-88
Joined on November 03 2002
Million Mile Club
Online Seven Century Club
50 State Club
Bi-Millennium Club
Dunwoody, GA USA
2,132 legs, 4,949.7 hours
1,197 legs,
2,739.0 hours online 1,301 legs,
3,486.7 hours ACARS 16 legs,
39.5 hours event
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Posted onPost created on
March 01 2005 16:46 ET by Jared Angstadt
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Hehehe the new and improved EasyBid there,I rememeber the days when dad, United 737 captain now, used a DOS version of that program. I think a bidding system like that would be awsome for those who want to included, I think something like this was discussed before in the cooler, but I haven't seen anything from it. I know if I were asked if I'd be in, my answer would yes by all means I'm in, wink, wink.
Jared AngstadtSenior Captain, MD-88
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DVA043
Senior Captain, MD-11
OLP
Joined on June 10 2001
Event Half Century Club
Online Double Century Club
50 State Club
DVA Twenty-Year Anniversary
Everett 1500 Club
Bi-Millennium Club
Four Million Mile Club
"Col. Panic" Marietta, GA
2,241 legs, 8,967.3 hours
240 legs,
553.9 hours online 1,899 legs,
7,760.4 hours ACARS 75 legs,
196.3 hours event 2,277 legs, 9,102.2 hours total 91 legs dispatched, 66.4
hours
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Posted onPost created on
March 02 2005 06:56 ET by Luke Kolin
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There are two problems we've always faced in terms of flight bidding at DVA. First, even if everyone was to participate, we still have a large surplus of flights relative to the number of participating pilots. Second, any sort of bidding could slow things down as people wait for bids to be accepted.
That being said, I'm not averse to the concept of flight assignments like we had before - with the caveat that the Delta schedule is going to be updated every quarter (maybe every month if I can optimize the import) and flights numbers can and do change regularly. Essentially, assignments are tied to the schedule revision in use and neither the current system nor the new one will get around that limitation.
The paradigm I am looking at with DVA2006 involves combining the "Find a Flight" functionality with the ability to select up to a half-dozen flight legs from the returned list to create a custom flight assignment for interested pilots. Would this meet your needs? If not, what would you like to see? Anything's on the table - wether it is technically or pratically feasible is another question, but that's for me to judge. You should feel free to make whatever suggestions you wish; you never know.
Cheers!
Luke KolinSenior Captain, MD-11
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DVA938
Senior Captain, MD-88
Joined on November 03 2002
Million Mile Club
Online Seven Century Club
50 State Club
Bi-Millennium Club
Dunwoody, GA USA
2,132 legs, 4,949.7 hours
1,197 legs,
2,739.0 hours online 1,301 legs,
3,486.7 hours ACARS 16 legs,
39.5 hours event
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Posted onPost created on
March 02 2005 07:41 ET by Jared Angstadt
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Luke,
Correct me if I'm misunderstanding you, but I think a third reason, based on your last post on this thread, that DVA has not put in place a "bidding" system is the concept of time, meaning if we were to have a system like the real airlines do, the higher up guys like yourself would spend most of your time figuring out which pilot gets which line that he or she bid, considering that this is just a hobby. The only problem I have with the Find a Flight fuction as it is now is that you can not input a desired dest, ie I want to find all flights for the CRJ-200 or -700 that operate from CVG to PFN between lets say 3 and 6 P.M, I'm not sure how many of us look at the duration of a flight, but for those who don't I don't know how usefull the trip duration variable is. I think the idea is good as it stands now, but I think there is room for a bit more flexiability in the fuction, if the pilot wishs to use it if given the option to use it. Also, I'm not sure how other pilots do it, but when I fly I try and find a flight that goes to and from the desired orgin and dest as well as matchs as close as it comes to the present time of day, I used to use the flight assginments fuction when I first joined, but that was because I thought it was like a bidding system simular to want was said eariler and after I found out that you didn't have to follow that and that it is just like picking out your favorite product at a store I started scanning the schedule and times and flying what I wanted, there for quit using the function.Just my 2 cents.
Jared AngstadtSenior Captain, MD-88
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DVA2001
Senior Captain, B777-200
Joined on November 06 2004
Triple Century Club
DVA Fifteen-Year Anniversary
Online Triple Century Club
Everett 250 Club
Fort Mitchell, KY
381 legs, 722.1 hours
328 legs,
634.3 hours online 130 legs,
245.2 hours ACARS 7 legs,
13.5 hours event
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Posted onPost created on
March 06 2005 04:58 ET by Randy Bauer
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If DVA were to offer the bidding system as a option, fine, let those people use it who desire that additional dymanic for realism. I recommend keeping the other option, which is the status quo, in addition.
The current DVA model works for me with the busy life style my wife and I lead, paying the mortgage, saving for kid's college, working 50 hrs/week, 1 hr commute, 2 kids in sports, blah, blah, blah. For me it's all about having fun with this hobby. Additional time constraints, flight constraints, inflexibility simply won't work, for me personally. This is a BIG reason why I am a member of DVA and not some other virtual airline.
I left a virtual airline and came to DVA partly because they required you to fly the same times as real world flights. Had this particular virtual airline invoked a bidding system where only the more senior pilots got to fly the bigger planes, I would not have joined in the first place. I reason life is too short to induce stress on one's personal time while doing something that is supposed to be fun.
Randy BauerSenior Captain, B777-200
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