Source: Elines 

In April 2015, the negotiated provision enabling Flight Attendants to make “generic requests” for trip trades with open flying, otherwise known as Open Flying Preferencing, was implemented following completion of the necessary Unimatic automation enhancements. 

Over the past several months since implementation we have received a number of  questions, suggestions and reminders.  Today, we will review some of these to assist you in taking advantage of this negotiated provision.

1.     To enter an Open Flying Preference, use Unimatic code DSPFAI

2.     If you do not enter an X in the PREF field, it will default to the traditional trade screen without preferences. 

NOTE:  If you place an ‘X’ in the PREF field of the initial request, it is critical that you understand selection of any criteria in the lower half of the screen may result in your being assigned to an open ID even if you entered a specific ID number in the top half of the request screen. The best rule to follow:

Do not fill in any items in the second half the request screen if you only want to enter into a trade with a specific ID number. 

3.     If you are looking to enter into a trade with open flying for only for a specific ID, do not place any additional preference options into the request.  The presence of these other criteria may result in the assignment to an ID you were not requesting. 

4.     If you enter more than one date, each date will be evaluated one at a time for a match.  In the case of back-to-back IDs, each date is considered as the date of the first ID. 

5.     If you elect to “Retain if Rejected”, you should be aware that the trade can be awarded during any open flying run.  Beware! 

6.     Once the trade is awarded, unlike the award of open flying, you will not be notified by the crew desk or Flight Attendant Support Team the trade has been awarded.  You are responsible to fly the ID.

For further information and a tutorial on submitting an Open Flying Trade Request Preference check out our Did You Know education article entitled How to Submit/Remove a Lineholder Trip Trading Preference with Open Flying.  This Did You Know article is available under the Contract Education section of our website.