Unionized flight attendants at Alaska Airlines say they are being set up to fail due to a lack of proper staffing on Boeing 787-9 Dreamliner flights.
The Association of Flight Attendants-CWA said Alaska is not honoring a prior agreement to study 787 staffing and adjust if needed.
At the onset of Alaska-branded 787 international service in April, the airline’s management agreed to a 30-day observation period that would including gathering flight attendant feedback and implementing service flow improvements, the union said. But that observation period ended May 28, and months later Alaska has “offered no resolutions to ease the demands of an operation they refuse to resource properly, citing claims of needing more data.”
AFA argued that Alaska can and does respond quickly to customer feedback, proving that the carrier could make needed changes, “but they simply choose not to.”
“Instead, management’s response to flight attendants has consistently been: Make it work,” the union said.
Alaska took delivery of its first mainline 787 in January and now uses the type on long-haul routes to destinations such as London, Rome, and Tokyo. Hawaiian Airlines has its own 787s, flying to markets including New York-JFK and San Francisco; while technically part of Alaska Air Group’s combined fleet, they continue to use Hawaiian branding and mainly operate from Hawaii.
The AFA did not include Hawaiian flight attendants in its grievance, though they are also represented by the union.
“At its core, this grievance is about one simple principle: If management expects a certain level of service, it must provide the staffing necessary to deliver it,” AFA said. “They face a clear choice: increase staffing to meet their service goals, or work with our Inflight Service Committee to establish realistic service standards that actually reflect the staffing provided. Until they choose one, we will not accept being set up for failure.”
