Iam And Us Agree To Talks!

[diogenes]

Gerry is from GSO, GSO is not a Big City station.

Check out page 122 of the fleet service agreement - GSO is indeed a class I (big)station.

And it is a matter of record that all of the fleet service signatures on page 94 came from class I stations.

Any input solicited from class II operations was pro forma.

Here's todays pop quiz on this subject.

How many of those guys were elected to those jobs?

 

[insp89]

It will go to arbitration, not binding arbitration and the IAM does not have to renegoiate the contract, there is nothing to negotiate on.

The grievance procedure under the RLA and the contract is quite clear.

Thanks, Do you know anything about my United question ??

 

[SpinDoc]

Bob,

If the IAM opens any of our contracts they will be voted off the property in a NY minute and they know it!

And the messenger is full of cow patties, he needs to print the truth in his headline, he insuiates the IAM is opening up the contracts when they are just meeting to show they company where they could do business smarter and save money like the IAM has been telling this company for over a year.

Here is the headline and first paragraph:

Union, US Airways to talk
Fleet service workers, mechanics to pitch their cost-savings ideas
Leaders of US Airways and the International Association of Machinists agreed late Friday to meet next week to discuss union cost-savings ideas.

You make me chuckle with your union rhetoric. Since you don't seem to understand the purpose of your union, let me explain it in terms simple enough for even you to understand. The main purpose of the IAM is to retain or increase membership numbers so they can get paid from your dues. If they refuse to talk with CCY and US Airways closes the doors, they would no longer have dues paying members from US Airways to pay for their summer vacation homes in the Hamptons. Therefore, the IAM will talk with CCY and they will find a way to resolve the issues at hand so that US Airways can move forward and Senior IAM leaders can make their summer vacation schedules.
Vote the IAM off the property because they are going to make a deal with US? That's funnier than an episode of Seinfeld. The rank and file couldn't draw the majority needed to vote the IAM out.
I think it's time for all union members on the property to learn to accept those things they cannot change or leave for another line of work.

 

[cavalier]

I think it's time for all union members on the property to learn to accept those things they cannot change or leave for another line of work.

I think it's time you and Jerry Glass wake up and smell the stink you guys created with your failed threats of do or die and crawl back in your lair and lick you wounds.

 

[700UW]

Spindoc, How do you like your crow?

IAM Members Protest US Airways' Management Tactics

Members of the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers (IAM) today are conducting informational picketing at four US Airways airport terminals to protest the airline's treatment of its employees and passengers. Informational picketing is occurring in Boston, MA; Pittsburgh, PA; Philadelphia, PA; and Charlotte, NC. IAM members are asking US Airways customers to contact the airline's CEO, David Siegel, and urge him to focus on building the airline rather than forcing employees and loyal customers to pay for his mismanagement.

"The IAM has identified ways US Airways could save $80-100 million annually within the framework of our current collective bargaining agreements," said IAM General Vice President Robert Roach, Jr. "There is no logical reason why the airline would rather pick our members' pockets instead of their brains."

US Airways has violated its contract with the IAM by subcontracting maintenance of aircraft, blamed employee unions for management's failure to produce an effective business plan and threatened to sell off some of the carrier's most profitable assets, including its east coast shuttle operation, if employees don't agree to amend their labor contracts.

"US Airways' passengers, employees and shareholders deserve true leadership," said IAM District 141 President Randy Canale. "Management has failed miserably in generating a successful business plan that would unify employees and provide the superior product US Airways' customers expect and deserve."

"The airline is in crisis, and management is attacking employees to divert attention from their inability to run the airline," said IAM District 141-M President Scotty Ford. "A company that doesn't recognize that employees are their most important asset is headed for disaster."

February 26, 2004

US AIRWAYS IAM MEMBERS OF DISTRICT LODGE 141-M

Today Thursday February 26th, I read with interest CEO David Siegel’s comments to Aviation Daily.

Siegel is quoted “making good progress†with the carrier’s labor groups.

Siegel is also quoted that he believes management is entering a “constructive phase†in its labor talks after both sides “vented†frustrations.

I am confused. Siegel would have us believe that talks have been on going with all the labor groups on US Airways. Once again, Dave has it wrong. There have been NO meetings with the IAM concerning further concessions.

Siegel also said, “we have no choice but to rally togetherâ€. I assume he means that the employees should rally around the flag to once again reach into our pockets and pay for his mismanagement of our past generosity.

