B.A.'s propaganda efforts are moving into a higher gear as indicated by 'loaded1'. This week's British Airways staff newspaper has a full page dedicated to an article reproduced from the Sunday Times.
The obvious intent is to give the impression of how fantastically well off Flight Crew are. I quote, < That now makes it possible that Delta's pilots may reject the 23% to 39% rise on offer when it comes to the vote next month. After all, one cannot expect a pilot to get along on $300,000 a year. >
That would equate to Delta's top paid pilots (I presume) being offered about £214,000 P.A. for carrying passengers who pay the same for their tickets as ours do.
The article says that fares will have to rise by 10% to offset the wage hikes. Oh deary me no, how will the consumer cope; after all fares have consistently reduced for decades. Maybe the consumer will just have to pay a bit more, like they have to for virtually every other commodity. Another quote from the article says < And in real terms average fares have fallen by 40%, (since 1978) with people who have the flexibility as to travel dates and times getting the greatest benefits. >
The article also says, < All this makes the profits performance of B.A. even more remarkable than it's quadrupling of profits in 2000 at first seems. > No surprise here is there, if your wage bill for Flight Crew, Maintenance Engineers and a lot of other groups of staff is about half that of your competitors then one would expect a better financial performance.
Another quote, < the airlines Chief Executive, R.E., deployed his attractive, outgoing personality to get his ground staff and in-flight crews to abandon their grievances and petulance and once again concentrate on customer service. > So we have abandoned our grievances have we, petulant lot that we are. I don't think so.
Regards
Exeng