British Airways

[BABetrayal13]

On 15th June, I will be made redundant from the job I love after 15 years of loyal service. Redundancy notices are to be issued to 43,000 of my colleagues: the entire workforce. Yep, you heard right!

31,000 "lucky" former employees will then be offered re-employement on a far inferior contract that the company has wanted to enforce since 2010. For me, this would represent a 60% pay cut. Again, you heard right!

This is to be accompanied by an increase in productivity of 25%, not to mention far inferior T&Cs and, basically, a zero-hours contract.

All of this is with a backdrop of our CEO's bonus of £3.2 million in March this year; he’s been paid £33 million over the last 9 years. For the financial year '19/'20, the company I work for made a near record-breaking operating profit of £1.9 billion. I received no bonus; not a penny. Yep, you heard right!

The company I work for has the biggest cash reserves of any airline on this planet: £9 billion. During this "fight for survival", the company I work for is in the process of spending £1billion buying another airline. You heard right!

Nobody is saying we shouldn't all do our bit and take a shared responsibility approach as we ride this storm. However....! The company I currently work for absolutely refuses to negotiate. You heard right! 😡😠🤬🤬
#BAbetrayal

<strong>*Post edited by MNHQ</strong>*

Isn't British Airways a Spanish owned company now

No.......

It is however one of the IAG OpCos.

Should have added:

www.investopedia.com/terms/o/opco.asp

God some of the comments on here are 🙄 My friend is BA crew and has been for 20 years. Why should they accept 10k pay cuts? Is everyone on here willing to accept that themselves?

They work long unsociable hours, regularly miss birthdays, xmas etc. What is it with this race to the bottom shite?

BA have a 9 million fighting find. Willie Walsh has had millions in bonuses. Why should they accept zero hours contracts? Why shouldn’t they be paid well- they are the frontline of feeling safe on a flight too.

It always feels like people slag off cabin crew because of their lifestyle- that somehow they don’t deserve their pay or decent conditions.

BA are disgusting and actually, it sounds like the government are going to intervene. Huw Merriman, chair of the transport committee has said something along those lines this morning.

Solidarity OP

notimagain - Not sure why you think anyone would mistake you for a BA manager ?

BA won't be able to access a taxpayer funded bailout unless they've shown they have done all they can to reduce expenses.

Unfortunately having a large part of your workforce on contracts which pay way over industry normal, is going to come under scrutiny.

The BA staff have done a great job of keeping their pay high in the past, and well done to them.

But realistically covid has brought an end to that now.

Absolutely - Littleblackdress. As you say Huw Merriman and the Transport Committee are on to this. Thank goodness they are astute enough to see what's going on. As Huw mentioned - its an absolute abuse of power.

Slashing salaries and terms and conditions just because they can. To do it under the guise of Covid 19 as well is an absolute disgrace.

Solidarity OP

@TheLastSaola says who? Who sets airline pay? Why would they come under scrutiny? From who exactly? Stop making stuff up- you also sound like a BA manager trying to talk down staff terms and conditions and make out the crew are wrong and are somehow undeserving of their decent pay and conditions

The scrutiny comes when BA asks the government for hundreds of millions of pounds of money as a bailout.

The scrutiny comes when the government loans hundred of millions to BA, and the press respond with articles about how much extra Ba pilots and cabin crew get than people doing the same job in other airlines.

The scrutiny is from bin men in Barrow and pensioners in Bridlington who elected this government and will not want what they see as their money spent profligately.

Sorry, but as long as it's a private dispute I couldn't care less. When it involves taxpayer money then it does matter to me, and to a lot of people.

@TheLastSaola well, maybe the other airlines paying poverty pay should be the ones who are scrutinised. Why single out BA staff die scrutiny? Why not think about how many billions have been wasted on Brexit?

Your argument just sounds like an excuse to have a massive dig at BA crew pay to be honest

I'm fine with BA going bust by the way.

It'll open up the market for flights massively and increase price competition - leaving me better off.

I'd be happy for the government to refuse to give money.

BA might just be planning on raising the money privately. But any lenders will want to make wage reductions a condition of lending. So it leaves BA in the same position

They want to get rid of those on those old golden contracts. Callous, but isn't that's h they are these days? They want to save money where possible and those decades-old contracts are crazy expensive for them. This is the perfect excuse to try and get rid of these financial inconveniences. The pilots too have taken willing stupendous pay cuts in order to stay employed by BA, but when working for just ONE year for a Chinese airline gets you more, tax free, than three YEARS for ba, they're going to find many will start to jump ship if they keep treating their staff like this. You pay shit pay, don't expect your staff to give a shit when working.

@TheLastSaola glad you have so much concern for families losing their livliehoods and jobs as long as you are ok.

I hope you don’t lose your job or get asked to take a 10k pay cut 🙄

Give over.

Millions of people are losing their jobs or taking big pay cuts.

It's shit for everyone of those people. I don't wish it on anybody.

But BA staff aren't a special case.

