Outsourcing ground handling

[freedom]

No , so that these Americans working these jobs can get a fair shake , such as health care and living wages , MAYBE even a few tickets to fly on the airplanes that they work each year …


do you think these contract vendors pay well , or provide health care and flight benfits ? Cause i hear they don't

 

[night-ice]

No , so that these Americans working these jobs can get a fair shake , such as health care and living wages , MAYBE even a few tickets to fly on the airplanes that they work each year …


do you think these contract vendors pay well , or provide health care and flight benfits ? Cause i hear they don't

When did the "new" IAM contract take effect?

 

[wings396]

No , so that these Americans working these jobs can get a fair shake , such as health care and living wages , MAYBE even a few tickets to fly on the airplanes that they work each year …


do you think these contract vendors pay well , or provide health care and flight benfits ? Cause i hear they don't

100% Agreed on this. Contract vendors pay crap, and have crap for benefits, if any at all. They bid low to get the contract, and still manage to make a profit on the backs of the poor unfortunate slobs that have to work for them at povertly level wages. High turnover rates coupled with poor trianing, and workers who could care less about their jobs is a bad combination to have ground handling multi-million dollar A/C. If it were not for the mere existance of these scumbag vendors, the Airlines would have no option other than to use their own employees to get the job done. The upstart of these low wage vendors have contributed to the loss of thousands of decent paying jobs accross the country. :angry:

 

[philly rocks]

Freedom is correct that all these jobs should go to Usairways. Get them organized! Get them all to the table to negotiate fair labor practice. Shame on our company!

 

[wings396]

As we all know, many jobs were lost to the Express operators as well. Had they been organized long ago with a decent wage being paid, there wouldn't have been such an advantage to using them over our own people to begin with. The latest effort by the CWA to organize PDT is long overdue, and I applaud them for taking the first step in this direction. Anyone who is employed by PDT should be ready to vote YES in a heartbeat when the time comes. These Express operators, many of which are W/O have been getting away with paying crap wages to their employees for way too long. Let's level the playing field here a bit so it wont be so easy for the company to eliminate decent paying Mainline jobs in favor of outsourcing to the lowest bidder.

 

[sharktooth]

For the same reason we don't use silver or gold as wiring inside our homes even though it has better conductivity than copper, at some point costs become an issue. That being said... "Pay peanuts, get monkeys."

So muses Jester.

Not to be OT and certainly you have a point, but copper is used because of its far superior physical characteristics under electrical load, money being secondary. Perhaps you are too young to remember the fiasco when contractors started using aluminum wiring, cheaper yet, and how well that worked out. :-7

 

[mopar man]

It doesn't matter if you have a union or not... Lets take the IAM for an example...in the ramp contract it OK's ramp agents to do the work of utility and some maint. (pushbacks,etc) if no mechanics are around. So what did the company do..get rid of hundreds of mtc and related and put more work on the ramp agents by whoring them out to do some critical jobs. I'm a ramp agent and don't feel we are qualified to inspect an aircraft after parking it or checking the wings for ice....thats the pilots or mechanics job and both the company and IAM say its OK. Will the union back us if that bird goes down because we said the wings look OK but they weren't????

 

[Jester]

Freedom is correct that all these jobs should go to Usairways. Get them organized! Get them all to the table to negotiate fair labor practice. Shame on our company!

You don't get it, do you? That's how subcontractors work. Better yet is when the subcontractor is a wholly-owned subsidary as with DL's Delta Global Services (DGS) handling its ramp operations in many outstations. They are non-unionized for a reason because should they become unionize and demand higher pay, Delta ends their contract with DGS. Delta can then create a "new" wholly-owned subsidary subcontractor, for example, called "Delta Omnipotent Universal Ground Services" (DOUGS) and the former DGS people can re-apply to DOUGS (provided they didn't appear to be pro-union at DGS).

While certainly there is a value to experienced ramp agents in terms of aircraft damage, missing bags, getting planes out on time, etc., at some point ever-increasing wage demands offset those aforementioned issues. Unfortunately, this is the reality of being a homogenous, fairly unskilled work group for which tens of millions of people can replace the workers with relative ease, especially in a industry of anemic profit margins where the pressure to cut costs are paramount. In a highly competitive market for airline seats or unskilled labor, it is critical not to over play your economic hand in thinking the buyer will pay any price.

 

[freedom]

Well look at it like this jester , lets say us airways contracted out to DGS , most contracts run the course of several years and have performance clauses in them … if we unionized the work force of DGS at the start of a multi year contract , DGS would either A except it because the non performance clause might be too costly or B. fight the union resulting in a strike triggering the loss of any contract .

Furthermore with the ease of technology it would be almost realistic to keep unionzing any new contract service on the property ,. I can just imagine walking up to their workers and saying , hey all you have to do is sign this paper and then call in to vote and you’ll get a 3 dollar rasie . Piece of cake .

Last but not least , even the THREAT of a unionizing drive might be enough to force these contract vendors to raise pay ,, anything that hurts them strengthens us .

 

[john john]

As we all know, many jobs were lost to the Express operators as well. Had they been organized long ago with a decent wage being paid, there wouldn't have been such an advantage to using them over our own people to begin with.

Had express been union that would the doing mainline work at express pay and benefits with the unions blessing just like ALPA and IAM

 

[Jester]

Well look at it like this jester , lets say us airways contracted out to DGS , most contracts run the course of several years and have performance clauses in them … if we unionized the work force of DGS at the start of a multi year contract , DGS would either A except it because the non performance clause might be too costly or B. fight the union resulting in a strike triggering the loss of any contract .

Furthermore with the ease of technology it would be almost realistic to keep unionzing any new contract service on the property ,. I can just imagine walking up to their workers and saying , hey all you have to do is sign this paper and then call in to vote and you’ll get a 3 dollar rasie . Piece of cake .

Last but not least , even the THREAT of a unionizing drive might be enough to force these contract vendors to raise pay ,, anything that hurts them strengthens us .

First, since Delta owns DGS, I doubt they would construct a contract which commits them to much of anything beyond the basics... for all I know, it could be month to month. So the "ease of technology" would be good for about a month or until replacements could be found. How long did it take Alaska Airlines to replace its Seattle ramp agents?

Second, yes, the threat to unionize would be legitimate as it has been with Delta. Just think if America West ramp agents weren't unionized, we could threaten unionization with a vote and be making about 20% more with Delta's non-unionized wages while not paying dues. Go look at the IAM's "Messenger" kitty litter box liner from a few months ago as proof.

So promulgates Jester.