On Wednesday, 2,500 service workers at LAX will vote to determine whether to go on strike.

The workers, who have been negotiating their contract since May, are employed by airline subcontractors to provide passenger services to several major airlines, such as United, American, and Southwest. A Los Angeles Times story reports:

The union members include service workers employed at both the airport terminals and on planes in jobs such as security, wheelchair assistance and airplane cabin cleaning. The union is pushing for higher wages, improved medical coverage and more training, equipment and staff support, said Mike Chavez, a union spokesman.

He said although workers are employed by contractors, the responsibility lies with the airlines that hire the contractors.

“The airlines need to take some leadership,” Chavez said. “They have a role in saying what their contractors should be doing.”

Click HERE to read the report.

Polly Drew with the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel recently gave a definition of “Flightmare” in her post:

Flightmares go well beyond the usual perils of airline travel such as crowded seats, lost luggage and food not fit for a dog. A flightmare usually involves lost money, lost opportunities (such as missing a graduation or a funeral) and lost dignity.

An example is her daughter’s recently trip from Boston to Denver with JetBlue, when her flight was canceled for 2 days and the airlines unwilling to provide hotel or food voucher.

Ms. Drew called Kate Hanni of the Coalition for Airline Passengers’ Bill of Rights for advice. Click HERE to read the article and find out how her daughter was able to get JetBlue to pay for her hotel room, get food vouchers and confirmed on the first flight to Denver the next day.

photo credit: Bangkok dear Edward

Steve Surjaputra at Tripso wrote about the airline subsidies report released by the East Bay Alliance for a Sustainable Economy (EBASE), Los Angeles Alliance for a New Economy, and Working Partnerships USA. Here are some of what he highlighted from the report:

From the first days of flight up until the 1970s, taxpayers, through the federal government, provided more than $155 billion in direct support for the aviation industry. Even after deregulation, federal and local governments have continued to provide infrastructure support, tax exemptions and low-cost financing….

Since 2002, in California alone, the airlines received approximately $487 million in state and local subsidies that included tax exemptions and low-interest bond financing. For example, the airlines are exempt from state sales taxes on jet fuel purchases for some flights. This exemption for international flights will cost the state and local governments more than $800 million from fiscal year 2005 to 2009. Despite this, the airlines still want to expand the exemption for out-of-state domestic flights.

Click HERE to read his post, “After years of airline subsidies, how about a payback for taxpayers?”

As airlines enter code-sharing agreements and buy seats off each other, customers are finding it difficult to get refunds from the right airline. The Times Union’s consumer advocate, Nadja Drost, penned the story of how an Albany, New York, couple tried to get a $150 refund from a 3-leg trip with 3 different airlines in her post, “Airlines Give Customers the Run-Around”.

Click HERE to read their story… and how they finally got the refund (hint: it’s NOT because of the phone calls and emails the couple sent to the airlines).

photo credit: Cubbie_n_Vegas

On July 30, United Airlines filed a lawsuit seeking a preliminary injunction against the Air Line Pilots Association (ALPA) and a group of UA pilots for allegedly abusing sick-time.

Holly Hegeman at PlaneBuzz.com offers some perspectives on the allegations.

[B]ased on conversations we were having with folks close to the situation, and comments from subscribers, it was pretty obvious that a situation was developing at United that resembled, in many aspects, the showdown between pilots and management at Northwest Airlines last summer.

… if you have pilots who refuse to pick up extra flying, along with higher than normal sick time calls, and you’ve got flying schedules maxed out because of summer schedules — all the ingredients are there for an opportunity to force the airline into flight cancellations.

According to various news reports, United officials say talks between the airline and its pilots’ union broke off last week before the airline filed the lawsuit. The Pilot’s contend that United appears intent on driving down standards for pilots. This seems to be par for the course, with United, as we’ve reported previously on How Was Your Flight. Ms. Hegeman posted an email she received from APLA’s Master Executive Council that may give insight into the pilots’ side.

To summarize, United’s managers will force pilots to work extra days with longer hours, they will bully pilots to prove their non-fitness to fly at their own expense, they will attempt to take away pass travel for you and your family, they will attempt to diminish Captain’s authority, they will take away United mainline flying and give it away to Express, and then they will either furlough you or surplus you at the end of the season.

Click HERE to read Ms. Hegeman’s post.

photo credit: Cubbie_n_Vegas

On July 9, the day US Airways began charging $15 per passengers’ bag checked, hundreds of skycaps across the country are scrambling to find jobs in a turbulent economy.

The skycaps, employed by third-party contractors, earned meager wages and had little or no benefits at work. In the past, they were able to supplement their income with tips – enough to make a decent living and afford. A recent new report discusses how, for US Airways skycaps, such as Mike Rossi, 48, and Kenric Burk, 57 at T.F. Green Airport in Warwick, Providence, that income had diminished long before they were laid off on July 9. According to the report by the Warwick Beacon:

Burk said ever since International RAM Associates won the bid for the US Airways station at T.F. Green, life?s been no picnic.

