Friday, July 9, 2010

Great for a commuter...not bad for a local

My airline sent out an email offering up a TDY for August. TDY is a Temporary Duty assignment. They are offered from time to time when staffing levels in a particular base are forecasted too be low.

At my airline a TDY assignment means working out of another domicile for one month. The airline pays for a hotel room for the entire month as well as pays the pilot per diem 24 hours a day. This equates to over $1200 in tax free per diem. By comparison I normally get $200-$400 a month in per diem....half of that is taxed!

If enough people bid for the TDY assignment, those awarded the assignment are placed BELOW the other pilots already in the domicile for bidding purposes. If there are not enough bidders and pilots are FORCED to the TDY, then they hold whatever line their seniority would get as if they were based there.

For me I am the most junior in my current domicile. In the TDY domicile I would be the in the top 10%. If I am forced there I can bid and easily hold a line.

Now I had been hoping for a TDY for a while. The extra money would be nice with the kid on the way. Having a hotel room for an entire month is nice as I could easily fly up family to visit the city. If I were a commuter I would surely love a TDY as it would mean one month free of hotel and crash pad expenses!

Unfortunately I have vacation and a baby on the way for August. I will not be bidding on the TDY. If I am forced into it, well I won't be there much.

Still working on a write up covering my 4 day trip last week.

No comments:

Post a Comment

If you are a spammer....your post will never show up. Move along.