Delta Atlanta year one on reserve from a new hire: the first month, the callouts, the guarantee in practice and what the work rules mean when you live them

Brandon, Delta Atlanta, year one, reserve, and Cassie and Sally wrote the reserve life from years two and three. This is month three, because the first weeks of reserve at a US major are a specific confusion and nobody writes it while they are in it.

The first month

Training ended, the wings, the base assignment (Atlanta, which I wanted), the first reserve month with the days off bid and the callout days. The first callout came on day two at 5:40am: a Jacksonville turn, report in two hours, and I was in the car in twelve minutes because I had laid the uniform out the night before as the training said. The second callout was a three day trip to Salt Lake with an overnight in Denver and I learned what a crash pad is by not having one.

The callouts in practice

The callout window is what the contract says and the reality is that the phone rings when it rings. Early, mostly. The reserve who is showered, packed and within the report time of the airport at the start of every callout window is the reserve who is fine. The one who is at brunch in Buckhead is the one on the disciplinary threads. Month one taught me the rhythm; month three I am living it.

The guarantee in practice

The reserve guarantee (the minimum hours paid whether you fly or not) is the thing that makes reserve survivable, and month one I flew under it and was paid the guarantee, month two I flew over it and was paid the hours. Reading the contract pages about it before month one was abstract. Living it is simple: the floor is the floor and the floor pays the rent in Atlanta, barely.

The contract pages

Delta is not unionised, so the 'contract' is the company's flight attendant work rules and pay policy, published to crew, and the reserve section of it is the section I have read most. The rest rules, the callout, the days off, the trip assignment order. The senior crew say know it, and the ones who know it are the ones who can say 'that assignment breaks the rest rule' at 5am and be right.

Atlanta as a base for a new hire

Big, busy, the world's biggest airport, a crew room the size of a terminal, and a seniority list where the domestic line comes in a year or two as Cassie described. Affordable to live near, which is why I am here and not in New York. The Atlanta reserves fly a lot of domestic and a little Caribbean, and the wide body course is scheduled for me in month five.

What surprised me

How much the senior crew help a reserve who asks. How tiring an uncalled day is (waiting is work). How fast the guarantee becomes the budget. And how the reserve month has a rhythm you can learn in about ten weeks if you pay attention, which I am.

For the next new hire

Lay the uniform out. Live near the airport. Read the reserve section twice. Ask the senior crew everything. And know that month three is where it stops being confusing and starts being a job. I am there this week.