Alaska Airlines continues to negotiate a new, competitive flight attendant contract
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You may be aware that some off-duty Alaska flight attendants are planning to participate in demonstrations such as informational picketing. The union representing Alaska Airlines flight attendants – the Association of Flight Attendants (AFA) – also announced a ‘strike authorization vote’ today. This vote does not impact our guests.
We respect their protected right to engage in these activities and do not expect any disruption to our operation or service as a result.
Any employee participating in these activities is not scheduled to work and they are not on strike.
We’ve offered an industry-leading proposal
– In October this year, we provided an updated comprehensive economic offer – the largest we’ve made in our history for our flight attendants’ contract – that would put our flight attendants at or near the top of the industry in most areas, including pay.
– The proposal included an immediate 15% increase to the wage scale, market rate adjustments to keep them in line with new contracts at other airlines, and no changes to duty day.
– Contrary to union narratives, we do pay flight attendants for boarding time through a pay mechanism that was negotiated with the union in previous contract cycles. We remain open to alternative pay structures proposed by the union during negotiations.
We’re actively negotiating
– Since September 2022, together with the Association of Flights Attendants (AFA) – our flight attendant union – we have closed more than 50 tentative agreements – representing dozens of topics where we’ve found common ground.
– We have meetings scheduled with AFA in January and February to continue negotiations and reach agreement on the outstanding topics.
– The only way to close the gap between parties is to discuss and work together. We are ready and willing to do that and are eager to resume negotiations in the new year.
Hawaiian Airlines Acquisition and its impact
– The news of Alaska Airlines acquiring Hawaiian Airlines does not impact our ability or desire to reach an agreement.
– We continue to plan for significant increases to our flight attendant contract.
We have a history of reaching deals
– The vast majority of our frontline employees are represented by a union, and we’ve recently closed five labor deals with other workgroups.
– We remain committed to reaching an agreement on a new competitive contract that fairly compensates flight attendants and continues to provide significant flexibility, but also maintains an emphasis on productivity that is critical to the sustainability of the company’s business model.
– This is ultimately good for flight attendants and the entire Alaska family, as maintaining growth and profitability enables us to hire more people and continue to provide all employees with competitive pay and benefits, invest in new planes and fly our guests to new destinations.
The negotiations process can take time
Here’s a handy graphic that explains how things happen. We’re currently in the “Mediation” step. It’s important to know a strike can only occur after a specific, multi-step process involving the federal government and National Mediation Board.
