The company held their quarterly earnings meeting at US Airways Headquarters in Tempe, AZ on July 31, 2007 at 1:30PM. Each Union sent a representative to hear the results and future plans from Doug Parker and to share some of the major issues facing each group in the workplace. In attendance for the company in Customer Service were Scott Kirby and Anthony Mule.
Doug Parker reported a 14% decline in second-quarter net profit because of spending by the airline to improve reliability. He said net income fell to $263 million, or $2.77 per share, from $305 million, or $3.25 per share, a year earlier. He felt the antiquated ATC system used by the Air traffic controllers has caused many recent delays which increased costs for the company. He also associated the airline's profit decline to costs from a plan to improve reliability after the company suffered a glitch in its self-service reservations system in the first quarter.
The costs he was referring to in improving reliability encompass hiring more than 1,000 airport workers, upgrading kiosk equipment and expanding connect times at some hub airports. Doug said they project profitability for the third quarter and full-year.
Looking ahead, Doug described building a better airline with schedule changes; Four additional operational spares, lengthened the operating day by 30 minutes in PHL and CLT, added 20 minutes per turn on average to turns in ORD, EWR, BOS-PHL, and the Shuttle. Single certificate Cutover is on track for September 2007. Labor negotiations continue to achieve single contracts. The challenges the company faces are the fuel prices and weather/ATC congestion.
The CWA talked about the abuse of mandatory overtime in many of the cities where we are grossly understaffed. There were examples shared where employees are being told they must work mandatory overtime on their two days off to cover sick calls, which is a violation of the contract. In many cities, we told the company, there are no managers on duty at the end of the night and the agents are having to mandatory themselves in order to cover the late flights that are coming in, again, a violation of our contract. Anthony Mule said he would look into the issues we raised about staffing and follow up with us. We also discussed the payroll problems we have experienced in the last few months which have caused many hardships for the members as well, Doug apologized for the glitches and said they are working on the problems they have had.
We discussed the new Attendance control program for the Reservation offices, which was rolled out recently. The fact the company feels they can put someone in a level for attendance and take away their right to swap if they called out while working a swap were explained to Doug as double-jeopardy and this has to be changed. There is no longer the ability to be removed from a level after 6 months of perfect attendance in RES, we feel this causes a faster track to termination under the new ACP. We were told to express these concerns and have further discussions with Brad Beakley about the new rules. Doug was advised that the Union was not included in the discussions of the new ACP for RES and we felt that this is something that needs to be done in the future. The new attendance program for the ATO's has not been released yet, but again, we asked that the Union be involved in discussions about the new plan before rolling it out. We advised Doug that working together makes the company a more productive place and the morale would be better if we were included in the rules that affect our daily lives in the workplace.
The OJI's occurring in the system are a concern we discussed and we shared the idea of having a piece of equipment that Janice Garris, local President of 3641 in CLT researched, which would help us lift the passengers in a manner that would reduce injuries. The company told us to contact Sam Mendenhall from the company to discuss this issue.
I had a separate discussion with Dan Smith, the IBT Business Rep and Anthony Mule after the meeting regarding the POC and PAC issues. The West agents are being paid the .57 cent CSS premium for performing the POC work but the EAST agents are not. We advised him this needs to be corrected immediately. He said they are looking into it and will get back to us. We will be grieving this issue if it is not resolved in a fair and timely manner.
The next Labor Advisory meeting is set for September 5, 2007 in Tempe, AZ.
Doug Parker reported a 14% decline in second-quarter net profit because of spending by the airline to improve reliability. He said net income fell to $263 million, or $2.77 per share, from $305 million, or $3.25 per share, a year earlier. He felt the antiquated ATC system used by the Air traffic controllers has caused many recent delays which increased costs for the company. He also associated the airline's profit decline to costs from a plan to improve reliability after the company suffered a glitch in its self-service reservations system in the first quarter.
The costs he was referring to in improving reliability encompass hiring more than 1,000 airport workers, upgrading kiosk equipment and expanding connect times at some hub airports. Doug said they project profitability for the third quarter and full-year.
Looking ahead, Doug described building a better airline with schedule changes; Four additional operational spares, lengthened the operating day by 30 minutes in PHL and CLT, added 20 minutes per turn on average to turns in ORD, EWR, BOS-PHL, and the Shuttle. Single certificate Cutover is on track for September 2007. Labor negotiations continue to achieve single contracts. The challenges the company faces are the fuel prices and weather/ATC congestion.
The CWA talked about the abuse of mandatory overtime in many of the cities where we are grossly understaffed. There were examples shared where employees are being told they must work mandatory overtime on their two days off to cover sick calls, which is a violation of the contract. In many cities, we told the company, there are no managers on duty at the end of the night and the agents are having to mandatory themselves in order to cover the late flights that are coming in, again, a violation of our contract. Anthony Mule said he would look into the issues we raised about staffing and follow up with us. We also discussed the payroll problems we have experienced in the last few months which have caused many hardships for the members as well, Doug apologized for the glitches and said they are working on the problems they have had.
We discussed the new Attendance control program for the Reservation offices, which was rolled out recently. The fact the company feels they can put someone in a level for attendance and take away their right to swap if they called out while working a swap were explained to Doug as double-jeopardy and this has to be changed. There is no longer the ability to be removed from a level after 6 months of perfect attendance in RES, we feel this causes a faster track to termination under the new ACP. We were told to express these concerns and have further discussions with Brad Beakley about the new rules. Doug was advised that the Union was not included in the discussions of the new ACP for RES and we felt that this is something that needs to be done in the future. The new attendance program for the ATO's has not been released yet, but again, we asked that the Union be involved in discussions about the new plan before rolling it out. We advised Doug that working together makes the company a more productive place and the morale would be better if we were included in the rules that affect our daily lives in the workplace.
The OJI's occurring in the system are a concern we discussed and we shared the idea of having a piece of equipment that Janice Garris, local President of 3641 in CLT researched, which would help us lift the passengers in a manner that would reduce injuries. The company told us to contact Sam Mendenhall from the company to discuss this issue.
I had a separate discussion with Dan Smith, the IBT Business Rep and Anthony Mule after the meeting regarding the POC and PAC issues. The West agents are being paid the .57 cent CSS premium for performing the POC work but the EAST agents are not. We advised him this needs to be corrected immediately. He said they are looking into it and will get back to us. We will be grieving this issue if it is not resolved in a fair and timely manner.
The next Labor Advisory meeting is set for September 5, 2007 in Tempe, AZ.
