American Airlines Crew Reject Union Contract

[Omaha Steve]

Source: AP-ABC News

By JOSH BOAK

Flight attendants at American Airlines rejected a five-year contract Sunday, forcing the world's largest carrier and its union for cabin-crew workers into binding arbitration.

Just 16 votes blocked the contract — with 8,180 voting for and 8,196 voting against, the Association of Professional Flight Attendants said in a statement.

The rejection of the contract affects roughly 24,000 workers and complicates the integration of American Airlines and US Airways. The two merged last year to form the world's biggest airline operator. The proposed contract included guaranteed raises but ended a profit-sharing plan.

Last month, American Airlines Group Inc., based in Fort Worth, Texas, reported an all-time best $942 million profit in the June-through-September quarter, nearly double the amount that American and US Airways earned separately last year. CEO Doug Parker predicted more records for the fourth-quarter.

FULL story at link.



Read more: http://abcnews.go.com/US/wireStory/american-airlines-crew-reject-union-contract-26792871

[valerief]

1. electronic votes?

[SoapBox]

2. Hehe...I just couldn't resist a little snicker.

[SoapBox]

3. Well isn't this interesting.

All I can ever think of is Doug Parker at the helm...and how the America West and USAir Flight Attendants never got a contract (for how many years? 5 at least?) until Dougie was scrambling to get stuff together, for the acquisition of American Airlines.

If American Flight Attendants thought their former management was bad, just wait for Parker to really get moving.

[spartan61]

4. My daughter was one of the "No" votes.

This article makes it sound like the flight attendants are just being greedy and I can tell you that isn't true. In 2003, they took a 33% cut in salary and lost one third of their earned vacation time. This TA is still less than what they were earning in 2003 before they made the concessions to save the airline from bankruptcy. Oh, and don't forget that when they made the concessions, management made sure to give themselves millions of dollars in bonuses that year and every year since. Many of the good things in this TA won't even take affect for 5 years and other things are "to be determined" and the FAs have no idea what or when. There is more to this than the just no profit sharing. Even with the so called guaranteed raises, since their health insurance is being raised to about the same rate as the raises, it will be a wash.

I'm sure many of you don't realize that a FA only gets paid once the plane is pushed back from the gate so if the plane has a mechanical or if the FA has a several hour sit time in the airport waiting for their next leg of their work day, they aren't earning anything. They can have a 14 hour work day but only be paid for maybe 6 or 7 hours, depending on the trip. They aren't complaining about that because they knew it when they accepted the job. I just added it for information about the "glamorous" job...not.

[Paulie]

5. Same with the pilots

Lots of unpaid prep time. The whole industry is designed to put hurt the workers.

[Ash_F]

7. Thank you so much for the inside look.

One of the reasons I keep coming back to DU.

[Major Hogwash]

6. And many here say their vote doesn't count!! Look at how close this vote was!!

I don't know if it was a good contract or not, but obviously a slight majority did not!!
Good for them for sticking to their principles!!!