Not liking that you can't cancel leases or make routes if you have no money

[coopdogyo]

I am not really liking this new feature where you can't cancel leases or make new routes if you have no money. My issue is that I am stuck with a bunch of 20 year old DC-9's that are coming up for C checks and I have brand new fokker 100's sitting on the ground but I can't cancel the leases on the DC-9's because I am 3 million in the red and I can't get out of the red  because I have to C check these Dc-9's. I can understand not being able to cancel leases at a certain point in the red like maybe 15 million but right now my airline is just going to be slowly forced in to bankruptcy. Or if you don't want to do that then give us the option to stop making payments on the planes and they can be repo'd with a ding to our credit score.

[brique]

I am not really liking this new feature where you can't cancel leases or make new routes if you have no money. My issue is that I am stuck with a bunch of 20 year old DC-9's that are coming up for C checks and I have brand new fokker 100's sitting on the ground but I can't cancel the leases on the DC-9's because I am 3 million in the red and I can't get out of the red  because I have to C check these Dc-9's. I can understand not being able to cancel leases at a certain point in the red like maybe 15 million but right now my airline is just going to be slowly forced in to bankruptcy. Or if you don't want to do that then give us the option to stop making payments on the planes and they can be repo'd with a ding to our credit score.

park the DC-9 as they come due for the c-check, un-schedule them totally (inc maint), then your only bill is lease and insurance on them : switch their routes to your F100's : you may have to mess around a bit re; turnarounds, etc, but you will have some room for adjustment in 'edit' mode when you change the type over to F100. (just checked DC-9 and F100 have same t/a and speed is close enough you may not need to adjust much at all) Then, fly yr new birds and make up the cash deficit, without paying for the c-checks as DC-9 are parked : when you make enough send them back as usual, and tweak your new F100 schedules with any new routes/edits that may be needed.

You'll have same staff reqt for the F100 so when you un-schedule a DC9 you'll not need more staff when you schedule those routes to the F100. (damn, just noticed, ones medium, other is large so pilots will be an issue, but rest stay as before)

or you could bk and start again...

[swiftus27]

I am not really liking this new feature where you can't cancel leases or make new routes if you have no money. My issue is that I am stuck with a bunch of 20 year old DC-9's that are coming up for C checks and I have brand new fokker 100's sitting on the ground but I can't cancel the leases on the DC-9's because I am 3 million in the red and I can't get out of the red  because I have to C check these Dc-9's. I can understand not being able to cancel leases at a certain point in the red like maybe 15 million but right now my airline is just going to be slowly forced in to bankruptcy. Or if you don't want to do that then give us the option to stop making payments on the planes and they can be repo'd with a ding to our credit score.

Is this a player or the CEO of American Airlines? 

[brique]

Is this a player or the CEO of American Airlines? 

could be both... you never know...

[coopdogyo]

sorry I am based in Austin not Dallas but yeah basiclly having the same problem as american airlines

[LemonButt]

You never were able to cancel leases without having the cash.  The route changes may be impossible if you need to buy slots for the new times.  I think the biggest problem with the rule change is that it was done mid-game versus from day 1 which is bankrupting those who weren't prepared for a cash only strategy.

[alexgv1]

Can you take out any loans buddy?

[coopdogyo]

nope no loans. really all I can do is not pay for c checks and ground planes and not renew leases

[Kadachiman]

I personally think this is one of the best changes that has been made to the game.

Not being able to continually spend money that you don't actually have or have the capacity to borrow, should slow down those players that have a strategy of 'grow at all costs'
Not being able to buy slots etc when in a negative cash position should see an end to airlines that have 200+ planes (all leased) and a value of -$100's of millions.

[flightsimer]

I personally think this is one of the best changes that has been made to the game.

Not being able to continually spend money that you don't actually have or have the capacity to borrow, should slow down those players that have a strategy of 'grow at all costs'
Not being able to buy slots etc when in a negative cash position should see an end to airlines that have 200+ planes (all leased) and a value of -$100's of millions.

well then you shouldnt be playing here, because no airline in the world would be allowed to start up with only 10 million dollars. So far, California Pacfic Airlines has funded over 50 million, has only 1 plane and is still not flying due to having not recieved their 121 license. Another airline is trying to start up on the east coast and has not even recieved DOT licenses because they do not have enough capital on hand yet.

