163,649 (Jumpseat, Brian Ross)

Today's SWAPA Number is 163,649. That's the number of CAS events or times the jumpseat was utilized on Southwest aircraft just by Southwest Pilots in the last 12 months. That's almost 450 per day, illustrating just how highly utilized of a resource our jumpsuit is. Jumpseating will always be a part of being a SWAPA pilot. So today we're sitting down with Jumpseat Committee chair, Captain Brian Ross, for a 360 degree view of the jumpsuit world and what you need to know moving forward. 

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Transcript

Tony Mulhare:

Today's SWAPA Number is 163,649. That's the number of CAS events or times the jumpseat was utilized on Southwest aircraft just by Southwest pilots in the last 12 months. That's almost 450 per day. Illustrating just how highly utilized of a resource our jumpseat is.

Matt McCants:

Jumpseating will always be a part of being a SWAPA pilot. So, today we're sitting down with Jumpseat Committee chair, Captain Brian Ross, for a 360 degree view of the jumpseat world and what you need to know moving forward.

I'm Matt McCants.

Tony Mulhare:

And I'm Tony Mulhare.

Matt McCants:

And here's our interview with Brian.

Tony Mulhare:

So, it might seem obvious to everyone with a job description of a Jumpseat Committee member looks like, but let's clue the membership in to what you guys weekly and monthly battle rhythms look like. What's your reason for being?

Brian Ross:

Well, that's a really good question. The Jumpseat Committee is a fairly small committee, but we do have a wide variety of situations that we deal with on a day-to-day basis. One of our main centers for being is centered around CFR 121.5.47. And if you look at that reg, it really doesn't talk about anything about jumpseat. It talks about admission to the flight deck and that's where we live in that reg. That has to do with anybody that's allowed into your cockpit, whether that be an FAA inspector or whether that be an offline pilot or an online pilot, or even if the pilot is sitting in the back as if they have access to your cockpit, they would fall within our scope.

Matt McCants:

Now we're going to cover a bunch of different issues, but let's talk what's been happening of late. What are some of the problems that we're seeing in the last couple of months or so?

Brian Ross:

Well, a lot of the cases we see on a day-to-day basis are problems with the paperwork that the ops agents and CSAs are generating. They're generating the wrong paperwork for people. That's an ongoing issue. We also have quite a few ongoing issues with etiquette and lack of etiquette, lack of grooming standards, lack of dress code requirements, just things like that, is our day-to-day bread and butter.

Tony Mulhare:

So, I think an important thing maybe to bring out there is that grooming standards and dress standards are different airline to airline. So, what's acceptable on Southwest Airlines, where I can wear a nice pair of jeans, may not be acceptable on American United or Delta, and where can I find all that information?

Brian Ross:

Well, in the dress codes not only are different on different airlines, they're different within our airlines. So, for example, a offline pilot has a different dress code than a Southwest pilot does on our own aircraft. For example, a Southwest pilot may wear jeans, no tennis shoes, but jeans. And that is not acceptable for a offline pilot, a United pilot coming into a jumpseat on Southwest, that wouldn't be an acceptable dress for them. So, they need to have business casual. So, all those dress code requirements for the different jumpseaters could be found in the Ops binder.

Matt McCants:

And speaking of grooming standards, I think I just saw something from American were they are not allowing anybody to ride in the flight deck if you have a goatee to or beard or something like that.

Brian Ross:

Yeah. They tried to allow the beards probably almost a year ago now, and we did the same thing. We looked into it and we contacted the manufacturer of the cup style mask and that's really the mask that's the problem here, is the cup style. The full face mask will form a seal, but the cup style mask, which probably, I don't know, 70% of our aircraft have still, the manufacturer strongly recommends against having a beard with that. And you really can't go to the FAA and say, "Hey, we want an exception for this beard, but it's going to make things less safe." If you have a jumpseater that's sitting in the jumpseat that becomes incapacitated, now he's basically blocked one of your emergency exits. And so they don't want to have that jumpseater potentially become incapacitated while sitting in the jumpseat.

Matt McCants:

Right. So, just one of those other things as you go to a list on another airline, check and see if they have any updates about facial grooming standards, so you don't have a surprise waiting for you at the ops desk at the airport.

Brian Ross:

And we put all that information into the swapa.org website under the jumpseat section, there's a subsection for Reciprocal Airlines and that has all the different airlines we have agreements with. And if you hyperlink on each one of those, it goes into how to list specifically for that airline and what their grooming standards are, how early you have to show up, things like that.

