Nice FA Contract for SWA

[lowecur]

Lets see, that's $182M in annual FA costs times 31% increase. Back pay owed would be around $112M for 2 years. That's $56M per year added to the payroll going forward. Can't wait to see how the airline does in the 4th Q. Add that to incentives including productivity pay, red-eye pay, training pay for new hires and an increase in per-diem pay to match pilots. The attendants will also get holiday pay and retiree health insurance benefits at age 55 for the first time. The deal also includes limits on the time that attendants will work on the ground between flights.

If all this is true, you guys better hurry up and order the E-series, cause it sounds like ol Herb & Colleen gave away the ship.

July 1, 2004

UNION TOUTS TENTATIVE CONTRACT WITH SOUTHWEST AIRLINES


DALLAS - A tentative labor agreement would give flight attendants at Southwest Airlines an average 31 percent pay raise and make them the industry leaders in pay and work rules, according to the union that negotiated the deal.
The Transport Workers Union local 556 said Thursday that the agreement would increase pay scales and shorten the time it takes a Southwest flight attendant to reach top pay from 17 years to 14 years.

The six-year agreement also includes stock options - a first for the flight attendants but recently given to other union workers at Southwest. The contract would be retroactive to June 1, 2002, if it is ratified by Southwest's 7,400 flight attendants.

Voting by phone and computer will occur from July 16 to July 30 with results expected on the final day of voting, according to the union.

Thom McDaniel, president of Local 556, said the agreement wouldn't jeopardize Southwest's ability to compete against other airlines that have higher costs.

The Transport Workers Union and the Dallas-based airline announced the tentative agreement last week but did not disclose its terms until Thursday. The highlights of the deal were posted on the union's Web site.

The deal appeared to end a two-year stalemate at the negotiating table. A federal mediator was brought in to help bring the settle the dispute. Company officials said they hoped the union would ratify the deal.

The agreement would lift pay scales from 22 percent to 126 percent, with the average flight attendant seeing a 31 percent increase over the term of the deal, which runs through May 2008.

Union officials said recently that starting pay for Southwest flight attendants is about $14,000 and median pay is $24,600, which they said lagged counterparts at other carriers.

Flight attendants would also get incentives including productivity pay, red-eye pay, training pay for new hires and an increase in per-diem pay to match pilots.

The attendants will also get holiday pay and retiree health insurance benefits at age 55 for the first time. The deal also includes limits on the time that attendants will work on the ground between flights.

Analysts have raised concern about rising labor costs at Southwest, where 85 percent of the work force is unionized. The airline's cost for wages and salaries jumped 14 percent in the first three months of this year compared to a year earlier. In May, Southwest offered early-retirement incentives to nearly all its 34,000 employees in a bid to cut costs.

Shares of Southwest fell 28 cents or 1.7 percent, to $16.49, in afternoon

 

[TonyC]

Ooops - - I misread the Thread Title - - I thought it meant SWA was going to have to contract for Nice FA's from now on.


Being totally ignorant of the issues the SWA FA's are negotiating, and being suspicious of anything I read in the media, I'll have to say I'm guardedly optimistic.


If this is a good thing for SWA FA's, good for y'all!

 

[Falcon Jet 1]

Lowercur

Are you that freakin ignorant that Herb gave away the ship. Dumass

 

[lowecur]

Lowercur

Are you that freakin ignorant that Herb gave away the ship. Dumass

Tweety Bird 1, why don't you explain to us all how LUV is going to afford this? The futures play will dry up in another year or so, and after that they have to deal with the pilot's contract (who expect to be paid more than they are making now).

Now why don't you show me how brilliant you are, and lay out the future so that I can finally sleep at night.

 

[BoilerUP]

Because we all know the Embraer 170/190 taco jet is the cure to ALL the world's airline financial problems

If you work to increase revenue, you don't have to worry about decreasing costs, which seems to be the hot ticket these days. A $10/ticket increase in fares across the whole system would have a negligable impact on Joe Blow's travel decisions, but would do a world of good for the airlines.

Herb isn't going to let anything happen to SWA, although high labor costs are what you get when LCC airlines get senior employees. God forbid FAs make a livable wage.