I guess he is suggesting that there is some spirit of cooperation within the employee groups and we are all eager to make further concessions to help him further mismanage US Airways.

Do I have to remind you how David choose to spend many of the dollars that we contributed to his management team in order for the carrier to exit bankruptcy? I probably don’t but I will any way. He has spent money for attorneys in an attempt to violate our contract by farming out Airbus heavy maintenance. Remember, these are attorneys paid for by our own dollars.

That fight continues to this day.

His management team has spurned every suggestion from the IAM on ways the carrier can improve operations and methods on every day procedures that would save millions of dollars a year. You workers know exactly what I am talking about.

I guess a word about labor relations should also be addressed. You would think that a company that’s very survival hinges on it’s employees moral might work a little harder to earn the goodwill of it’s employees. Instead simple grievances are being denied continually and District 141-M is forced to arbitration, which is costly, frustrating and time consuming. Is this any way to win friends and influence people? I think not.

I don’t know what the other US Airways labor groups are doing but I do know that if David Siegel expects meaningful discussions with District 141-M of the IAM, then he and his team better start showing a change of attitude or he may find himself the awkward teenager at the school dance going home disappointed and lonely.

Sincerely and fraternally,
Scotty Ford
President/Directing General Chairman

February 23, 2003

Response from Randy Canale to Doug McKeen

Doug McKeen
Vice President Labor Relations
US Airways
2345 Crystal Dr.
Arlington, VA. 22227

Dear Mr. McKeen:

This is in response to your e-mail request to meet with District Lodge 141 on Thursday, February 26, 2004 at USA Headquarters, and our telephone discussion of February 20, 2004.

We have declined to respond to the Company’s directive (I use their term because the date and time were arbitrarily established by the Company and not by mutual agreement) as we can see no purpose being served.

We do not share the root cause of the Company’s continued struggles, and it has been made abundantly clear by the Officers of the Company you do not share our views. Our members have made a huge investment in their Airline, both in sweat equity and wage investments, ($240 million per year, for six years by the IAM).

We have seen our efforts/investments squandered by poor management of the Carrier. Starting at the top with CEO Seigel and working its way down to the front line supervisors.

District 141 on a number of occasions has initiated meetings with Corporate Officers, Management and a member of the Board of Directors (not the IAM member of the Board.) We have also held joint meetings with District 141-M of the IAM and Corporate Management. The purpose of those meetings was to provide the Company with millions of dollars in savings just by improvements in the operation of the Airline. These meetings have been to no avail with the Company. No interest was expressed by the Company and the response has been to declare war on the very heart of the “franchiseâ€, its employees.

Our members have seen their once proud Airline run into the ground (operationally and Customer service wise) by a total inept level of management, not seen since People’s Express/Eastern Airlines and we know what happened to those Airlines. This is only underscored by an example experienced by our members in Philadelphia. USA passengers chanting, Southwest! Southwest! Southwest!, as they wait and wait for their bags to arrive, due in no way to Fleet Service, I might add. If staffing levels were appropriate, these types of problems would not exist.

Our members are frustrated by poor management of the airline operation, disillusioned/ dismayed by a management that doesn’t respond to real help and savings, angered by a waste of their money and being targeted as the problem.

You can whine about low-cost competition, but Southwest is the most union organized domestic airline (including the highest wages), but what you refuse to see or acknowledge is a superior management and operation, achieved with their employees.

This management has been given the tools and opportunity, and has failed miserably, and ignores/refuses help from its own employees.

We have no intention of giving this Management anymore than valuable advice. With the current Corporate Officers, our members could pay to work at the carrier, and this Management would find a way to lose.

We could turn this “franchise†around, both in profitability and operationally if there was a sincere effort to commit together.

When there is a management in place to do so, we will be first in line to make it happen.

Sincerely,
S.R. (Randy) Canale
President & Directing General Chairperson
District 141

Union cancels meeting with US Airways on concessions
By: Karen Ferrick-Roman - Times Staff 02/27/2004

Thursday was when representatives from the mechanics union at US Airways were to hear about the airline's new business plan - and get a clue what concessions the airline might seek.

But Thursday's meeting between the International Association of Machinists and Related Aerospace Workers and US Airways didn't happen.

The union canceled, said David Castelveter, company spokesman.

True, said Bill Freiberger, who handles negotiations as general chairman of the IAM's District 141-M.

And, he said, the union has no plans to meet with the company until the airline is as willing to listen as it is to talk.

Freiberger said that two weeks ago, he passed along cost-saving proposals that could save US Airways $500,000 a year when he met with two airline executives in Philadelphia.

