US Airways Passenger Service: March Bargaining Update

Your IBT/CWA Association Negotiating Committee met this month in Charlotte from March 12-15.

On Tuesday, March 12th, we met with the company and gave them a proposal for Article 27-Insurance. We proposed to improve our retirement medical insurance options to allow our members to be able to better afford health insurance expenses after they retire. We advised the company that the amount currently paid out for members' retirement sick account balances is substandard and should be increased. We also proposed relief to help with the costs of health-related expenses after our members retire.

The company gave us proposals on Article 18-Sick Leave, Article 25-Grievance Procedure, and Article 24-Shift Definitions and Premuims.

We ended the day with the Committee going over counter proposals for these articles.

On Wednesday, March 13th, we met with the company and gave them counter proposals to Article 10-Temporary Employees, Article 24-Shift Definitions and Premiums, and Article 25-Grievance Procedure. We pointed out to the company that our members who are asked to speak a second language at the airports deserve to get a premium.

The company gave us counter proposals on Article 6-Overtime- Customer Service and Article 7-Overtime-Reservations. The Committee stayed to put together counter proposals.

On Thursday, March 14th, we discussed our counter proposals to give to the company the following day.

On Friday, March 15th, we met with the company and passed counter proposals on Article 6-Overtime-Customer Service and Article 7-Overtime-Reservations. We wanted to stress the fact that we feel the company has abused the Mandatory Overtime in many locations. We feel the company should be required to pay a duty-free hour for violating the one hour notice for mandatory overtime. We ended the session discussing locations for our future negotiations.

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 will be in Tempe, AZ, April 16-18.