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American Airlines Attendants Reject Plan

Reuters, UK - 5 minutes ago

DALLAS (Reuters) - Flight attendants at American Airlines on Tuesday voted against
a concession agreement, paving the way for an imminent bankruptcy filing by ...

In other news, Southwest and Sky Blue triple in size overnight. I guess the union hasn't been reading the papers lately.

Self-inflicted bitterness and wailing in Oak Lawn tonight.

Take note. Non unionized airlines are doing very well financially.

American Airlines Attendants Reject Plan

Tue April 15, 2003 03:16 PM ET
DALLAS (Reuters) - Flight attendants at American Airlines on Tuesday voted against a concession agreement, paving the way for an imminent bankruptcy filing by the world's largest carrier, a local news radio station reported.
The airline has said that if its three major union groups do not ratify deals that will help save the carrier $1.8 billion a year in labor costs, American, a division of AMR Corp. AMR.N , would be forced to file for bankruptcy.

News radio station KRLD reported that the union had narrowly rejected the deal and was in talks with the airline to see if they could quickly poll their members again. The two other major unions at American had approved concession deals earlier in the day.

The Association of Professional Flight Attendants voted against a deal that would cut annual pay and benefits for flight attendants collectively by $340 million.

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Enjoy your biweekly $0.00 paychecks, stewardesses!

Yes, I said STEWARDESSES. Bwa-ha-ha!!

Flight Attendants Could Revote, AMR Says

Tuesday April 15, 2003 11:29am

Dallas, TX - A report in this morning's Dallas Morning News says that flight attendants could have a chance to revote on wage and benefit concessions proposed by the airline.

The report says AMR, American Airlines' parent company, says that if the flight attendants' union is the only one of the three unions to vote down the proposal, the company might give them another chance to ratify the agreement.

American set a deadline of ten o'clock Tuesday morning for the flight attendants to have their votes in. The airline is looking to cut 1.8 billion dollars in costs. That would result in about 17 percent pay cuts.

Tulsa has more than seven thousand union members in its Local 514 Transport Workers Union. Their deadline passed at nine o'clock Tuesday morning.

Tulsa's stake in this is more than one billion dollars. American's payroll in Tulsa is more than 500-million dollars and the residual income impact -- checks to local businesses and individuals who do business with the airline -- is estimated at about 669-million.

American Airlines also pays in more than three million dollars in sales tax each year.

American Airlines says if it doesn't get ratification on the agreement, it will file bankruptcy soon after those votes are made public. The airline says it should have all the votes totaled from all of its unions by 11 o'clock.

If the company declares bankruptcy, it could result in another 8 to 10 thousand job losses.

The flight attendants sound nearly as comical as the WNBA.
(Now there is a truly clueless group.)

See what I mean, here we have a union refusing to allow their dieing company one last gasp of air and hope for survival. Unionizing is never an solution.

Reminds me of a relative who is a pilot for a major recipient of the multi-Billion dollar bailout (at taxpayer expense). Pilots got a 30% raise, Corporate VP's got a 40% raise. Then, as the money was spent, the Pilots were asked to give 20% back, while the VP's wanted to keep their money.

Yep, that's how our tax-dollars were used by the major airlines, to dole out raises to a select few; not to stabilize the industry. I say, let the bankruptcies start rolling in.

IMHO, not too bright. They're cutting off the hand that feeds them.

Trading in the shares was halted about 45 minutes ago.

So stupid, let me see what is better:

Make some concessions, keep my job, and feed my family

OR

Make no concessions, lose my job, collect unemployment, continue to pay union dues.

Duh, I don't know let me ask my local union leader as soon as he returns from golfing.

Talk with just as he was leave for a vacation for four week at some resort. Could'nt go into detail and explain entire reason, vacation you know, but advised me to not give into any concessions.

Assured me he would look into the problem when he returned from his extend vacation, in the mean time hang in there he's with us all the way, oh and by the way don't miss any dues payments or I would be out of the union and then he would not be able to help me at all.

Just before hanging up to rush off for his vacation he wanted to know what my name was again so that he would remember it when he returned. Had no pen to write it down but don't worry he has a good memory, see you later uh, uh, uh oh whatever good bye.