For a brand new airline, they need to be able to borrow money to open new routes... I just started an airline not knowing this new rule off a 2-3 month break. I now have 4 aircraft i cant deploy on routes because of the slots costing so much and me not having any money. Mind you, im making a profit...

[LemonButt]

Slot costs were also increased ~1 year ago to slow down the explosive growth, which it did, but not by much.  Perhaps the slot costs need to be tweaked since we are cash-only now?

[Hwoarang]

I personally think this is one of the best changes that has been made to the game.

Not being able to continually spend money that you don't actually have or have the capacity to borrow, should slow down those players that have a strategy of 'grow at all costs'
Not being able to buy slots etc when in a negative cash position should see an end to airlines that have 200+ planes (all leased) and a value of -$100's of millions.

This change won't help, it won't only slow down those big players, it will slow down the smaller less experiences players either. In the end, the experienced players will have 200+ aircraft (it will take a bit longer to achieve 200+, but still they will make it). While the less experienced players will stay small and eventually bankrupt...

[brique]

I'm a bit perplexed by this debate : seems rather obvious that if you aint got any money, you cant spend any : if you run your airline in such a way as to be unable to buy slots to fly your airplanes, why should you be given the benefit of an interest-free overdraft to keep doing the same?

There is a loan facility, if you need extra cash, then use that and borrow and pay the interest and charges for doing so. ,

In RL, if you go into the red, you get a penalty-rate interest on that, but I don't know many banks would just shrug and then keep giving you more free money...

[Pilot Oatmeal]

I want to add my opinion on this.

This update has really messed up the balance of the game.  EVERYTHING that has been updated will hurt small airlines, the slot prices have gone up, personnel staff costs are the same, frequency rules changed (I agree with that one)and now you can't buy slots without the money.

Now I agree you shouldn't be able to buy slots without the money, but with slots as expensive as they are it is impossible to run a small airline.  Now the only way to fix this (realistically) is too either change slot costs to the size/weight of the aircraft like they do IRL OR reduce the overall cost of slots. 

Loans are not the answer as it's nearly impossible to take out a loan in the beginning/ or with a low profit margin. 

This sim is going to end up a 737/A320/Long haul a/c sim.  The rest of the types are rendered useless almost with these updates. 

Something does need to be done about this. 

[swiftus27]

Small airlines need too many times the slots as 4x dailies means 28 slots...
7 long haul flights is 7 slots ...
Shocker that an f27 fleet using 4-6x the number of slots would incur massive slot cost issues when slot costs are on a logrithymic scale.
These small planes never were intended to be used to the extremes they are.  Small tps are buffer/fillers to a fleet and never a backbone.

[Pilot Oatmeal]

Small airlines need too many times the slots as 4x dailies means 28 slots...
7 long haul flights is 7 slots ...
Shocker that an f27 fleet using 4-6x the number of slots would incur massive slot cost issues when slot costs are on a logrithymic scale.
These small planes never were intended to be used to the extremes they are.  Small tps are buffer/fillers to a fleet and never a backbone.

Swiftus how can you say this? Some airlines are COMPLETE turboprops, all they use is turboprops.  They most certainly aren't a buffer/filler to a fleet.  We are not just talking about turboprops though, we are also talking about small jets.  And the reason why jets can fly 4x daily is because the slot costs are proportionate to the size and weight of the aircraft.  So turboprops (which are significantly lighter than the big jets) will pay less for a slot than the bigger aircraft.  These aircraft ARE designed to do exactly that.  

[swiftus27]

We need to stop always comparing rare real life scenarios to what goes on in Aws. For example, prior to the changes, 752s were ordered 10 to 20x real life numbers.

Now it's too tough to fly a tp fleet.  Sure. But tell me, are you mad that you can't fly from Glasgow to the Isle of Man profitably?  or more that you can't use it to effectively out frequency another airline from a hd route? 

I'm finding that most of this complaining in all threads was to to old strategies no longer working.  