“The state allows companies to come in here and because of Rhode Island labor laws, they don?t have to pay holiday pay or vacation pay – it’s cheap labor,” Rossi said.

Burk said skycaps practically live off tips, similar to how servers in the restaurant industry do.

“We get wages but we just work on our tips, basically,” Burk said, “but we have to claim less and less because we?re working less and less.”

The US Airways skycaps received an hourly wage of about $5 an hour. Many of them have worked at the Warwick airport for almost two decades.

Rossi said he’s going to look for another customer service job, but these days with the job market and the pressure of having two kids, a mortgage and a house to pay for, the future looks bleak.

US Airways’ decision to end curbside baggage service across the country came after skycaps at Boston Logan International Airport successfully sued United Airlines for lost wages since the airline instituted a $2 per bag fee for curbside service.

According to a report by The Philadelphia Inquirer:

US Airways said its decision to stop using skycaps was not related to the lawsuit regarding skycap tips. Rather, the airline said, its union contract with Communications Workers of America specifies that unionized employees must collect funds “in the price range” of the $15 and $25 bag fees.

Boston lawyer Shannon Liss-Riordan said yesterday that she had filed a retaliation claim in federal court, alleging that US Airways was using the union contract “as a convenient excuse” to get rid of skycaps.

Liss-Riordan and Philadelphia lawyer Mikel Jones filed the federal suit in April in Boston on behalf of 3,000 US Airways skycaps nationwide, trying to recover lost wages and tips. Between 35 and 40 work in Philadelphia.

US Airways skycaps in Boston were notified Thursday that their jobs will be eliminated July 31. Skycaps at Los Angeles International Airport received a similar notice, Liss-Riordan said.

In April, a federal jury in Boston ordered American Airlines to pay nine skycaps more than $325,000 for tips lost since the fee was implemented by American in late 2005. The jury found that American violated a Massachusetts law that protects tips received by service workers who are paid below that state’s $8-an-hour minimum wage. Pennsylvania’s minimum wage is $7.15 an hour.

Other lawsuits on behalf of skycaps for United Airlines, JetBlue Airways Corp., and American are pending in federal court in Boston.

US Airways says it will drop the $2-a-bag curb fee when the $15 first-bag charge goes into effect July 9.

photo credit: Cubbie_n_Vegas

In addition to $15 for checked first bag, $25 to book on the phone, $5-$30 for sit in the front, near the window, or the aisle, $2 for sodas or coffee, and the end of free pretzels and curbside check-in, US Airways announced it is removing its in-flight movie systems from domestic aircraft.

Click HERE to find out more.

photo credit: wyclif

Tracing their history back to the tradition of the Pullman porters during the railroad era, skycaps used to be decent-income jobs for African Americans who supplemented their meager wages with tips – enough to buy their own homes and send their children to college.

Today, that reality is becoming more like a dream for skycaps across the country, according to a Los Angeles Times article.

“This used to be a solid job where guys could make a decent living,” said Howard Mcgee, 64, of Los Angeles who has been a skycap at LAX for eight years. “But with rising ticket prices, more baggage fees and increased security, it is getting harder and harder to make the kind of money we used to make.”
…

Skycaps and union officials who represent airport service workers estimate that the earnings of the typical skycap have dropped 35% to 50% during the last several years.

Meanwhile, they say, the hours some skycaps work per week have been cut from 40 to less than 25, forcing many to take second jobs. In addition, US Airways plans to phase out the use of skycaps at LAX and other airports.

In California, local and state elected officials are stepping in to protect the income of the skycaps.

The Los Angeles City Council and the San Francisco Board of Supervisors have directed their attorneys to research measures that would protect the incomes of skycaps and other airport service workers, such as wheelchair attendants. No action has been taken yet.Councilwoman Janice Hahn, who requested one of the studies, said the effort could result in ideas similar to the city’s protections for wages and tips earned by hotel workers.

“The airlines are nickel-and-diming passengers, and the people who try to make a person’s trip convenient and pleasurable are losing out,” Hahn said.

Click HERE to read the full article.

photo by superciliousness

Click HERE to read about her experience.

photo credit: Cubbie_n_Vegas

In an era of nickel-and-diming by the airlines, passengers are seeing all kinds of fees being placed on their flights – 1st baggage, 2nd baggage, leg room, snacks, etc. Every airline has its own fee scales, and it can be confusing – not to mention costly – for passengers.

Fortunately, Rick Seaney, the CEO of Farecompare.com and airline industry expert, has put together a convenient chart of all fees that U.S. airlines charge the passengers. Click HERE to see the chart.

photo credit: Alan Nakkash