As a pilot for American that voted for these cuts, it stinks that a few hundred FA's will be responsible for our company (probably) filing bankruptcy. One thing many of you aren't aware of is that the FA's got a great new contract just before 9/11. I hadn't heard of one that wasn't pleased with it. Now after 9/11, a terrible economy, a war, increased competition and a company on the verge of bankruptcy what is their response? They haven't given up one thin dime. It's too bad they won't have to bear the brunt of what follows. Such is life.

The trouble with brinksmanship is that sometimes you go over the brink. Sounds like one of those times.

flight attendants vote themselves out of a job...


April 15, 2003 3:41 p.m. EDT

U.S. BUSINESS NEWS

American Attendants Vote
To Reject Wage Concessions

By SCOTT MCCARTNEY
Staff Reporter of THE WALL STREET JOURNAL

The flight attendants union at AMR Corp.'s American Airlines narrowly rejected $340 million of contract concessions by only a few hundred votes, people familiar with the situation said, but the company and union are discussing whether to hold a new vote because of problems in balloting.

The board of the Association of Professional Flight Attendants is meeting to discuss the results. People familiar with the matter say there have been discussions between the union and AMR management on the possibility of allowing a new vote, perhaps in as short a time as 24 hours, because flight attendants weren't allowed to change their vote even as contract terms changed last week.

Unions representing pilots and ground workers approved concessions earlier today. Without ratification by all three unions of the plan to slash $1.8 billion in annual labor costs, American has said it will file for bankruptcy reorganization.

Late Monday, the Association of Professional Flight Attendants asked senior executives at American for an extension on the company's self-imposed noon EDT deadline today because of ``problems with the balloting process, including the delay in the delivery of the contract language to the APFA membership." American rejected that request, but people familiar with the matter said the company left open the possibility that if the vote was close, and only the flight attendants union rejected the deal, another vote would be allowed. Such a move would have to be approved by the union board, which last week had made the decision not to allow members to change their votes.

Leaders of both the Allied Pilots Association and the Transport Workers Union allowed their members to change votes in the Internet and telephone balloting supervised by the American Arbitration Association. That proved critical when American agreed to several contract enhancements late last week, including shortening the duration of concessionary contracts for pilots and flight attendants by four months and adding a wage bonus plan of up to 4.5% annually if AMR regains an investment-grade credit rating.

The flight attendants union, however, didn't allow members to change votes because of a requirement in the union's constitution. Many flight attendants voted early, union officials said earlier, when anger over the contract cuts was running deep and the company's offer to sweeten the pot wasn't yet known.

Flight attendants have been asked to cut their wages by 15.6% and reduce other benefits to save American $340 million a year in labor costs. The company has asked its workers for a total of $1.8 billion in annual savings over the next six years.

American has said it will seek reorganization under the U.S. Bankruptcy Code if the tentative agreements aren't all ratified.

Pilots voted 69% in favor of the contract concessions, which will cut their pay 23% on May 1 and improve productivity. The pay cut will revert to 17% after one year.

Mechanics at American voted 52.6% in favor, and baggage handlers and other ground workers passed their concessions with 54.1% of the vote. Overall, the Transport Workers Union voted 53.3% to 46.7% in favor of the concessions.

Separately, AMR's auditor, Ernst & Young LLP, raised doubt about the company's ability to continue as a going concern in its report on the company's financial statements.

The report, included in the company's annual report filed Tuesday with the Securities and Exchange Commission, said the auditor issued the going concern doubt because of the company's recent history of "significant losses," negative cash flows from operations, uncertainty regarding its ability to reduce operating costs, the potential failure to satisfy the liquidity requirements in certain credit agreements, and its diminishing financial resources.

--Dow Jones Newswires contributed to this report.

Write to Scott McCartney at scott.mccartney@wsj.com¹.

URL for this article:
http://online.wsj.com/article/0,,SB10504146904685400,00.html

So the Stewardesses would rather have nothing than 90%? Sounds like a lot of "Conservatives" on this site come election time.

If true, Tommie Da$$hole will be deeply troubled by this.

His wife, Linda, the big time lobby person in DC, gets a lot of money from AA!