Well I suppose we cant expect a response from a managerial position on this post, while often there is on these threads, but since there is not much disputing all these allegations, it just goes so show the truth hurts!
Since post examinership there has been no improvement or change for the better to Aer Arann’s operational ability, if anything it’s been worse. The cold weather spell is not to blame it just revealed the soft underbelly of a disastrous structure. Yet again the operational dictators can’t be held accountable for their mistakes while the crew will be very quickly disciplined for their errors. If only the paying pax really knew how many of their flights in the cold spell weren’t cancelled due to weather but rather inefficiencies from operations. To name some horrors, Such as three flights being cancelled due to a plane diverting to a nominated airfield (which has been used for years) and had no performance de-icing tables for departure. Or a plane arriving back from a diverted airport to collect its passengers, only to be told by the ground staff that there are no passengers as the flight was cancelled by operations-the same operations which dispatched that plane in the first place. Or flights cancelled as understaffed bases had no crew to operate the following day after the pushed their crew to maximum Flight And Duty hours on the previous day, and with rest restrictions were unable to crew the planes in sufficient time to get people home for Christmas. With a massed increased of discretion reports over the past month to the IAA proving this.
The flight crew are rightly upset and have been pushed in a corner with pay cuts. Their pay increments ceased two years ago. Followed by illegal pay cuts of seven to ten percent, which was imposed to “save the company” - Yet since post examinership with new investors, the crew continue to lose 7 - 10 % of their total salary while managers rumour to have bonuses. The increased Irish tax system taking its chunk too. Furthermore you have Second, Third, Fourth year Captains being paid the same as First year Captains. So there is a pay drop every year with the incremental pay scale having being ceased illegally. It’s probably better off being cabin crew, whose basic salary was not reduced, get paid more hourly FDP rate than pilots and get paid an inflight sales end of year bonus, earning themselves as good as a F/O salary’s. This is not taking a dig at the cabin crew as they have to deal normally with the usual irate messed around passengers, but pilots still need to be compensated accordingly. And there is no pension either for crews in Aer Arann; even the tiny Arann Island Express has a pension scheme for the pilots. So every year the pilots should have been rewarded more, as they were putting more money into the company yet they are just abused more.
Leading on from the pay crisis, it can’t be resolved because of the inefficiency of the JRG (Joint Regulation Group) which was formed as company Union representation. What a farce. This was a pilot body put together which was there to protect the pilots, yet they just get bullied in every meeting by the top office managerial players who consort with the group and manipulate the pilots working standards without letting them ever being able to contest. When the paycuts commenced, the JRG group were told that they would show their financial hand and present book figures, allowing the crew peace of mind that they really were paying in and helping the company to keep afloat. Well the Office managers never kept their side of the bargain, never revealed openly figures and continued to misuse company money in ridiculous day to day running cost situations, then came examinership, and let us not start on managerial bonuses written into their contracts yet. This all while a skeleton flight crew in every base barely kept the operations running by working to maximum duty hours to save costs of hiring new crew. IALPA were consulted, and within a month over 50% of the company joined IALPA, yet they cannot formerly step in, as they could not be recognised as a "hollow vessel" JRG was in place which protected Aer Arann management from IALPA. There's still a healthy contribution of money paid by the pilots for an “overseeing helpless eye”, with crew now expected to be seeking private legal action against Aer Arann (hope the new investors have accounted for this). The JRG needs to be disbanded and proper representation instated otherwise the managers will continue to walk over the pilot body.
The Unfortunately Aer Arann is not an airline it’s a select few of Head Office feathering their own nest, It’s the real workers which the public see which keep the ship above water, for how long though?