Are you listening, Airtran, Frontier & Jetblue???

 

[lowecur]

Because we all know the Embraer 170/190 taco jet is the cure to ALL the world's airline financial problems


Herb isn't going to let anything happen to SWA, although high labor costs are what you get when LCC airlines get senior employees. God forbid FAs make a livable wage.

Are you listening, Airtran, Frontier & Jetblue???

It's jungle jet, as tacos are Mexican.

The problem with these kinds of contracts are that you get a "favored child" type reaction from the pilots. They will want to shown in their next contract that they are truly the stick that stirs the drink. It's almost like one upmanship. These things are not good for the airline as a whole. This contract was $115M more than LUV was offering in their last "best offer" at the beginning of the year.

 

[StopNTSing]

The problem with these kinds of contracts are that you get a "favored child" type reaction from the pilots. They will want to shown in their next contract that they are truly the stick that stirs the drink. It's almost like one upmanship. These things are not good for the airline as a whole.

Dude, for a guy who has only ever been on the outside looking in, you sure seem to think you've got your thumb solidly on the pulse of this pilot group. In fact, most guys I fly with are very much aware that at the rate the industry is going, we may just find by the next Sect 6 that we are already the highest-paid 737 crews in the biz (we're already the most productive). Will we expect a new contract with a net increase in pilot costs to the company? Yes, though I can only dream of it being anywhere near the magnitude you seem to think we are capable of achieving. If you were truely a scholar of SWAPA contract negotiations, you would see we have a long history of taking the company's first offer. Look for some improvements in our retirement, schedules (to make us even MORE productive), and other QOL bennies...and not much else.

Oh, and look for the order...for more 737s.

 

[mach zero]

From BoilerUp
"Because we all know the Embraer 170/190 taco jet is the cure to ALL the world's airline financial problems "

I sincerely hope for Embraer's sake that they have completly redesigned the 170/190 series and that they carry nothing over from the 145 line. The EMB-135,140, and 145 were hands down the worst airplanes I have ever flown. Problems ranged from high noise levels (greater than turboprops) to overly sensitive warning systems that grounded them on numerous occasions when nothing was in fact wrong.

Instead of "Taco Jets" or "Jungle Jets", we called them "Disposable Jets" because they seemed like they were not built to last. Plus, no matter how cheap they were per hour to operate, they ended up costing us dearly in hotel rooms and tickets on other airlines for our pax when they broke down.

 

[lowecur]

From BoilerUp
"Because we all know the Embraer 170/190 taco jet is the cure to ALL the world's airline financial problems "

I sincerely hope for Embraer's sake that they have completly redesigned the 170/190 series and that they carry nothing over from the 145 line. The EMB-135,140, and 145 were hands down the worst airplanes I have ever flown. Problems ranged from high noise levels (greater than turboprops) to overly sensitive warning systems that grounded them on numerous occasions when nothing was in fact wrong.

Instead of "Taco Jets" or "Jungle Jets", we called them "Disposable Jets" because they seemed like they were not built to last. Plus, no matter how cheap they were per hour to operate, they ended up costing us dearly in hotel rooms and tickets on other airlines for our pax when they broke down.

Sincerely..........Zero?

Why is it you never have anything nice to say about Embraer? What have they ever done to you to deserve such disrespect?

I see you have moved on to WN. I suppose there were so many things going right at ATA, that you had to go somewhere else with more of an edge to it. Hopefully you can show the folks at WN how to turn things around.

 

[lowecur]

Dude, for a guy who has only ever been on the outside looking in, you sure seem to think you've got your thumb solidly on the pulse of this pilot group. In fact, most guys I fly with are very much aware that at the rate the industry is going, we may just find by the next Sect 6 that we are already the highest-paid 737 crews in the biz (we're already the most productive). Will we expect a new contract with a net increase in pilot costs to the company? Yes, though I can only dream of it being anywhere near the magnitude you seem to think we are capable of achieving. If you were truely a scholar of SWAPA contract negotiations, you would see we have a long history of taking the company's first offer. Look for some improvements in our retirement, schedules (to make us even MORE productive), and other QOL bennies...and not much else.