Tony Mulhare:

So, let's talk about etiquette for a minute. You mentioned that, and we certainly have a high volume of new pilots that may not have jumpseated before. Walk me through how I ask for a ride to my destination and just don't go, "Hey, I'm Tony. I'm in the back."

Brian Ross:

Well, the key word is you just set yourself ask. You need to go up to the captain and say, "Hey Captain, I'm Brian from Southwest Airlines. Could I get a ride with you today to Las Vegas?"

Tony Mulhare:

And what should I be ready to show that captain?

Brian Ross:

Well, you need to be ready to show him a couple things. Number one is your license. Number two is your medical and he may even ask for your passport as well.

Matt McCants:

So, Brian, we've talked about etiquette. There are alcohol policies associated with jumpseating, correct?

Brian Ross:

Correct.

Matt McCants:

Let's remind the membership about what those are.

Brian Ross:

So, the alcohol policy is you're not allowed to have anything to drink eight hours prior to jumpseating. You are acting as a crew member at that point, even as a jumpseater. So, generally the problems we see out there with regards to alcohol are not that somebody's sitting in the back as a jumpseater and consuming alcoholic beverages. The problem is they don't even know they're on the jumpseat at this point. And let's get back to something else I said that the pilot shows up and he's given a seat in the back, but if they haven't paid for the ticket, and they haven't purchased a Zed fare and they approached the podium with the intent of jumpseating, they are a jumpseater and they're not allowed to drink alcohol in the back. And doing so puts your ticket at risk because the FAA could see that as a crew member drinking alcohol during duty.

Tony Mulhare:

Right. Because it's so important to foot stone that as a jumpseater, you are considered to be part of the crew.

Brian Ross:

That is correct.

Tony Mulhare:

Even on another airline.

Brian Ross:

Even on another airline.

Matt McCants:

Okay. Let's pivot back to an internal look of the committee here and Contract 2020 had a couple of jumpseat touches, so let's take the membership through what those are.

Brian Ross:

All right. We had a couple of different touches in this last contract and the first one we received [inaudible 00:06:46] before fly almost a year ago now, maybe a little over a year ago that removed the flight deck jumpseaters from the order of removal. And that allows us to not get bumped off due to weight of the aircraft. So, if the aircraft is overweight, the ops agent is supposed to go through this order of removal checklist in order to bring the aircraft down under your maximum weights for takeoff. So, holders of JPFD-I and JPFD-II, which are the official jumpseat boarding passes, if you hold one of those and you're a Southwest pilot, then you're not subject to the order of removal checklist. And in case anybody's wondering that order of removal checklist is located, it's in comply under non-flying and supplemental operations.

Tony Mulhare:

Well, that's a huge improvement because that was a massive pain point for jumpseaters before trying to get to and from work, especially when there was weather and we were trying to get a bunch of other passengers on restricted number of flights. So, I think that's been a pretty big win for Contract 2020.

Brian Ross:

I think everybody's getting it now. There's still a couple agents out there that are asking for people for, saying that they need to check-in with the ops agent before they issue the jumpseat pass, but those are getting fewer and fewer between.

Tony Mulhare:

So, contract 2020 also included language allowing deadheading crew and jumpseaters to board with the crew flying the aircraft once the flight attendants have completed their checks, and the gate agent has opened the flight. But there's been some implementation issues with that and the word hasn't gotten to everybody. So, if I have a problem with a gate agent, is that a Jumpseat Committee issue? Is that something I call you for or is that a contract admin issue?

Brian Ross:

Well, this is one of those issues that we work with contract admin on and so we want to hear about it, but there's two things you need to do. The first thing you need to do is fill out the pre-board denial form on swapa.org, that's going to get you paid for the two TFP. The other form we want to hear is the Jumpseat Complaint Form that allows us to track these events and make sure that they're not trending in the wrong direction.

Tony Mulhare:

And so speaking of that form, why is the PNR so important on that form for you guys to be able to do your due diligence?

Brian Ross:

So, the PNR is like a digital fingerprint for your ticket. If you plug in that PNR number, it shows them exactly who, throughout the system has ever touched your reservation. So, if that's the ops agent that scans it or the CSA that issues it, that will show up the timestamp of who has touched it. And then that way they can be more surgical when they have a problem, instead of going out and blasting everybody. Because a lot of times there's more than one customer service agent that works on a desk. Instead of going out and blasting everybody, they can go back to that individual agent and say, "Hey, you did this incorrectly."

