[Joeaksa]

Friend of mine is having some problems and thought I would see if anyone on the list has any ideas with this.

She works in SoCal and has been with the company about 15 months. They give everyone in the company a weeks vacation per year. Everyone at the office gets this time off no matter what. Just put in for it and poof you are at home, on the beach or where-ever you want to be and NOT work.

My friend is a pilot and she is on duty 357 days a year, 24/7. They call and she heads for the airport, and no "time off" so to speak. That's the life we put up with as pilots.

Now she put in for vacation and was told "lets see" as we might have a flight then. Excuse me? The time period she is asking for is next summer, as in ONE YEAR away!

Does anyone know California labor law and how it deals with vacations? This person is being told that she might have to change everything "if a flight pops up" but she simply cannot do this. The tickets have been purchased for all the events she wants to attend (its a sports event with her family that is very important to them) and so on, so moving the dates around is not going to work. Also they are now telling her that the time she takes off needs to be "important, and not a day or two at the beach!"

There are contract pilots around who provide companies a pilot during vacation and training times. We just used one last week when my copilot got married.

Any insight on this? Can they really tell someone what they can take vacation for and force them to take the time on the companies schedule in California?

Thx,

Joe A