US Airways Passenger Services: Bargaining Report for May 2012

On Tuesday, May 1st, we met with the Company and they gave us a proposal for Article 5-Hours of Service and Article 31-Part-time Employees. The Committee discussed counter proposals for the Articles. There were many proposed changes in Article 5, for example, the Company proposed that part-time shifts should be able to have more varied shift lengths, both shorter and longer than what is currently allowed. The Union did not agree with this. We also proposed to have paid breaks vs an unpaid lunch included in part-time shifts and to go back to the 1999 language for our shift 3 full timers, which included a paid lunch.

The Company came back in the afternoon and gave us a proposal for Article 10-Temporary Employees, Article 1-Purpose of Agreement and Article 8-Seniority. The seniority Article is very close to a tentative agreement, the Union has proposed, among other items, to allow you to accrue pay seniority while on a longer unpaid leave. We ended the day with the Committee giving the company a proposal for Article 26-System Board of Arbitration. We proposed that Arbitrations are held on the East Coast for the CWA and on the West for the IBT to save money and time. We believe we are very close to a tentative agreement on this article as well.

On Wednesday, May 2nd, we met with the company and gave them our counter proposal to Article 5. The Company delivered its counter proposal for Article 26. We met with the Company in the afternoon and gave them our counter proposal for Article 8. The Company delivered its counter proposals for Article 26 and Article 9. The Committee stayed to put together counter proposals to be submitted the following day.

On Thursday, May 3rd, we met with the Company and submitted counter proposals to Article 26 and 1. The Company came back and gave us a counter proposal for Article 8. We ended the session discussing our counter proposals.

Keep in mind we do not give specifics right now on each article because they can change in each session of bargaining and until we have a final tentative agreement to vote on, the proposed language can change often and we do not want to cause any confusion.

The next scheduled bargaining session is in Tempe, Arizona on June 12, 13 and 14.