Tony Mulhare:

And I'm assuming that can just be found on my jumpseat boarding pass?

Brian Ross:

Well, there's a couple different places that can be found. It can be found on your jumpseat boarding pass and it's also on the confirmation that's sent to you when you list for it. So, if you've thrown that jumpseat pass away, look into your old emails and it should be right there for you.

Matt McCants:

All right. Those are pretty good updates about what's been going on here at Southwest Airlines when it comes to some of these jumpseat changes and processes that we have in place, and how to provide feedback. Your committee is also pretty unique in that you interact with your counterparts of the other airlines as well on a pretty frequent basis. How is that going and what are some of the recurrent issues we see at the other carriers?

Brian Ross:

So, this is one of the areas that the Jumpseat Committee is a little bit differently and we have longstanding relationships with all these people from different airlines. I've been doing this for, this is my fifth airline and I've done it, every other airline I've been at, I've done a jumpseat, involved with the jumpseats. And so I know a lot of these people from way back. The coordinator from United can call me up directly and say, "Hey, I got a problem with one of your pilots on one of our aircraft." And we can then talk to that pilot and correct the problem without involving management and some of these things. So, that keeps people out of the chief pilot's office and keeps people out of being front of the FAA.

Tony Mulhare:

So, what are some of the common challenges that the entire airline industry is facing in all their different Jumpseat Committees?

Brian Ross:

A lot of people lost what the meaning of the jumpseat is. And by that I mean, why is it there? Is it just another way to commute to work or is it something more? And the jumpseat was originally created with the intent of not only getting pilots to work or where they need to be, but also as a safety factor. It gives you another set of eyes in the cockpit or it gives you another set of hands in the cabin should something go wrong and you need to have somebody that's on your side back there.

Tony Mulhare:

Okay. So, speaking of that, if I'm sitting on the jumpseat and I am paying attention, like I should be, to what's going on with the flight and the crew members in front of me. If I see something that is either starting to deviate from safety of flight or something, what is the appropriate way for me to talk to the crew that's flying the aircraft?

Brian Ross:

So, I actually had something that happened to me very similar to that once, and I was sitting on the cockpit jumpseat. The first officer and the captain had a small light come on right after takeoff, it was a packed trip off light. Well, the first officer was fairly new and he started going through this checklist and he got down to the four dots and he kept going, he didn't stop. And the captain really wasn't paying attention and they were getting ready to shut off the second pack.

And so I just simply reached up, put my hand on the captain's shoulder and said, "Hey, hang on a second. I think he missed those four dots," and then they went back stopped and they said, "Oh yeah. Yes. Thanks." And that was the end of it. That was where a third set of eyes came in handy because they were in the red with all the things that they had to do at that point with talking to the ATC and not making sure they didn't got things taken care of before they got over 10,000 feet and a bunch of different issues. That's kind of the way you should be handling the situation is, speak up. If you see something, say something. Put your hand on the guy's shoulder. If he's got his headsets on, he might not be able to hear you, just get their attention.

Matt McCants:

Yeah. Tact is key here. And on the same note, I think I saw something about this happen recently. How about the situation where you're a Southwest pilot on our aircraft, you're deadheading in the back to your next flight segment and an OAL pilot who is going to be jumpseating with us but has been given a seat in the back or hasn't been called with the front yet, they sit in an exit row seat. Now, what's happening here and how should we address that?

Brian Ross:

Well, the extra seat is an interesting one in that Southwest is unique in the way we do our seating. And it's really frowned upon to sit in the emergency exit row when you are not a paying passenger. So, in those kinds of situations, I would probably have the flight attendants just talk to them about it or maybe do a little bit of education because most airlines, they will actually assign their crew members the exit row to help out. And in that case, it's a matter of education. I think they just don't know that we have this unique seating arrangement here at Southwest.

Matt McCants:

Right. It's time to educate that other airline pilot as opposed to resulting to certainly not scolding or anything like that, but give the flight attendants an opportunity to do their job. And if there's some questions, then there you are to answer them for them.

Brian Ross:

And if you're a pilot and you're the captain of that flight and this happens to you, you can give me a call and give me the guy's name, and I can call up the United Airlines coordinator and we can talk about it, and he can give them a little education as well.