Interesting that the default now seems to be anybody who dares question the status quo or even raises an eyebrow at certain contracts is accused of either being a BA manager or sounding like a BA manager...

We have all noticed, haven't we (?), that the world has changed for the worse. That's not the CEOs' spin or Government spin, objectively the aviation industry is in deep doo do. IAG have got supposedly a lot of cash in the bank but it's not unlimited...(I do however also agree going out and looking to by other airlines isn't a good look..)

However I do honestly feel it's entirely unreasonable for the Unions to seemingly approach this with the attitude that their section of the work force should simply be left alone in glorious isolation, whilst pretty much every other employee group in the company is looking at S188, redeployment, re-applying for jobs.

The BA staff have done a great job of keeping their pay high in the past, and well done to them

What?? You talk such crap.

Nice. I read this on Facebook the other day too.

Ahh a quick google shows it to be posted lots of places. Did you write that OP? Are you spamming everywhere with your own work or someone else's?

@nasalspray it’s part of the trade unions comms to get the message out there so that people understand what’s going on. Nothing wrong with that at all.

@notimagain yes the world has changed. But you can still treat your staff well and fairly. BA are not doing that. Why should Willie Walsh get 33 million on bonuses while his staff are on minimum wage?

notimagian - nobody accused you of being a BA manager. You were the one who said 'I'm not a BA manager' up thread.

It was Realistica11y who sounded like the BA manager. I don't think they have been back to the thread to confirm either way!

it’s part of the trade unions comms to get the message out there so that people understand what’s going on. Nothing wrong with that at all.

I understand. Not wrong no, but it's important to be clear as to whether it's you or a copy and paste.

@Littleblackdress04

nobody accused you of being a BA manager.

Thankfully..think I'd be rather upset if they did

it’s part of the trade unions comms to get the message out there so that people understand what’s going on. Nothing wrong with that at all.

Agreed..and I certainly get that, where it went wrong (IMHO) is that the text in the OP dresses it up as a highly emotive plea from an individual highlighting what was happening to them.

Problem is as anybody with friends who are crew at BA very very quickly found out it was effectively a mass mail shot....

Clearly there are many that still don’t get it, and never will ...

There are millions of people, across all professions, industries and pay grades who every single working day of their lives begin their day well aware that they have demonstrate not only to themselves, but also to their employer that they are the best person for that job, and that nobody else could perform better, or do even half as good a job for a lower salary.

That’s reality.

I’ll use the analogy of a football team, even though I don’t follow football ...Every player on the pitch is scrutinised to the n’th degree. Every time they touch the ball, every time they miss it, and every time they score or miss a goal.

A couple of bad matches and a players future within the team becomes very questionable. It may come as a shock to some, but that’s the reality facing the majority of the countries workforce on a daily basis, again across all industries, professions and pay grades.

If your salary has been paid up to date, then your employer owes you absolutely nothing. If they tell you that from now on, they can only offer you a salary which is 10K, 20K, or 30K less than your current salary, then that’s what they’re offering you, you have a choice to take it or leave it, based on your circumstances and true ability. It really is nothing personal, and nor does it make you a victim in any way.

To all those who think that this is unreasonable, in exactly the same way that you don’t pay significantly over the market value for your weekly shopping, why on earth would a business who is fighting to survive In a competitive market pay significantly above market value for employees to fulfil their duties ? ... There’s no shorter road to catastrophic failure.

With regards to the jealous rants about CEO pay, it’s only through paying the kind of salaries commanded by CEO’s that companies such as the one in question are able to successfully plan, manage and implement extensive restructuring programs and are able to survive.

Oh, and for the record, I’m not an employee of BA, or a CEO of any organisation.

They work long unsociable hours, regularly miss birthdays, xmas etc. What is it with this race to the bottom shite

So do other crew including their own mixed fleet colleagues as do those many other jobs and professions. The salaries of those on older contracts are out of step with the current market even the BA crew I know will admit that they have had it good. If you are working for an employer that has tried and failed before to negotiate new terms, only because you held the company to ransom with strikes you must know they were going to get their way at some point.

it’s part of the trade unions comms to get the message out there so that people understand what’s going on. Nothing wrong with that at all.

Nothing wrong with that, I guess it's the only card the can play as strikes are not an option. My social media is full of these all copies as if personal posts. However these people fail to realise that there is a world outside BA. Other people in other industries going through redundancy and they are not in a position to campaign about it publicly.

A totally sensationalist post from the OP.

The times of earning £50k+ as cabin crew are over, BA can no longer afford to pay these wages for crew. The legacy fleet have had 30+ years of this pay so they should have enjoyed it whilst it lasted. Why should there be unequal levels of pay for cabin crew doing exactly the same job. (mixed fleet and Worldwide as an example!)

It’s totally unsustainable for the company to continue to pay these wages in the long term, and this has been exaggerated by Coronavirus.

It’s either pay these wages and the company goes bust or restructure and there’s some hope of survival... In management shoes I think we would have all made the same decision to be honest.

I totally agree with you @Realistica11y when you say

Clearly there are many that still don't get it, and never will...