Cutting Maintenance is the easiest/ fastest to cut cost when money is tight. After almost all buy outs the buyer starts cutting every thing that does not bring money in NOW. With Maintenance on the top of the list
Maintenance can always be put off till the next day with out any one noticing, until some one gets killed that is--and of course we all know that those stupid gov. reg are with out merit, cause unneeded expenses and keep a good company down.
As in this case, I thought I read some where SW was just going to relogo the Air Tran planes , short term cost saver, but a long term maintenance problem if they want to stick to the one type of plane concept as a long term cost saver. Might be cheaper over a few years to retrain pilots, and the buy new of the same type they fly now and dump the maintenance units/repair hub
This may save you guys money at the big hubs with more competition with the big airlines, but us poor smucks in the boon docks will be footing the bill ( happened with Delta/NW ) as competition stops at the out here and our prices go up. So if you fly SW for a vacation, please bang one in honor of those of us here hinter land who paid for your cheaper flight