Oh, and look for the order...for more 737s.

Very noble reply. I'd luv to see the benevolent look on some of your cohorts right now. Time will tell, and for the sake of WN, I hope you're right.

 

[wms]

Nice FA Contract

I think being nice should in every FA contract.

 

[apdsm]

Tweety Bird 1, why don't you explain to us all how LUV is going to afford this? The futures play will dry up in another year or so, and after that they have to deal with the pilot's contract (who expect to be paid more than they are making now).

Now why don't you show me how brilliant you are, and lay out the future so that I can finally sleep at night.

Seems you have it all figured out. Maybe Colleen and Herb should have consulted with you first and maybe they would have taken your advise and not given away the ship. I guess you're right in your thinking tho'. They don't have much experience in running a successful airline and probably don't even know they just gave away it all away. Maybe you should apply for a management position so LUV can take advantage of your self-proclaimed expertise in the airline financial arena.

 

[mach zero]

From lowecur:
"Why is it you never have anything nice to say about Embraer? What have they ever done to you to deserve such disrespect?"


I'll tell you what Embraer did. They cost me money because we were not fully paid for flights that cancelled due to maintenance. They cost me days off with my family because I had to pick up overtime to make up for the lost wages. They risked my own and my passengers lives when we experienced a full failure of the entire (main and standby) pitch trim system or when we lost our horizontal stabilizer de-icing while in icing conditions. There was a reason many of our F/A's bid lines that had no EMB flying in them. The problems have definitely gotten better with each revision of the airplanes computers however, when a fleet is new you should be experiencing lower than average maintenance issues not vice versa. Embraer is revolutionizing the airline business and I wish them continued success. I just hope the 170/190 fleet is not plagued with the same problems I dealt with on the 145's.

 

[lowecur]

Seems you have it all figured out. Maybe Colleen and Herb should have consulted with you first and maybe they would have taken your advise and not given away the ship. I guess you're right in your thinking tho'. They don't have much experience in running a successful airline and probably don't even know they just gave away it all away. Maybe you should apply for a management position so LUV can take advantage of your self-proclaimed expertise in the airline financial arena.

They don't need to consult with anyone. They have done a masterful job of running an airline. A contrarian point of view is always interesting whether you agree or not, as it promotes discussion. Discussion promotes free thinking, which in turn can foster tolerance or intolerance.

The decisions being made today by WN managment will show company's like Jetblue, AirTran, and other LCC's what they should expect in years to come as they mature. It will be interesting to see if SWAPA really shows an understanding of what WN needs to compete in todays marketplace when their next contract comes up. From what little this article teaches about the F/A's contract, on it's face it seems to be more than was needed. I also get the feeling the contract is back-loaded so as the last two or three years could get really expensive for WN. More will be learned in the next few weeks.

 

[frjmx328]

From lowecur:
"Why is it you never have anything nice to say about Embraer? What have they ever done to you to deserve such disrespect?"


I'll tell you what Embraer did. They cost me money because we were not fully paid for flights that cancelled due to maintenance. They cost me days off with my family because I had to pick up overtime to make up for the lost wages. They risked my own and my passengers lives when we experienced a full failure of the entire (main and standby) pitch trim system or when we lost our horizontal stabilizer de-icing while in icing conditions. There was a reason many of our F/A's bid lines that had no EMB flying in them. The problems have definitely gotten better with each revision of the airplanes computers however, when a fleet is new you should be experiencing lower than average maintenance issues not vice versa. Embraer is revolutionizing the airline business and I wish them continued success. I just hope the 170/190 fleet is not plagued with the same problems I dealt with on the 145's.

that is when you have a fleet of "proven" new aircraft. From what I hear, Mid Atlantic is having a helluva time with their new 170's. On a few nights I stuck around BOS waiting to get a picture of the 170 arriving from PIT @ 1900, it didn't show. Why? She broke down. See with any brand new aircraft, there are lots and lots of bugs to work out. Especially when your talking a Brand spanking new type. I can only imagine the avionics problems those guys are having. Give it a year or two and you'll see revisions for the 170/190 software. I have heard great things about the cabin comfort though.....