BA possibly making up to 12,000 redundant. Here we go. Recession looming.

[BubblesBuddy]

Life has ground to a halt and BA don’t think we will be flying in the same numbers as before. This is 25% of their staff. This is serious.

The parent company IAG are only announcing redundancies in the UK - why?

Perhaps they think the UK is more likely to drag its feet over opening up travel than others and a certain amount of this is sabre rattling to get things moving asap?

When thinking about future travel it's worth remembering the colossal lobbying power of the airlines. Joe Bloggs with his corner shop might be ignored, but it'll be harder to ignore the likes of BA, Virgin, etc.

BA is an expensive workforce for IAG that is why.

BA is an expensive workforce for IAG that is why.

Perhaps in some areas of the company but I'd be very reluctant to express that sentiment within earshot of BA Mixed Fleet Cabin Crew..

The parent company IAG are only announcing redundancies in the UK - why?

One theory being expressed is that it may be easier for IAG to dispense with workforce in the UK than it is elsewhere in Europe...

BA has from the beginning made a big thing of not wanting Government bailouts - because it wants other airlines to go bust (particularly Virgin), so wants to put pressure on Government not to help any airlines, because it sees itself as the one most likely to survive and mop up the others’ business in future.

It is odd that BA, which delivers the bulk of IAG profits, is the only one in the group to have redundancy proposals announced so far. What’s going on there? Even more suspicious that they apparently want to trash the local economy of the part of West Sussex where Gatwick airport is based (BA going would destroy the livelihoods of many thousands more people than just those directly employed BA staff), despite the fact it makes no sense to pull out of there altogether: maybe a bid to get a better deal from Gatwick airport? It is also a load of absolute bollocks that the average pay for a pilot is £167,000. And it is a 100% certainty they are taking advantage of this situation to try to turf employees off contracts with better terms and conditions permanently, regardless of actual necessity, because they have been trying to do this for years.

Perhaps in some areas of the company but I'd be very reluctant to express that sentiment within earshot of BA Mixed Fleet Cabin Crew.

That is very true, sadly I think that is the work model they want to impose across the airline

Everything that @Walkaround said.

It is also a load of absolute bollocks that the average pay for a pilot is £167,000.

I missed that..and yes, very much

If you crunch the numbers suitably at some airlines you'll possibly get that as a mean (of total income) because of the effect produced by a relatively few in number high pay training captains/management captains but the mode or the median figure will be lower.

I'd suggest those pilots brave enough to join the industry in the last few years, possibly now servicing six figure loans for their training will be very very lucky to see that sort of figure and - that is only if they can keep their jobs..

The salary quoted was a BA figure from a few years ago. What are the current pay scales and allowances package and perks worth? Free travel if it still exists is worth a lot plus pensions. Everyone knows BA pay pilots more than Ryanair.

Why wouldn’t an airline streamline services. If they keep Gatwick, more jobs go at Heathrow. It’s swings and roundabouts isn’t it? Virgin isn’t the only competitor. All the state owned ones are bigger competitors. Emirates etc.

I know more than 20 people who work for BA. This is very Bad news. But not unexpected. It's been coming for some time, even before corona.

FYI - Aer lingus, who are part of IAG, have announced job cuts of 900 out of 4,500 workforce ... so 20%.

I know more than 20 people who work for BA. This is very Bad news. But not unexpected. It's been coming for some time, even before corona.

I don't think anybody I know at BA knew up to 12000 redundancies were in the offing prior to corona, especially given the state of the balance sheet just a year ago...I do however think a lot there, especially those on the "legacy" contracts, knew that their T&Cs were always going to be under threat.

BubblesBuddy - it’s a bit of a silly comment to say Virgin is not the only competitor and state owned ones are bigger competitors, given the fact a non-state owned competitor cannot face down a state owned competitor. It can help dispose of its commercial competitors, though, and that’s the only chance for airlines not propped up by the State. And it’s not just swings and roundabouts to “streamline” by losing all presence from Gatwick, which is cheaper in every way (including staff pay) than Heathrow and caters more for the holiday market than the business market. Why on earth would an airline dispose of all its slots at a lucrative airport at which it has great bargaining power and put all its eggs in just one basket?

It's never been that much...maybe in the 60s?

Btw, BubblesBuddy, I think if you had put your glasses on when reading up average pilot salaries, even excluding the fact that the “average” as has already been pointed out is skewed by a few very high earners at the very top, on longhaul routes and who have worked for the same airline all their working lives (and could also be, eg training captains), you would probably have seen it was an average for captains, not pilots in general, the majority of whom are not captains, but first officers. That’s not saying, of course, that being a pilot is not generally extremely well paid if you do it for long enough, just that it is ludicrous to claim it is on average that well paid!