"If the IAM has suggestions on ways to save money and cut costs, we're more than willing to hear them," Castelveter said. "Not only to hear them, to discuss them thoroughly. In addition, we want to provide the IAM's leadership with information about the company's business plan, as we have done with the other unions, with the pilots and the flight attendants, but the IAM refused to attend the meeting."

Freiberger said that he took some of the proposals to the airline last May "and they haven't taken any type of response on it."

He contended the reason is because the proposed savings involve doing Airbus work in-house instead of using outside contractors.

The proposals have nothing to do with another battle over whether in-house mechanics or outside contractors in Mobile, Ala., provide heavy maintenance on the Airbus fleet, Freiberger said. That issue remains alive in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 3rd Circuit in Philadelphia. The last ruling went the company's way and reduced the dispute to a grievance procedure; the mechanics are petitioning the entire appeals court to decide the case.

Freiberger said the cost-savings proposals instead deal with repairing flight controls, ceiling panels, emergency power supplies and avionics equipment.

Routine Airbus maintenance is done internally, Castelveter said, and outsourced only if a plane needs repairs while at an airport without a US Airways maintenance base.

But the union has a different outlook.

"They're hell-bent on not utilizing existing mechanics, as well as bringing laid-off ones back to work," Freiberger said.

"Until they're willing to meet with us on what we suggested to them, why would we do anything else?"

Meanwhile, a meeting Thursday between the Association of Flight Attendants and David Bronner, chairman of the board for the US Airways Group, was canceled. A spokeswoman from the Retirement Systems of Alabama, which Bronner also chairs, said the meeting had been postponed and no other date set.

Bronner needed to travel through Charlotte, N.C., which had been socked with 10 inches of snow, Castelveter said.

After meeting with Bronner last week, Air Line Pilots Association representatives decided to reopen negotiations with US Airways.

An arbitrator decided Tuesday that six US Airways pilots were improperly laid off.

Individual pilots have not yet been identified, said Jack Stephan, spokesman for US Airways' pilots union.

The pilots were laid off between February and June 2003, according to an update posted on the union Web site.

The union was aware that positions would be eliminated, but Stephan said, "The company was supposed to get to that point through attrition."

The airline will work with the union to decide pay and other terms for the pilots to be recalled, said David Castelveter, US Airways spokesman.

Karen Ferrick-Roman can be reached online at [email protected].


I believe that refutes what you have posted.

 

[insp89]

As I read thru this topic, I didn't recall anyone mention that the Pennsylvania judges refused to hear the IAM's case.. It is my understanding, (Please correct me if I'm wrong) that the IAM has only 2 options left..... Accept Binding Arbitration or Re-negotiate the contract........Another question came up today that I'm interested in seeing answered..., Did the IAM recommend a " YES " vote at United that included the faming out of 100% of UAL's Heavy Maint. ???? I would appreciate an informed answer. Thanks........

Anybody informed about my UAL/IAM "YES" recommendation???

 

[wings396]

I know very well where Gerry is from. At the time of the contract talks, GSO was a bigger station than it is today. That is why I said that he may cut his own throat, as GSO may join the ranks of Mainline Express or MDA in the near future. Only the larger stations and hubs had imput from the AGC's that came from those cities.
You don't think that they would have taken a $13 an hour wage to their boys do you???? They sold the small stations out, but they may screw themselves in the near future.

 

[700UW]

Wings, let me ask you this:

Did Gerry, Randy, Bill, Tom, Pat and whoever else involved ratify the contract or was it the rank and file Fleet Service members?

 

[SpinDoc]

I think it's time for all union members on the property to learn to accept those things they cannot change or leave for another line of work.

I think it's time you and Jerry Glass wake up and smell the stink you guys created with your failed threats of do or die and crawl back in your lair and lick you wounds.

Cav:

I admit my post was out of bounds, however, I only wanted to point out that maybe the IAM leadership has a vested interest in keeping US Airways alive and not so much in following the rank and file sentiment. I would bet that a majority of the IAM rank and file would gladly authorize work rule changes, temporary wage reductions, and some outsourcing in exchange for job security guarantees and performance based pay. Heck, I think CCY should offer buyouts to the most senior IAM members to lower the overall wages of those that remain. Like it or not, Southwest employees are for the most part much younger than US and their pay and benefits cost less as a result. Plus, they receive profit sharing based on the performance of the company. That is one of the reasons they have been successful, because the employees do what they can to save costs so that they can receive bonuses at the end of the year. I believe Jerry and Dave have plans on the table to offer performance based incentives such as Southwest does, and the IAM, AFA, and CWA rank and file don't even want to listen to the proposals. That's crazy.

