Helicopter firm jobs being lost in Aberdeen

dopester

mitchaa wrote: »

Support staff i am led to believe, stores persons, catering staff and non essential management, i.e managers that have managers that have managers that have managers.

There has been talk of pay freezes in my company but so many are protected by the union that this is a no go.

Pay freezes and pay-cuts are better than lots of job losses. The unions know that to be true as well.

lostinrates

dopester wrote: »

Pay freezes and pay-cuts are better than lots of job losses. The unions know that to be true as well.

Indeed, is it not the relevant union supporting just this sort of move in the car industry?

mitchaa

donaldtramp wrote: »

(Edit: posted after you Mitch!)
Any word Mitch?
I know you said you thought the chopper companies were undermanned but surely this latest story must make you think.

Nobody is safe in the Oil industry just now. I personally 3 mates who are sitting at home twiddling their thumbs. can't land a job at all just now. No-one is hiring. I know that twitchy feeling as well!

Undermanned in the engineering aspect, or up until recently they were anyway. The Heli1 base maintenance coming closure has seen empty slots being filled up between the 3 operators

There are only a couple of advertised jobs left on aviation job search.com in Aberdeen. About 6mths ago, there were around 100, so they have certainly tightened their belts.

Bristows has recently secured a lucrative contract

http://www.oilvoice.com/post/Company_News_Release/Bristow_Secures_New_North_Sea_Contract/92a3a29e74.aspx

Additionally, CHC are hot favourites for a 25yr search and rescue contract..

http://www.pressandjournal.co.uk/Article.aspx/846891?UserKey

As to your question, i was speaking to a few offshore workers today as they were about to board and a couple of them were contractors who had been out of work since mid December:eek: Although they were on a 28 day £750pd stint which sort of makes up for that break now i suppose. I suspect they'll be saving it now though incase of another 3mth absent period.

dopester wrote: »

Pay freezes and pay-cuts are better than lots of job losses. The unions know that to be true as well.

If we were to strike, the cost to the company would run into the millions in very quick time as the Aircraft would become grounded and the oil companies would start fining us for not providing them the service that we agreed to. If the offshore workers cannot get back and forward, oil production in the north sea stops and then things really turn nasty with regards to securing new contracts in the future etc etc

So it is not in their best interests to break our pay award contract. We will get the bare minimum award though but seeing as deflation is likely, that's still a good payrise in retrospect.

ess0two

Industry wise we just agreed 5% this year,then next year 2.5%+RPI rate,so 2.5% if its zero.

dopester

BTW, some further press-info about the ditch/crash of that helicopter.

North Sea oil rig helicopter did not ditch.. it crashed

Mar 9 2009 By Charlie Gall

THE helicopter that came down in the North Sea last month crashed after its crew lost their bearings in thick fog.

Early reports after the accident suggested that pilot Michael Tweedie made a controlled emergency ditching, saving the lives of all 18 men on board.

But Government investigators have learned that Tweedie and his co-pilot were hampered by heavy cloud as they tried to land on a rig in darkness.

They emerged from the cloud to find that the rig was much closer than they had expected.

Tweedie raised the nose of the Super Puma aircraft in a bid to gain height, then hit the water without warning.

The investigators have found that the aircraft did not suffer any malfunction.

The new account of the crash emerged after the Government's Air Accidents Investigation Branch passed their early headline findings on to North Sea helicopter companies.

Bosses at Bond Helicopters, who owned the crashed copter, met officials from Bristow Helicopters and CHC Scotia And all three companies posted the AAIB's initial findings, and the pilot's account of what happened, on the walls of their pilots' rooms.

The role the weather played on the night of the crash will raise further questions about the forecasts given to Tweedie's bosses, Bond Helicopters.

A weather report claimed conditions were suitable for a "visual" landing on the rig, with the pilots using their eyes rather than instruments.

But, as the Record revealed two days after the crash, sources described the forecast as "totally inaccurate".

http://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/news/scottish-news/2009/03/09/north-sea-oil-rig-helicopter-did-not-ditch-it-crashed-86908-21183444/

dopester

lostinrates wrote: »

Indeed, is it not the relevant union supporting just this sort of move in the car industry?

It is... Today's Times.

From The Times
March 24, 2009
Pay cuts and freezes spread as inflation plunges to 50-year low

Christine Buckley, Industrial Editor, and Gary Duncan, Economics Editor

While unions do not want to support pay cuts, they are proving increasingly willing to negotiate them in return for pledges on no compulsory job losses. Jim D'Avila, regional officer for the Unite union at Honda's base in Swindon, said: “Honda is following Toyota's lead. In return for no compulsory redundancies the company is asking the staff to accept cuts in pay.

http://business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/business/industry_sectors/article5963294.ece

Shame !!!!!! left the boards. I'd like his response.. A year+ of arguing why there are pay-cuts looming in a deflationary world... and a year+ of his denial and warning to be prepared to pile in to property and BTL for the coming high-inflation to wipe out bad debts....

So shallow. Inflation wipes out bad debts but also wipes out good credits, and you can't run any economy just with houses and the creditworthy in the financial system all wiped out.

Also you mitchaa... you'd never accept a pay-cut remember. You'd rather leave and find a better paying job, or take a year out - remember?

Mitchaa - even if it is the"support staff, stores persons, catering staff and non essential management, i.e managers that have managers that have managers that have managers" they are getting rid of, I hope you can also re-analyse your model of affordability for house prices, which you based on 2 income earners, (on big money).

You used it to justifying mortgages and current house prices, but it hits hard when one person loses their jobs or even both, or has to take a pay-cut, which can leave a dock-off mortgage to service. In new circumstances for many people, it makes house prices look very out of whack to me.