Leave of Absence UPDATE
DATE:Sunday, March 29th 2020
SUBJECT: Leave of Absence UPDATE
Hello Everyone,
Your union leaders have reached a Memorandum of Agreement (MOA) with the Company and the details will be published once finalized.
As most of you may know, your Executive Board has been hard at work diligently working to secure a deal with the company to allow our members to take Voluntary Short Term Leave (VSTL) for the month of April. VSTL is very different than CCL and we wanted to make sure the right language was included. This MOA would allow members to take the month of April off and potentially other months off while still retain their Medical, Dental, Sick, Flight Benefits AND receive 53.33% of your guarantee. These negotiations have been a difficult back and forth process to get the best package and indeed presented challenges with the company.
We continued to talk with the company even after multiple rejections between both parties and after conferring with International. The Executive Board tirelessly met repeatedly to hash out the importance of our members health, medical and compensation needs during these unprecedented times. The initial offer received required many changes over the last several days. We worked around the clock from Thursday evening 3/26 through today 3/29 conducting many conference calls well into every night securing a deal with everyone's best interest in mind. Our objective was compensation to cover members medical needs during the pandemic that was much better than the CCL + $600 package released today. Although we do have language protection in the CBA in regards to guarantee and other pay, we feel this will help those who prefer to stay home and take care of their loved ones.
The timeline of this agreement to take effect for April is tight, please assist us in reaching out to your fellow Flight Attendants through text informing them to look out for an email from the company outlining the detail's.
In Unity,
Executive Board