 

[insp89]

Anybody informed about my UAL/IAM "YES" recommendation???

The silence is deafening.

 

[PITbull]

LOL.....

Leave??? We are the company you sick....potatoe. If it was about dues dollars WE WOULDN'T HAVE RATIFIED THE "NO FURLOUGH" CLAUSE TO BE GONE!!!!
We as employees gave this company all we have for it to survive, so the scums leeches like you could keep their job. The nonunion workers have been living high off the hog, because unions have set the bar wage SO YOU COULD LIVE COMFORTABLY ABOVE CONTRACTED EMPLOYEES.

 

[PITbull]

Spin Doc,

Stop with the "spin".... Jerry and company have NOT offered any incentives what so ever with AFA. They haven't even given specifics on a "plan" let alone what the particiaption is.. they need to present the specifics to the membership NOT the leadership.
Stop with the deception already..

 

[to much time to quit]

The silence is deafening.

OK, 700 is very ashamed about the iams performance, or lack of performance at UAL. And the 100% truth is they did recomend a YES VOTE at ual which also gave away ALL of HEAVY MAINTENANCE. He will come back and say but the membership voted it in, buts thats a poor excuse. That is why they are out the door for the mechanics at UAL. Like I posted in the past the bylaws changed at 141m in jan 2003, after our vote, back to the union reccomending a yes or no vote. This info I'm posting is 100% accurate and I would be glad to share it with you in the clt hangar.You pick the shift and place.

 

[SpinDoc]

LOL.....

Leave??? We are the company you sick....potatoe. If it was about dues dollars WE WOULDN'T HAVE RATIFIED THE "NO FURLOUGH" CLAUSE TO BE GONE!!!!
We as employees gave this company all we have for it to survive, so the scums leeches like you could keep their job. The nonunion workers have been living high off the hog, because unions have set the bar wage SO YOU COULD LIVE COMFORTABLY ABOVE CONTRACTED EMPLOYEES.

PITBull:

During the past 15 years, I have been a member of the IBEW, CWA, and AFTRA. I can tell you that I would much rather have had the opportunity to negotiate my own wages when I started working at the places where I was a union member, rather than letting the union decide for me. I worked in the radio and television industries in Pittsburgh under these unions and I also worked in non-union television positions where I was able to negotiate my own wage walking in the door. I found that my wages were higher in the non-union shops and I was not subjected to any unfair practices by management. I took responsibility for my own actions and was a productive worker and I saw my wages rise accordingly. I did not need a union representative negotiating for me to ensure my wages were increased based on my seniority. The airline business may have needed unions in the formative years, but they are no longer necessary. I'm tired of the union entitlement mentality. Nobody in this universe is entitled to be employed, receive salary increases without maintaining acceptable performance, or have long term job security, however, union members receive pre-determined increases based on seniority regardless of their performance. No wonder US Airways and the U.S. steel industry have had so many problems. When a person accepts employment in a non-union environment, they are provided with a job description and a list of expectations from management. They either choose to meet the expectations of management, or they find something else to do voluntarily, or involuntarily. It's a personal responsibility issue, something unions do not incorporate into their contracts. Non-union employees control their own destiny and union employees are at the behest of their union negotiated situation. Given the choice, which one would you rather have? Never mind, I think I know.

 

[BoeingBoy]

SpinDoc,

I think I'm beginning to see where you're coming from. Those past companies had what, 50 - 100 employees? The boss knew everyone and everyone knew the boss. Would it be safe to presume that you were able to negotiate your own pay and benefits here also? If so, that puts you among the handful of employees that are able to do that.

Most of the 28,000 employees will rarely (if ever) see Siegel. They were told what the job they sought paid when they applied - no negotiations allowed, just take it or leave it. Good employee or mediocre, Siegel will never know. It's kinda hard to be singled out for superior performance when the boss doesn't know who you are.

Maybe you haven't been here long enough to know that some employee groups elected to vote in a union because they got tired of being told by management that their pay or benefits were being cut. They weren't asked, weren't evaluated, weren't negotiated with. Accept it or there's the door - that was their choice.

A union is like the government. There are times when it's good and there are times when it's a pain in the pocketbook. But overall, for most of us regular working stiffs the good outweighs the bad.

Jim