71% Of United Airlines Flight Attendants Rejected Their Contract—Now The Airline Has A Controversial Scheduling Demand

United’s flight attendants haven’t had a raise in 5 years. But at this point they’re waiting because they rejected a contract that their union negotiated. AFA-CWA said that contract was the best they were going to do.

What ultimately happened is that United and the union had gotten to a place where the airline was spending as much on flight attendants as they were going to. They union had squeezed out all the money. But the union also misjudged the priorities of their flight attendants.

• Flight attendants had been told a new contract would get them more than just boarding pay (pay for time spent boarding the plane, rather than just higher wages meant to account for this) but also time spent waiting for flights in the airport. The union had been promising this, so when they didn’t deliver it was a big blow.

• And flight attendants were concerned about language in the contract that let the airline put them in inferior hotels – properties that are merely ‘tenantable’, though the union argued that they were actually going to get better hotels (and that the union would be involved in picking them).

71% of flight attendants rejected the contract, the union went back to the drawing board surveying its members about what’s most important to them in a contract, and the parties are back at the bargaining table February 10-12.

United has been updating flight attendants with its message directly, not just through the union. Last month they told flight attendants that pay for time spent waiting in the airport was on the table! But the total cost of the contact couldn’t really go up. They were already offering industry-leading pay, benefits and work rules. So they were going to have to offset the cost for this and other priorities that the union was now asking for in a new bite at a contract. And they suggested a couple of things were being negotiated:

• Reducing guaranteed hours for flight attendants working reserve from 78 to 75, and phasing out reserve override.
  
• Moving to ‘Preferential Bidding System’ (PBS) scheduling, which is more efficient and in use at other major airlines but many flight attendants hate it.

United sent out another message to flight attendants (.pdf) on Friday and it was all about PBS scheduling.

United is trying to reframe the ‘TA2’ conversation around using Preferential Bidding System for scheduling, saying that’s where they say most questions come up. They’re positioning this as “background and education,” not a hard sell, while making a clear case for why they want it in the agreement they’re negotiating.

With PBS flight attendants bid ‘what they want’ (pairings, days off, layovers, start times, aircraft, etc.) and the system awards trips to match preferences as much as possible. It does not create pairings – pairing construction stays the same. It does not eliminate trading, pickup, and drops. Instead, it replaces the line build process.

• Current scheduling: Management builds pre-packaged monthly lines (complete schedules). Flight attendants bid on those lines by seniority. If you win a line, you basically know what your month looks like, then you trade, pick up, and drop around it.

• PBS scheduling: Instead of bidding on a prebuilt line, you bid your preferences (e.g., “avoid early reports,” “want 3–4 day trips,” “prefer Europe layovers,” “want weekends off”). The algorithm awards pairings and days off in a way that tries to satisfy as many preferences as possible subject to rules, staffing needs, and seniority.

United points out that it’s industry-standard and “modern” – American, JetBlue and Delta use it and the AFA union has implemented it with other carriers. United’s pilots have been using it for over 20 years.

They say PBS improves operational predictability and creates savings that can be “directed back” into the flight attendant contract.

And not to worry, it’s not immediate, and will take years to design, test, train and roll out in partnership with the union and with cabin crew input.

Here’s why United wants it:

• match staffing to demand better
  
• refine schedules more before bid close
  
• reduce last-minute manual schedule changes
  
• eliminate the need for a vacation relief bid
  
• let training be bid as part of the schedule
  
• which gives them a “more predictable operation” as well as fewer disruptions and reassignments

United gets reduced administrative complexity, fewer manual interventions, and better alignment between staffing and actual flying needs which reduces costs from inefficiencies and reworking schedules. That pays for union asks in a revised contract.

They pitch is as better for flight attendants:

• more influence when preferences don’t fit neatly into pre-built lines
  
• bid what matters instead of accepting a line with tradeoffs they don’t like
  
• Potentially better stability if it reduces reworking schedules after awards are made
  
• And it’s like tools flight attendants already use for vacation relief lines and reserve preferencing

Why flight attendants often don’t like PBS:

• It feels complex and can be intimidating
  
• It can feel less predictable than line bidding because crew aren’t choosing a fixed package of flights, and because results can vary month to month
  
• When flight attendants don’t get what they wanted, it feels like the system “chose against them” even if it’s just rules and seniority, versus getting a known specific bundle of flights. PBS can feel like bidding into a fog, especially for mid-seniority flight attendants who get different mixes of trips each month.
  
• optimal bidding can become a game, with more time in the system, more strategy, and more tinkering.
  
• people who’ve built childcare and commuting routines around a stable line can see reduced predictability.

But does United even want PBS schedling? Yes, but:

• The union told flight attendants that the original agreement they voted down had as much money in it as possible.

• Flight attendants still voted against it. The union misread priorities. The money wasn’t allocated the way flight attendants overall wanted.

• So there are new demands – but to meet those, within a fixed budget, there needs to be tradeoffs elsewhere in the deal. PBS creats savings that provide “flexibility to address other priorities…without increasing the cost of the overall agreement.”

• Many flight attendants hate PBS. Putting it on the table and making clear it’s the cost of getting wins elsewhere in the contract could let the union beat them on it, take a win back to flight attendants, and help both underscore that (1) any new deal is the best they could have gotten without PBS and (2) look like the union fought for the best deal possible. That helps smooth passage.

United genuinely wants PBS. But it can also be a ratification lever – accept PBS for more money, or we took PBS off the table now vote for the agreement.

Ultimately, United may not be using PBS as a decoy. It’s something they want to get sooner or later, and a new tentative agreement is a time to trade for it. And they’re campaigning for it. But it’s also a strong bargaining chip to trade away to get a deal done.