Post by Corporate Malfeasance at VNR on Jul 5, 2013 15:16:29 GMT -5
Hello fellow affected owners, employees, and vendors,
Please let me apologize in advance that my first post here was not a happier one, but alas, the morass that we find ourselves in does not contribute to buoyant posts.
To begin, I chose my username in honor of a true leader in Corporate America, business, and aviation and someone who still inspires aviation professionals and other CEO's, alike, today: That man is Herb Kelleher, the founder and former CEO of Southwest Airlines. In fact, Mr. Kelleher, also a lawyer from New Jersey, inspired my former CEO, Mr. Steven Santo, enough that he often called Avantair "The Southwest of Fractionals". Unfortunately though, any similarities between Mr. Santo and Mr. Kelleher and between Avantair and Southwest ended at lawyers, New Jersey, and airlines. Again, I chose my username, whatwouldherbdo, as a tribute to Herb and as a comparison to what we have seen in the "trenches" and front lines as employees of VNR.
That brings me to my next point, which is a term with which lawyers are familiar: Malfeasance.
mal-fea-sance n. intentionally doing something either legally or morally wrong which one had no right to do. It always involves dishonesty, illegality, or knowingly exceeding authority for improper reasons. Malfeasance is distinguished from "misfeasance," which is committing a wrong or error by mistake, negligence or inadvertence, but not by intentional wrongdoing.
So I will begin with my first example of malfeasance, in my humble opinion (not being an attorney): Stiffing ones loyal employees and vendors. Many of you are considering entering into an agreement with a management team that has shown contempt for FAA Regulations, Labor law, honesty, integrity, and honor with its owners, employees and vendors. True, from the proposal you truly don't know WHO will be on this management team, something that I consider a very troubling omission indeed. As a furloughed VNR pilot, you as an owner entrusted me to fly you, your mothers, your fathers, your brothers, your sisters, your newborns, your toddlers, your daughters, your sons, your friends, your business associates, and your beloved pets into and out of some of the most challenging airports in North America. This is a trust with which I am proud, honored, and humbled at the same time. We are also the people who have come to your forum with detailed locations, conditions, and even pictures of your asset, while the Company has told you little or nothing with regard to your aircraft. As of June 28, I still have not been paid the money that I am owed by VNR, the money that my family depends on. To add insult to injury, we were informed late on a Wednesday, June 26, 2013 that we only had insurance benefits until the end of the month, a Sunday! This should concern you that you are about to possibly give money to potentially the same people that allowed employees to work for nearly three weeks knowing full well that the Company would not be able to fund payroll and that the employees would have little time to scramble for health insurance. Of course, the vendors have not been paid either so that is why gaining access to your planes may be difficult now. Ask yourself, would you do this to your employees, your vendors, your "family, your fellow Americans? What would Herb do?
My next example of malfeasance, again in my opinion only, is misleading your owners, customers, potential owners and customers, and your loyal employees. For now, forget about the poor employees and think back to why you all started your forum: Not getting what you were promised. How many of you were sold a share into an aircraft that has not flown in years or has been cannibalized for parts? A great number of our aircraft look like those sitting in hangars all across the Eastern Bloc at the end of the Cold War; Sitting on stands because of no landing gear, missing parts, shells of the sleek aircraft they once were. For those of you who doubt this assertion of cannibalization, I encourage you to call Landmark SDL, maintenance in DAL and MCC and ask the people who worked on your planes the truth. And certainly if there are any former VNR mechanics here, I am sure that they could provide insight to this assertion, too. How about aircraft performance? Ocean Reef, full fuel, six passengers non-stop to Farmingdale... No problem! How about promised communications? We will update you in x days? Here are some promises that were told to the employees (and maybe some owners, too): "We will never cut your pay"-FALSE, "All of our aircraft will have wifi"- FALSE, "We will replace all the I's with II's"- FALSE, "trust me, you all don't need a union"- FALSE, "We will have 100 airplanes by 20XX"- FALSE, "twelve hours off after twelve hours of duty, fourteen hours off after fourteen hours of duty"-FALSE, "safety is our FIRST concern", FALSE, "We will fix these maintenance records (after the first maintenance stand down)"- FALSE! Again, is this how you would treat an owner, customer, vendor, or loyal employee? What would Herb do?
