Tag Archives for flight attendants.
This summer the Supreme Court let stand a 9th Circuit Court of Appeals ruling that said flight attendants based in California are subject to the state’s rest rules.
In Bernstein v. Virgin America the court found that California could require 30 minute meal breaks for flight attendants every 5 hours, and 10 minute rest breaks every four hours.
Kuwait Airways is under fire after women applying to become flight attendants report being required to strip down to their underwear as part of the interview process.
The interviews, which occurred in Madrid, are under investigation by Spain’s Ministry of Labor, after a contractor conducting the interviews at the Meliá Barajas hotel was said to require these women to bare themselves in order to check for tattoos, scars, and other marks.
American still has an international (“Flagship”) first class. It’s not a competitive product. And they’ve basically already given up on it. American no longer even sets the table for first class passengers and now just delivers trays with flatware already on it.
Iberia’s flight attendants object to the larger overhead bins that the Spanish airline and British Airways sister carrier has been putting in Airbus A350-900 planes. Customers are able to fit more bags into XL bins, making them heavier. And flight attendants went to court seeking an order that they don’t have to lift those bins closed.
It used to be that when the doors of the aircraft closed, passengers could re-arrange themselves freely. If there were empty seats, you’d see passengers spread out for more room. That made sense.
However airlines now charge for seats, and they don’t even just charge for extra legroom seats. An aisle seat and even a window can cost more than a middle. A seat towards the front of the cabin might cost more, too.
American Airlines flight attendants have a generally weak union. Sara Nelson’s larger Association of Flight Attendants has eyed coming in and taking over. AFA-CWA even sent masks to legacy US Airways flight attendants during the pandemic, telling me they still consider those crewmembers to be members of their union.
It’s no wonder that they aren’t seeing the concessions they’re after from American Airlines in contract negotiations.
There are some absolutely brutal schedules that many flights attendants have to work. Flight attendants who used to work 3 days trips may have worked 4 day trips when airlines were short staffed. These longer trips may have had more waiting time between flights, or more running from flight to flight, often with legal minimum rest. Complaints of burnout are common.
Flight attendant Cierra Huffman, known online to her 3.5 million followers as ‘cierra_mistt’, was kicked off of TikTok after hundreds of flight attendants around the country complained to the Chinese social media phenomenon about her videos. However it appears she has her TikTok account back.
The ex-Republic Airways crewmember, who has flown under the regional banners of American Airlines and Delta, goes online (sometimes in provocative attire) to discuss things like when to buy an airline ticket, how to get upgraded, and joining the Mile High Club in the crew rest area of widebody aircraft.
The American Airlines flight attendants union is reporting that the airline is firing three times as many cabin crew for cause as they would in a normal year. This isn’t a bad thing, for customers or for flight attendants!
The Association of Flight Attendants – Communications Workers of America (AFA-CWA) is trying to organize flight attendants at Delta. They are promising more money, less work and a pony. It costs them nothing to make promises, which are almost certainly not true. In reality, Delta’s cabin crew will pay for union representation, they won’t make as much money as they will under Delta’s unique model in the industry, and their work lives will be worse.
Every Delta flight attendant should ask, are cabin crew represented by AFA-CWA actually happier and better off at the myriad of airlines where the union represents them now – like United Airlines, Spirit, Frontier, and Mesa?
Gary Leff is one of the foremost experts in the field of miles, points, and frequent business travel -- a topic he has covered since 2002.
Co-founder of frequent flyer community InsideFlyer.com, emcee of the Freddie Awards, and named one of the "World's Top Travel Experts" by Conde' Nast Traveler (2010-Present) Gary has been a guest on most major news media, profiled in several top print publications, and published broadly on the topic of consumer loyalty. More About Gary »