Matt McCants:

But it's certainly not something to get out of control and rise to the disciplinary level.

Brian Ross:

No.

Matt McCants:

Okay.

Tony Mulhare:

And so we've been talking a lot about US and other airlines, but what about our relationship with the company? What's your counterpart across the street that you interact with and what's that been like?

Brian Ross:

We have been dealing with one person for many years and then recently, Barnes Pruitt has taken over that position. It's still a work in progress. I think Barnes is doing a pretty good job. He's not quite up to speed on a lot of different things yet, but he's getting there.

Tony Mulhare:

What is the company's role in this? Is it just the security part? Is it the documentation part? How do they counteract with you?

Brian Ross:

Well, the role of the company is, if you think about the jumpseat and getting on the cockpit, it's really like a three-legged stool. You have to get permission from the FAA, you have to get permission from the company and you have to get permission from the PIC. So, if any one of those people do not get permission, you can't get on board. And so the company is one of those legs of the stool. They hold the approvals and the AOM, and the FOM, and the POPs binder to allow the jumpseaters on board.

Tony Mulhare:

Is it ever appropriate to deny a jumpseat if you're working on, let's say, you're a check airman, you're working on a UOE or a line experience or something along those lines, or there might be more instruction going on up front than there would be normally or is that something where you would normally just allow the guy to sit there?

Brian Ross:

Absolutely. And there's times where, if the safety of flight is in question, I think that would be appropriate time to deny the ride. If something just seems off, deny the ride. It's better to deny it and come back, and look at the issue, and Monday morning quarterback at later than it is to get yourself into a situation where you've got somebody that is compromising your safety.

Matt McCants:

Yeah. I think that's a good way to look at this is safety continues to be the number one priority in air travel. So, that's where having that mindset is and should be backed up by everybody that's involved with this. And we've talked a lot about getting approval from the captain. This is something important to point out. Sometimes the captain is not available when jumpseaters getting on. Let's talk about first officers dealing with jumpseaters as well.

Brian Ross:

There's been sometimes too where I get on and the captain is not available and so there's a couple of different ways I can deal with it. I can either stand back out in the jet bridge and wait for him to come in or a lot of times I just say to the first officer and ask the first officer permission and just say if the captain has anything he needs more, come back and get me, and then go proceed to have a seat in the cabin. And so that's generally the way I handle things and I've never had a problem with that as long as you check in with somebody first.

Matt McCants:

Perfectly appropriate. So, there's just no surprises when either the pilots are finished boarding the aircraft, getting in the cockpit, making their nests and getting ready to fly that you do in fact have a jumpseater back there because that's part of the resources that are available to you.

Brian Ross:

Let me make something clear too, a jumpseater that sits in the back of your airplane. If the pilots don't know he's there, what good is he? He's not a resource for you at that point. You only have a resource if you know have a resource. And so that's why it's so important for people to check in, even if they think, well, I'm not on the jumpseat. If you signed up for that jumpseat and you didn't pay for a Zed fare, and you didn't pay for a full fare ticket or you're not on a buddy pass, even if the agent assigns you a seat in the back, you should always check in with the crew.

Tony Mulhare:

So, let's spin back to the comm and the feedback you received from the line. Is this always from pilots or do you hear from ground ops as well?

Brian Ross:

No, we don't hear anything from ground ops. It's all from the pilots.

Tony Mulhare:

How about their leadership? What kind of feedback are you getting through the company from ground ops?

Brian Ross:

Southwest has got a lot of silos and kingdom set up in their headquarters and the ground ops, it's a kingdom of itself and they really don't talk with us. If they do, it has to be through Barnes Pruitt and it's facilitated through him. But generally we don't have a lot of contact directly with ground ops.

Tony Mulhare:

How is the education piece going with the CSAs and the ops agents as far as issuing our documentation and the documentation from other airlines? Obviously, there's been a lot of new people throughout the entire company and just not pilots, but tons of new ops agents and customer service agents. Every time somebody comes on they have to be retrained. Is that something that's been going well or are we finding constant pain points there?

Brian Ross:

I think it's important to realize that ops agents are just people just like pilots are. And there's a lot of pilots that don't read or read before flies like they should or they might read some and miss it. Ops agents and CSAs are the same way. They have a lot of read before flies and they [inaudible 00:18:37] them read before works. And so there are times that they may miss something or forget something, and they may do the wrong procedure. And so it's better to go after them, not go after them, but education on a one-to-one basis and hopefully that keeps it down to a minimum.

