7.14.20 – Trip Trade System (TTS) Updates

Tuesday, July 14, 2020

Trip Trade System (TTS) Updates

• Multiple Drop Requests in TTS
• Understanding the Difference Between ‘Requests’ and ‘Choices’
• Complex Ballots

 

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Multiple Drop Requests in TTS

Multiple drop/trades in TTS are expected to be available in the next few months (JCBA Section 10.E.1.d.iii). TTS processing times increase with each added feature. Initially, multiple drop/trades will be limited to two (2) drop sequences and one (1) pickup sequence within a single transaction.

 

Understanding the Difference Between ‘Requests’ and ‘Choices’

• Request: To ask for a sequence (pickup, drop, or trade on specific dates); each request is a possible award
• Choice: Selecting/ranking your pickup sequences within a request

 

Ballots may include up to seven (7) Requests and up to 200 Choices. Sequences/positions can be listed in one (1) Choice and treated equally or ranked by order of your preference.

Only 1 Choice in each Request can be awarded.

You can rank your selections using the Create Choice and then Save as Separate Choices buttons.

 

Example:

In the ballot below, Request 1 contains 8 sequences/positions separated into 5 ranked Choices.  Only one of these sequences/positions can be awarded.  In Choice 1, 26334/10Jul position 1 is considered first. If this is not available, TTS will move on to Choice 2: 26334/10Jul position 4. Choice 3 contains multiple sequences and positions. All of these are in the same Choice and are considered equally.

Complex Ballots

TTS processing times generally take between 6 – 25 minutes depending on the number of ballots in a run. Recent TTS runs have taken up to five times as long to process. In each of these runs, the extended processing time was due to a ballot that included multiple Requests and each Request included multiple sequences with the same departure dates. This is referred to as a complex ballot. To put this in perspective, the TTS Optimizer runs legality checks on each Request up to a maximum of 30 times to search for a solution. A Flight Attendant with seven Requests that contain the same origination dates can require over two million checks per Request.

If the Optimizer cannot find a legal solution due to a complex ballot, the lowest-ranking Request on your ballot will be ignored and your ballot will be rerun. An ignored Request will show the results “Cannot find legal solution due to complex ballot”.

To prevent a complex ballot denial, each Request should cover different departure dates. The dates on these Requests can be in any order and ranked by your preference.

The above example is just one way to resolve a complex ballot. If this complex ballot was not resolved, Request 7 would be ignored, and the ballot will be run with requests 1 – 6.  If the ballot is still complex, Request 6 will be ignored, and the ballot will be run with requests 1 – 5.

Best practices for TTS bidding:

• When adding a new sequence to an existing ballot, add to a Request that covers that origination date, if one exists.
• When adding a pickup sequence for a trade, selecting a sequence that overlaps an existing sequence on your schedule will prevent you from being awarded.
• Delete expired sequences from ballot.
• Delete drop bids if you are below 40 hours.
• Delete Requests/Choices when the drop sequence is no longer on your schedule.

 

In Solidarity,

Renee Mayer
APFA JCBA Specialist
[email protected]