In my final example of, again my opinion only, malfeasance is the misuse of Owner or Company assets. Recent revelations about the proven cannibalization of Owners aircraft parts and the documented lack of proper bookkeeping of maintenance records have already surfaced here on this forum and ours, but how about some other examples. I realize that "feeding your troops first" (a popular quote from Herb Kelleher) is passe' in the new world of Wall Street and Corporate America, but what does it say when the leaders of a Company only take symbolic cuts to compensation in the single digits, but our new First Officers (already pay deficient) take double digit pay cuts? Other Departments employees pay had been frozen or cut long before. When Herb had his losing quarter at Southwest, he only allowed himself to be paid $1.00 USD. Herb was already a wealthy man from his legal career, so this was really only a symbolic hit to his wealth. But that one Dollar earned him billions of Dollars worth of employee respect, that is still talked about today by the wildly loyal Southwest Airlines who would have followed Herb through the gates of Hell after his leadership by example. This is in direct contrast to CEO's like United's Glen Tilton who came onboard during Chapter 11 and slashed, burned, and cut employees, aircraft, service, etc., but walked away with $40 Million under the euphemism of "shared sacrifice". And while not malfeasance, use of executive benefits during a time when the Company's benefits were stretched to a breaking point is beyond obtuse. During Christmas 2012, our "Royal Family" was flown to Colorado for Christmas Vacation in one of our Piaggios. This purportedly resulted in the delay of at least one Owner. This happened again, in Feb. 2013 with a trip to the Cayman Islands to supposedly attend a conference. With just one-third of our entire fleet of aircraft, shouldn't airlines have been used instead so that our valued Owners would not be inconvenienced? And while executive travel on Company was supposedly banned so that less Owners would be inconvenienced by or lack of flyable aircraft, why did this continue to the end with trips to Colorado, the Caymans, and Ocean Reef? And the flightaware.com-blocked TBM? I don't know where to begin, other than saying "what would Herb do?"
Well, I didn't intend this first post to be such a long one but unfortunately I have seen too many examples of things that I know are not right. And I'm afraid that this thread will unfortunately grow commensurate with the amount of bad things that have happened to us all. But thinking of Herb and those others that have done right in Corporate America give me hope for our future, maybe just not in aviation.
May I wish my former Owners, former friends and co-workers, and this sites Admin the best of luck in recouping our losses from the demise of Avantair.
Please let me apologize in advance that my first post here was not a happier one, but alas, the morass that we find ourselves in does not contribute to buoyant posts.
To begin, I chose my username in honor of a true leader in Corporate America, business, and aviation and someone who still inspires aviation professionals and other CEO's, alike, today: That man is Herb Kelleher, the founder and former CEO of Southwest Airlines. In fact, Mr. Kelleher, also a lawyer from New Jersey, inspired my former CEO, Mr. Steven Santo, enough that he often called Avantair "The Southwest of Fractionals". Unfortunately though, any similarities between Mr. Santo and Mr. Kelleher and between Avantair and Southwest ended at lawyers, New Jersey, and airlines. Again, I chose my username, whatwouldherbdo, as a tribute to Herb and as a comparison to what we have seen in the "trenches" and front lines as employees of VNR.
That brings me to my next point, which is a term with which lawyers are familiar: Malfeasance.
mal-fea-sance n. intentionally doing something either legally or morally wrong which one had no right to do. It always involves dishonesty, illegality, or knowingly exceeding authority for improper reasons. Malfeasance is distinguished from "misfeasance," which is committing a wrong or error by mistake, negligence or inadvertence, but not by intentional wrongdoing.
So I will begin with my first example of malfeasance, in my humble opinion (not being an attorney): Stiffing ones loyal employees and vendors. Many of you are considering entering into an agreement with a management team that has shown contempt for FAA Regulations, Labor law, honesty, integrity, and honor with its owners, employees and vendors. True, from the proposal you truly don't know WHO will be on this management team, something that I consider a very troubling omission indeed. As a furloughed VNR pilot, you as an owner entrusted me to fly you, your mothers, your fathers, your brothers, your sisters, your newborns, your toddlers, your daughters, your sons, your friends, your business associates, and your beloved pets into and out of some of the most challenging airports in North America. This is a trust with which I am proud, honored, and humbled at the same time. We are also the people who have come to your forum with detailed locations, conditions, and even pictures of your asset, while the Company has told you little or nothing with regard to your aircraft. As of June 28, I still have not been paid the money that I am owed by VNR, the money that my family depends on. To add insult to injury, we were informed late on a Wednesday, June 26, 2013 that we only had insurance benefits until the end of the month, a Sunday! This should concern you that you are about to possibly give money to potentially the same people that allowed employees to work for nearly three weeks knowing full well that the Company would not be able to fund payroll and that the employees would have little time to scramble for health insurance. Of course, the vendors have not been paid either so that is why gaining access to your planes may be difficult now. Ask yourself, would you do this to your employees, your vendors, your "family, your fellow Americans? What would Herb do?
