American Airlines flight attendants have been fired for failing to pay their union dues in full.
Two crewmembers were reported by the union to the airline, which was required to terminate them under the contract that the Association of Professional Flight Attendants had negotiated.
- Normally, flight attendants have their union dues deducted from their paycheck automatically (they don’t have a choice in this).
- But when they go on leave, or don’t work enough hours, their pay may not fully cover the dues. They still owe that money to the union.
- The union says it’s owed more than a million dollars by flight attendants – and it’s coming for the money.
The American Airlines flight attendants union has been sending crewmembers to collections and threatening to have them fired since 2022, when they reported that 32% of their members were in arrears. In total, 7,636 flight attendants oved their union $2,983,410.10 at the time.
The union has also looked to its members for a lot more money without promising anything more back in return.
Corporate greed, unchecked power, and consolidation of wealth, are the real problems, not workers or unions. Yet, here we go again at VFTW with yet another round of union-bashing… Yeah, those members didn’t pay their dues; they are outliers. Still, the underlying merits of organizing remain beneficial to workers with airlines and other industries. Much better to have them negotiating, protecting, and advocating on your behalf, especially when companies are laying off tens of thousands on a whim. And, best yet, you can run for leadership. Be the change you want to see.
This really doesn’t make sense for a process that is basically an auto deduct situation.
My guess is that the union is trying to collect dues from many people who have retired, resigned or have died and their accounting has not caught up with the correct status for many of these staffers.
While I dislike American Airlines profusely and would never fly them, these FAs should be paying their dues! They want union protection, pay your dues to be a union member in good standing!
Unions, as structured in society, represent the antithesis of freedom and anyone with a moral code would denounce them and advocate for the rights of all individuals.
American has FAs based at DCU?
@Mike P — So wrong, as always. Enough of your typical ‘sovereign citizen’ nonsense. Anarcho-libertarians leads to corporate feudalism, not a ‘freedom-loving’ utopia.
These people sometimes don’t work enough hours (sick, leaves, etc) to cover the deductions. Union members also have the option to pay it manually and not payroll deduct. These people often times never pay. Finally, APFA has numerous payment plan options for people that fall behind on dues.
There really is no excuse to not pay.
I’d expect that type of response from a hypocrite.
@1990, What corporate greed are you referring to?
The money owed goes to the union not AA.
Does AA really have 5 flight attendants based at DCU — Decatur, Alabama — an airport that has no commercial service from any airline, much less from AA?
Unpaid dues accrued on an inactive status can’t result in termination but dues accrued on active status can. Those Flight Attendants are sent multiple certified letters over an extended period of time so this isn’t dropped on them overnight and they are made aware of the deadline they will face to get paid up before termination proceedings begin.
It’s a closed shops and they are made aware of that when they join the firm. If they are still opposed to that they can resign and be an Ellis objector or an agency fee payer but they still have to pay dues as they benefit from the windfalls of the contract, even as a non-member.
@Pilot93434 — Did Isom really ‘need’ $31,400,000 for 2023? Average pay for pilots $100K; for flight attendants $47K. I meant what I said above.
The explanatory note that goes with the table Gary posted of the past $2 million in dues in arrears says that it reflects people who left the company with a delinquent balance.
DCU was DC/US Airways (as opposed to DC/AA). It was only city that had bases for both airlines so DCA/DCU were used while separate work groups.
The flight attendants listed as DCU & STL in the table were gone from the company. That was their last base of record when departing from American.
Dues also are due while on leave from the company. Not every union does that, but APFA takes the view that they negotiated that benefit for you so you owe them while out. For unpaid medical or military leave, you still owe and have to pay to be in good standing but upon returning to active duty APFA will rebate it or wipe the balance owed.
why are *any* FAs stationed in decatur alabama?
same question with STL – the hub was killed in late 09
sorry @nedskid had not seen your post
Here’s your revised table, now sorted from highest to lowest “Balance per F/A”:
| Base Code | Nbr F/As | Balance ($) | Balance per F/A ($) |
|———–|———-|————-|———————|
| PHX | 367 | 204,226.19 | 556.47 |
| SFO | 139 | 75,590.74 | 543.82 |
| STL | 13 | 6,171.76 | 474.75 |
| CLT | 802 | 356,199.06 | 444.14 |
| LAX | 689 | 303,334.61 | 440.25 |
| MIA | 825 | 362,773.41 | 439.73 |
| LGA | 940 | 366,778.42 | 390.19 |
| DCA | 261 | 96,954.58 | 371.47 |
| PHL | 687 | 253,188.55 | 368.54 |
| BOS | 144 | 48,412.89 | 336.20 |
| DFW | 2,017 | 678,069.14 | 336.18 |
| ORD | 747 | 230,952.25 | 309.17 |
| DCU | 5 | 758.50 | 151.70 |
| Total | 7,636 | 2,983,410.10 | 390.70 |
what is “deducated”?
So are AA FA’s on a fixed union dues regardless of paid hours? My dues to three different unions were ALWAYS a percentage of my pay and deducted accordingly with Per Diem being exempt. If I made zero $ (which while one of the airlines pay was near that), I had zero in union dues deducted. I can understand why the FA union, or any union, may not like that arrangement.
1990, where did you get the average pay of $100k for pilots…certainly not a Part 121 Carrier in 2025?
What is the source for the firing of these workers? Gary, your information apparently comes from PYOK.com, but the author over there provides no citations or evidence for these particular firings. He begins his article: “It has been revealed that two American Airlines flight attendants were fired earlier this year ”
This is lazy reporting. Revealed by whom? Where does this news come from?
I have no reason to assume that PYOK just made this story up for clicks, so the responsible thing to do would be to explain to the readers the information comes from. The current American Airlines contract (https://www.apfa.org/contract/#2024cba) does indeed contain a provision for terminating flight attendants who are delinquent in their dues, but I have found no news stories about the the firing of any two specific flight attendants. Who told PYOK about this? And why do you just repeat an unsourced story without any further evidence?
…so is AA a Union Shop (like Hollywood)? And even if it is, isn’t there some way for employees to “cram down” on their owed dues (FiCore is the term I heard over in Hollywood)?
1990,
No, Isom definitely didn’t/ doesn’t deserve his pay!
1990 is to union shilling what Tim is to Delta Premium
US Airways management (some continuing thru changes to AA) made it clear that if you did not have a union, you were an idiot. They followed up by freezing non-union wages for about 10 +/- years after they took over and screwed up Piedmont and PSA.