US Aiways Passenger Service: October Bargaining Update

On Tuesday, October 30th, we met with the company and they gave us counter proposals for Article 9-Filling of Vacancies, Article 12-Reductions in Force and Article 32- Call Monitoring. We advised the company that our objective was to make sure the furlough process was handled differently than the current process. The company left and we discussed counter proposals.

Later we met with the company and we passed counter proposals for Article 20- Vacations, Article 17- Leaves of Absence and Article 32- Call Monitoring. We proposed language that allows for a transparent process when a supervisor selects calls to be monitored in reservations. We told the company that there were some discrepancies between the current contract and the company handbook when it came to Leaves of Absence and would like to see a longer paid leave allowed for bereavement. We also said that we felt we should go back to the number of weeks we were given for vacation in our pre-bankruptcy contract. The Association proposed that employees with 1-9 years of service be allowed a week of DATS. We ended the day with the Committee going over counter proposals.

On Wednesday, October 31st, we met with the company and gave them our counter proposal to Article 19- Holidays. The Company delivered its counter proposal for Article 8-Seniority and Article 32-Call Monitoring. We met with the Company in the afternoon and agreed on a Tentative Agreement for Article 8 Seniority. The Company delivered its counter proposals for Article 20- Vacations. The Committee stayed to put together counter proposals to be submitted the following day.

On Thursday, November 1st, we met with the Company and submitted counter proposals to Article 10- Temporary Employees and Article 11- Seasonal Employee Transfer. We ended the session discussing future bargaining dates with the company.

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 December 11th, 12th and 13th.