My next example of malfeasance, again in my opinion only, is misleading your owners, customers, potential owners and customers, and your loyal employees. For now, forget about the poor employees and think back to why you all started your forum: Not getting what you were promised. How many of you were sold a share into an aircraft that has not flown in years or has been cannibalized for parts? A great number of our aircraft look like those sitting in hangars all across the Eastern Bloc at the end of the Cold War; Sitting on stands because of no landing gear, missing parts, shells of the sleek aircraft they once were. For those of you who doubt this assertion of cannibalization, I encourage you to call Landmark SDL, maintenance in DAL and MCC and ask the people who worked on your planes the truth. And certainly if there are any former VNR mechanics here, I am sure that they could provide insight to this assertion, too. How about aircraft performance? Ocean Reef, full fuel, six passengers non-stop to Farmingdale... No problem! How about promised communications? We will update you in x days? Here are some promises that were told to the employees (and maybe some owners, too): "We will never cut your pay"-FALSE, "All of our aircraft will have wifi"- FALSE, "We will replace all the I's with II's"- FALSE, "trust me, you all don't need a union"- FALSE, "We will have 100 airplanes by 20XX"- FALSE, "twelve hours off after twelve hours of duty, fourteen hours off after fourteen hours of duty"-FALSE, "safety is our FIRST concern", FALSE, "We will fix these maintenance records (after the first maintenance stand down)"- FALSE! Again, is this how you would treat an owner, customer, vendor, or loyal employee? What would Herb do?
In my final example of, again my opinion only, malfeasance is the misuse of Owner or Company assets. Recent revelations about the proven cannibalization of Owners aircraft parts and the documented lack of proper bookkeeping of maintenance records have already surfaced here on this forum and ours, but how about some other examples. I realize that "feeding your troops first" (a popular quote from Herb Kelleher) is passe' in the new world of Wall Street and Corporate America, but what does it say when the leaders of a Company only take symbolic cuts to compensation in the single digits, but our new First Officers (already pay deficient) take double digit pay cuts? Other Departments employees pay had been frozen or cut long before. When Herb had his losing quarter at Southwest, he only allowed himself to be paid $1.00 USD. Herb was already a wealthy man from his legal career, so this was really only a symbolic hit to his wealth. But that one Dollar earned him billions of Dollars worth of employee respect, that is still talked about today by the wildly loyal Southwest Airlines who would have followed Herb through the gates of Hell after his leadership by example. This is in direct contrast to CEO's like United's Glen Tilton who came onboard during Chapter 11 and slashed, burned, and cut employees, aircraft, service, etc., but walked away with $40 Million under the euphemism of "shared sacrifice". And while not malfeasance, use of executive benefits during a time when the Company's benefits were stretched to a breaking point is beyond obtuse. During Christmas 2012, our "Royal Family" was flown to Colorado for Christmas Vacation in one of our Piaggios. This purportedly resulted in the delay of at least one Owner. This happened again, in Feb. 2013 with a trip to the Cayman Islands to supposedly attend a conference. With just one-third of our entire fleet of aircraft, shouldn't airlines have been used instead so that our valued Owners would not be inconvenienced? And while executive travel on Company was supposedly banned so that less Owners would be inconvenienced by or lack of flyable aircraft, why did this continue to the end with trips to Colorado, the Caymans, and Ocean Reef? And the flightaware.com-blocked TBM? I don't know where to begin, other than saying "what would Herb do?"
Well, I didn't intend this first post to be such a long one but unfortunately I have seen too many examples of things that I know are not right. And I'm afraid that this thread will unfortunately grow commensurate with the amount of bad things that have happened to us all. But thinking of Herb and those others that have done right in Corporate America give me hope for our future, maybe just not in aviation.
May I wish my former Owners, former friends and co-workers, and this sites Admin the best of luck in recouping our losses from the demise of Avantair.