Tony Mulhare:

And so like what John Ross from Pro Standards had always said is always treat people with respect. Speaking of Pro Standards, if I have a problem with an ops agent or a customer service agent, not just, can I have an opportunity to come to you through the jumpseat Committee, but they have their own pro standards that John can reach out to as well. Correct?

Brian Ross:

That's correct. And so what we do is, if the complaint or the problem is with your jumpseater or you are the jumpseater with the problem, come to us with it even if it's an interpersonal problem. And if we have to pull in John Ross from Pro Standards or we have to pull in the security committee or we have to pull in the safety committee or there's a problem that's a contract admin type of problem, we can pull in all these different committees for you and let you know the best avenue to take to resolve our problems.

Matt McCants:

Sure. And I think it's worth hammering home here again to try to keep this at the lowest level, keep it at SWAPA levels, and then to use those forms that you mentioned before so that we have documentation of this because word of mouth is just not very useful.

Brian Ross:

That's correct. And the best way to get us hold of us is either through the form, which goes to our jumpseat@swapa.org email. And so we're on distribution list and it goes to all of us together. And so I have us split up into different call days. And so the fastest way to get a hold of us is probably through the email, so jumpseat@swapa.org or the form.

Tony Mulhare:

So, Brian, what are some of the longer term issues that you're working on? I know International CAS is one of those. Can you talk to that for a minute?

Brian Ross:

Yeah. The International CAS is the ability to jumpseat in the cockpit on an international flight. And that was taken away shortly after September 11th and it hasn't been back since. So, we've been working on that one for 23 years now, a little over 23 years. It was close. It was real close to getting it here this last spring. There was a incident where they allowed some coaches up in the cockpit during the flight and that incident put a stop to the whole process for a while, while the TSA is determining what they want to do next. So, right now the whole thing is on hold. We're hopeful that it'll be taken care of soon. There's no real barriers to it being implemented except the TSA.

Tony Mulhare:

Brian, that was a lot of information. So, let's end on how SWAPA pilots can make their lives easier with all things jumpseat. Take them through and remind us what are the needs to know and where are the resources to jog our memories if it's been a while since I needed to commute.

Brian Ross:

So, we have two main resources. The number one resource for us is the swapa.org website under the Jumpseat section. And we have a lot of information on there. The best resource I can point people to as far as if they have questions on how to list or what the dress code is or what the grooming standards are or whatever it is, is to check under the Reciprocal Jumpseat Agreement section. And all those are hyperlinked in per airline and it gives you exactly what you need to do to jumpseat on another airline. The other resource we have is the ops binder. The ops binder has a lot of information in it and it's one of those manuals that gets lost sometimes, but it does have a lot of useful information, especially what kind of documents you need to check, for example, for different jumpseaters.

Tony Mulhare:

And then there's always the Jumpseat Checklist in the cockpit. Right?

Brian Ross:

Yeah. You should be giving that to people and if they have any questions, they need to address those. But the other thing is too is that we ran into this recently is everyone that sits in the cockpit needs to have a jumpseat validation card or JPFD-I and it needs to say approved for flight deck on there. If they don't have that information, if they just flash you a badge and say, "I'm here. I'm your jumpseater," they don't get on the cockpit. They must have that paperwork.

Matt McCants:

So, as a final reminder to the membership, Brian, what would you like them to take away from this?

Brian Ross:

Well, I'd like them to take away that the jumpseat is a professional courtesy that we extend to other pilots and it's a privilege, not a right. So, if you are on the jumpseat, ask for the jumpseat. Don't assume it's yours. So, let's continue to treat this process with respect so that we can continue to use it and all the great things it does for our pilots.

Matt McCants:

We'd like to thank Brian for stopping by to explain the many roles that the Jumpseat Committee serves. If you encounter an issue out on the line or if you have any feedback or questions, please drop us a line at comm@swapa.org.

Tony Mulhare:

And finally, today's bonus number is 170,687, which is the number of times other airline pilots have used the Southwest jumpseats just in the last year. That's compared to the 85,576 times SWAPA pilots have used other airline jumpseats. So, we are carrying twice as many jumpseaters as they are carrying us. Make no mistake about it, the Southwest jumpseat is a valuable resource to both us and our other airline pilots alike. Let's protect its utility and maintain its value.