If the sim is deemed to be out of whack, Sami will fix it.  

[LemonButt]

Small airlines need too many times the slots as 4x dailies means 28 slots...
7 long haul flights is 7 slots ...
Shocker that an f27 fleet using 4-6x the number of slots would incur massive slot cost issues when slot costs are on a logrithymic scale.
These small planes never were intended to be used to the extremes they are.  Small tps are buffer/fillers to a fleet and never a backbone.

I live in Asheville and KAVL has nothing but small aircraft, mainly ERJ and CRJ jets flying out of here.  You may think it is unreasonable for 4-6x daily flying 50 seaters versus just flying in a 757 2x daily, but the fact is we have 9x daily to ATL and 7x daily to CLT using CRJs.  On top of this, all of the aircraft are flying nearly full due to the cutbacks during the downturn reducing the number of flights.  These could easily be serviced by pure turboprops, which are cheaper, but in the real world the more expensive jets are used.  Not only is it nearly impossible to run a turboprop airline in AWS serving these routes, but doing so with regional jets is a impossible for all but the most astute players with lots of time to micromanage. http://flyavl.com/media/documents/flight-schedules-2012/September%202012%20%20Non-stop%20Flight%20Departures.pdf

I asked a series of questions looking for answers from sami in the features forum with no answers as of yet.  Most importantly is the taxation situation since negative cash is impossible.  I may have failed to explain it thoroughly in the feature section, but gave a very concise example for Project Portugal in how profits are taxed at a 7.84% override with small airlines at a disadvantage to larger ones due to negative cash activities being available to the latter: https://www.airwaysim.com/forum/index.php/topic,42333.msg229591.html#msg229591

[swiftus27]

I live in Asheville and KAVL has nothing but small aircraft, mainly ERJ and CRJ jets flying out of here.  You may think it is unreasonable for 4-6x daily flying 50 seaters versus just flying in a 757 2x daily, but the fact is we have 9x daily to ATL and 7x daily to CLT using CRJs.  On top of this, all of the aircraft are flying nearly full due to the cutbacks during the downturn reducing the number of flights.  These could easily be serviced by pure turboprops, which are cheaper, but in the real world the more expensive jets are used.  Not only is it nearly impossible to run a turboprop airline in AWS serving these routes, but doing so with regional jets is a impossible for all but the most astute players with lots of time to micromanage. http://flyavl.com/media/documents/flight-schedules-2012/September%202012%20%20Non-stop%20Flight%20Departures.pdf

I asked a series of questions looking for answers from sami in the features forum with no answers as of yet.  Most importantly is the taxation situation since negative cash is impossible.  I may have failed to explain it thoroughly in the feature section, but gave a very concise example for Project Portugal in how profits are taxed at a 7.84% override with small airlines at a disadvantage to larger ones due to negative cash activities being available to the latter: https://www.airwaysim.com/forum/index.php/topic,42333.msg229591.html#msg229591

The GAAP stuff bugs me too.  A prepaid lease would still be an asset and not an expense.  Those payments aren't realized until that period passed.

But your example using crjs is fine.  Small airport to big one.  I'm finding that many people are griping about many issues and many lead back to the fact that it deals with them not being able to fly from x to y every 15 minutes between ORD and ATL

[Pilot Oatmeal]

We need to stop always comparing rare real life scenarios to what goes on in Aws. For example, prior to the changes, 752s were ordered 10 to 20x real life numbers.

Now it's too tough to fly a tp fleet.  Sure. But tell me, are you mad that you can't fly from Glasgow to the Isle of Man profitably?  or more that you can't use it to effectively out frequency another airline from a hd route? 

I'm finding that most of this complaining in all threads was to to old strategies no longer working. 

If the sim is deemed to be out of whack, Sami will fix it. 

I wouldn't say that this is rare tbh swiftus.  I can list many many airlines that only use turboprops/small jets and a mixture of them both.  I'm not mad, I am making a point that the sim with the way it is current cannot operate a small airline any more (or very well I should add).  IOM to Glasgow is serviced by turboprops, and probably my the best example I can give you as to why turboprops are viable in today's climate FlyBE which operate both Turboprops and small jets.