Shift trading for aircraft maintenance crews
Updated
In aircraft maintenance, not just anyone can take your shift. Your classification, and what you are licensed and qualified to do, decides who can legally do the work, and the bid decides who is scheduled when. A group chat knows none of that.
Shift Exchange was built around it. Here is how it works for a maintenance station.
Your line comes from the bid
When you sign up you pick your craft, where you work, your shift (Days, Swings or Graves) and the line with your days off. That is how the app knows which days are yours to post and which shifts you could cover.
An administrator at your station approves your account. After that you can change your line yourself, within your classification, up to three times a year. Anything else goes through your administrator.
Only shifts you can legally work
Each station sets which classifications can cover which work. The Board only shows open shifts you are qualified to pick up. A shift you cannot legally work never shows up.
Some departments trade only among themselves. The station switches that on per department, and it works both ways: nobody outside trades in, and nobody inside trades out.
Giving a shift away
Only your rostered days
The Post tab lists the days you are actually scheduled.
Whole shift or part
Give away the whole shift, or just the hours you need covered, with or without lunch.
Or offer a swap
List up to five shifts you would take in return.
Checked before it posts
It will not post a shift that has already started or a day you are not scheduled.
Picking one up
Taking a shift is one tap, and the poster is told straight away. A swap lists the shifts the poster wants in return, and you can take it if you work one of them. If plans change, release it and it goes back on the board. Once a shift is picked up, the two of you get a message thread for it.
Alerts for the areas you would work
Nothing is switched on until you choose. Pick the areas you would pick up from, or everything you are licensed for, and you are told every time one of those shifts is posted. Watching areas is free, as many as you like, and alerts are never slowed down for anyone.
Still your employer’s call
A trade is not a change to your schedule until your employer records it, by whatever process your workplace uses: a form, a scheduler, a supervisor’s sign-off. Until then the shift is still yours. Shift Exchange is where you find the coworker. It does not approve trades or change schedules, and it is not your union or your employer.