American flight attendant reserve: RAPs and call-out

How long do you sit reserve?

It depends on when you were hired. For flight attendants hired before the date of ratification, you are on straight reserve for the first 12 months after initial training, then one month on and one month off for three years, then one month on and three months off. § 12.A.3.a.i § 12.A.3.a.ii § 12.A.3.a.iii For those hired on or after the date of ratification and the later implementation date set in the Implementation Letter of Agreement, the straight reserve period is the first two years, followed by the same one-on/one-off and one-on/three-off rotations. § 12.A.3.b § 12.A.3.b.i § 12.A.3.b.ii § 12.A.3.b.iii

All of this applies only “if needed as a Reserve”. The number of reserves is set by the company’s service needs. § 12.A.3 If more reserves are needed in a month, they are picked in reverse order of seniority, and their reserve duty won’t go past their rotation. § 12.A.3.a.iv § 12.A.3.b.iv

You can also choose reserve out of turn (“Senior Bump”) by bidding reserve before PBS opens, if your seniority allows it, and doing so changes your future reserve cycle. The exception is a reserve who is on reserve by their own choosing in a month with more than three days of approved vacation or a Voluntary Leave of Absence: they have not fulfilled their reserve obligation. § 12.A.3.c

What is a RAP?

A Reserve Availability Period (RAP) is the window you must be available. There can be no more than four RAPs, each starting on the hour and lasting 12 hours. The start times are published in the bid package for each base. § 12.G.1 § 12.G.2 The last RAP (RAP D) runs 1400 to 0200 HBT, but ends at 2359 HBT on the last day of your reserve block, and ends earlier once all departures are airborne and there are no known diversions or returning flights. § 12.G.1

You do not have to be reachable outside your RAP. If you get no assignment you are released automatically at the end of it. § 12.G.2 An assignment can report up to two hours after the RAP ends, except that a reserve with a Flex Day following their RAP may only be assigned a sequence that signs in on or before 2359 HBT on the last day of reserve. § 12.G.2 You can extend the end of your RAP if you want to, but not the start. § 12.G.5 You can ask Crew Scheduling to release you from a RAP; if they agree, your guarantee is not reduced. § 12.G.6

How fast do you have to report?

Within two hours of being notified by Crew Scheduling; reserves at co-terminals get three hours. § 12.H.1 Former Shuttle flight attendants based in DCA when the Shuttle Fence was removed keep a three-hour report time if they live outside the two-hour mainline report time, unless they bid or are displaced to another base. § 12.H.2 Crew Scheduling calls your primary number first, then a secondary number if you gave one. You have 15 minutes to respond to the call. § 12.H.3 § 12.H.4

Between 0000 and 0500 home base time you cannot be called for a same-day assignment unless the departure is within three hours or the call is needed to prevent a delay. § 12.P.5 If you reach the airport after the sign-in time but within the two hours, you are paid and credited as if you had checked in with the rest of the crew. § 12.H.1 But if you have not checked in within ten minutes of report time, Crew Scheduling may remove you from the sequence, and you forfeit the pay and credit for it. § 12.P.7

What about rest after a trip?

After any reserve sequence you get at least 12 hours of rest at your crew base, which you can choose to shorten as Section 10 allows. § 12.E.1 You do not have to be available to Crew Scheduling during that rest. § 12.E.3 When rest ends after your RAP has started, you are available one minute after it finishes, and the RAP end time stays the same. § 12.E.5

What are Golden Days and Flex Days?

Your reserve line has days off of two kinds. You can’t be assigned flight duty on a Golden Day unless you agree. § 12.B.2.a A Flex Day can be used for an assignment, in which case a new day off is scheduled and the time is paid at pay and credit. § 12.B.3.a Apart from that, the company can’t move a Flex Day without your consent. § 12.B.3.c

If you are assigned into a Flex Day, or operations push you into one of these days, you must call Crew Scheduling within 48 hours to agree a replacement day. § 12.D.1 § 12.D.2 If you don’t call in time, or there is nothing left to convert, you are paid for the day instead of getting it back. § 12.D.3

What is airport standby?

A standby shift is airport duty in uniform to cover a sequence and prevent a delay. § 12.F.1 Standby shifts are four or six hours, and you can ask to extend one to six or eight hours with Crew Scheduling’s approval. § 12.F.4 You can’t be involuntarily assigned to a standby shift more than twice a month unless every legal and available reserve at your base has been assigned twice. § 12.F.5 You must be available for immediate contact but do not have to be in the standby room. § 12.F.17 A sequence assigned from standby must depart no later than two hours after the scheduled end of the standby shift. § 12.F.8 If you are held past the end of the shift for boarding duty assigned before it ended, you are paid minute for minute. § 12.F.9.d A standby shall not be assigned a sequence into a Flex Day unless they are the only standby available and Crew Scheduling can’t split the trip before the Flex Day. § 12.F.16

A standby who does not fly is entitled to 3:30 for a four-hour shift, 5:15 for six hours and 7:00 for eight hours. § 12.F.9.a If you are assigned a sequence from standby, you get the value of the sequence (scheduled or actual, whichever is greater), plus standby duty time at one hour of pay and credit for each 1.25 hours. § 12.F.9.b § 12.F.9.c

What if your trip is cancelled?

It depends on whether you had reported yet. Before report, if there was no RAP assigned, you are on duty for the rest of the RAP in which the sequence originally reported. § 12.M.1 If you reported but did not fly, Crew Scheduling can put you on standby for up to six hours, or release you with call-out pay. § 12.M.2 If you reported and the flight was delayed or cancelled, you are covered by the rescheduling rules in 10.J.3.d first; if you aren’t rescheduled you can elect to be processed as before report or as after report, and you still owe any remaining reserve days of the original sequence. § 12.M.3 A reserve removed mid-sequence is, if not rescheduled, released once at base for the rest of the day, and still owes any remaining reserve days from the original sequence. § 12.M.5

What is the guarantee?

A reserve gets a 75-hour monthly guarantee at their hourly rate, prorated if active less than a full month. § 3.B.3 § 3.B.4 If you give a trip to another flight attendant through the ETB or Crew Scheduling, your guarantee is reduced by the value of that trip. § 12.T.2.a A reserve who gets a missed trip is subject to one of two outcomes: release from availability for the rest of the day, with the guarantee docked for that one day, or staying available that day, in which case Crew Scheduling may assign another trip, airport standby or the reserve obligation and the guarantee is not docked if nothing is assigned. § 12.U.1 § 12.U.2

Are these rules in effect yet?

Not all of them at once. Provisions of the 2024 agreement take effect on the first day of the bid month after ratification unless the Implementation Timeline Letter of Agreement (L1) gives them a later date, and until a delayed provision is implemented the matching provision of the prior agreement stays in effect. § L1.A § L1.E

Several reserve provisions have later target dates in L1’s Attachment A, including standby pay based on the departure time at assignment (12.F.9.b), the Flex Day sign-in limit in 12.G.2, sequence acknowledgement (12.P) and the reserve information system (12.Q), each targeted 12 months after signing, and the new-hire reserve rotation in 12.A.3.b, which is to be implemented within the duration of the contract. [[L1.AttA@2]] This page does not check whether each one has actually gone live, so ask your APFA representative about a specific rule.

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