The salary quoted was a BA figure from a few years ago. What are the current pay scales and allowances package and perks worth? Free travel if it still exists is worth a lot plus pensions.

I know this will sound like a cop out but there genuinely isn't the space here to get into the current BA pay scales/allowances/hourly rates etc but they aren't all they are sometimes imagined to be. The pension scheme the newer joiners are on now isn't stellar.

Free travel if it still exists. Outside of duty travel (i.e; the company is sending you somewhere), No it doesn't - you always pay something and sometimes it's quite a lot. TBH if you need to hop around Europe your average LoCo often provides a better deal than a staff standby ticket on BA

Everyone knows BA pay pilots more than Ryanair.
"Everyone" might be slightly surprised then if they knew the reality, especially if they were aware of potential earnings over the first few years in the respective companies. .

Don't get me wrong, it's a good deal (perhaps not for long), nobody is pleading poverty (yet) but some of the figures that get quoted in the press are highly misleading.

Yes, this is serious. And every day lockdown continues the recession will be worse. Probably worse than any recession anyone alive has seen before.

on a slightly more optimistic note, just read on twitter that nissan are Intending to restart production in sunderland in june.

Five MPs with constituencies local to Heathrow have written a joint letter to Alex Cruz asking that he briefs them on the steps he is taking to reduce the number of jobs which could be cut ...obviously big losses at BA mean a real knock on into local communities.

In other news IAG and Willie Walsh are starting to get some heat over loan being approved for their Iberia OpCo..one rule for IAGs Spanish OpCos and another one for the Brits?

www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-05-01/iag-s-iberia-and-vueling-sign-1-1-billion-syndicated-loan

Actually I’m happy for Captain pilots to earn highly. I want the best people and I want to be safe. If an average was £167,000 it was an average. That takes high earners and lower earners into account. I assume captains are present on aircraft and if they are paid well that’s fine by me. When lower paid pilots get promotion then they will earn more too. It’s like teachers who become executive heads. It’s a career structure and some are at the bottom and others are at the top. There’s nothing wrong in that and it’s normal. Aim high, be the best and you get high pay.

I wonder if Iberia is a much smaller concern with very different routes? It might have less competition in Spain and be essential? A company can only take on so much debt and this debt is backed by the Spanish government and possibly is favourable. It still doesn’t alter the fact that 91% of flights have gone at the moment but overheads are massive. You could argue far more jobs could be at risk.

BubblesBuddy - it was an average for captains not pilots. You don’t assess teachers’ average pay by excluding most teachers from the calculation altogether. The same applies to pilots - you need to make it clear what you are assessing the average of, or your argument loses all sense. Likewise, there are 3 types of average - mean, median and mode, and the 3 do not always produce similar results, so it’s unhelpful not to specify when figures are being thrown around. Thus the £167,000 figure was unhelpful and inaccurate if using it as a justification to make a quarter of pilots redundant.

Just so awful. Personal connection

There plenty of competition to Iberia in Spain - Vueling, Ryanair, and several other carriers, plus a very good high speed rail network, so I'd say Iberia is no more essential to internal travel in Spain than BA is to internal UK travel. I'd be interested in hearing our Spanish residents' POV.

Even if you can justify the assistance for Iberia down to it being labelled as "essential" the fact is that the group boss (Mr Walsh) seems quite content for that to go ahead but OTOH he is on the record as stating that there should be no such government assistance for the UK airline in the group...or any other UK airline.

Finally what doesn't help BA employee attitudes is that one look at the IAG accounts will show BA have been IAGs cash cow for several years mainly due to cuts made in T&Cs, whereas it appears Iberia have at best been "neutral" in their contributions....yet the axe gets taken to BA? The perception people are getting is it's easier politically for the group to cull staff numbers in the UK than it is elsewhere, .

The problem that airlines have is that it is phenomenally expensive to train pilots, and qualified commercial pilots have to fly regularly, and undergo regular route checks, safety training and simulator testing and training, and have regular health checks to remain “current” and keep their licence to fly. Make too many redundant and, if things pick up quicker than expected, you cannot compete, because you cannot just go out and re-recruit and get people flying again really quickly, you have to get them “current” again. That’s why this uncertainty is a particular nightmare for the aviation industry.

Definitely easier politically in the UK.

Cabin crew are going to be merged onto one fleet apparently, flying long haul and short haul. “Flexible” contracts. Zero hour contracts? It wouldn’t be the first time BA has employed crew on a casual basis.