British Airways - CC Industrial Relations & Negotiations

[Dawdler]

Quoting other posts.

I find the most reliable way is to copy and paste as suggested above and then preface the piece by square brackets [ ] around the word "Quote" then end it with square brackets again [ ] around the word "/quote" . you will find that this form works on most forums ( or should that be fora ) I am never quite sure.

Digressing a bit, I wonder why when any Unite representative is interviewed on TV muttering about getting back to negotiation, they are not challenged about things like refusing to sit with other union's reps, refusing to look at the books, not turning up for meetings etc?

[Tiramisu]

Originally posted by romans44
Tiramisu, I'd like to quote what you are saying but I still don't know how to do it.
Been told that there should be some buttoms on top of the square but I see nothing.
In reply to you ,I would like to say that yours is a huge assumption and it makes very sad that a CSD has such view on CC.
As main crew I always look up to CSD for leadership and guidance, to think what a low opinion you have for the majority of crew makes me wonder what it would be like working with you.
How can you rely on your crew, especially in an emergency, when you have such low opinion of your crew..
I am very proud to be part of such diverse comunity made up of ex doctors,nursers, policemen/women, teachers, supermarket workers and so on.
I mean!!!! Look at your reply to my second post. You have no problem in confirming what wheather map is saying and yet you make no comment on what I said.
I'd expect that next thing you will be telling me is that you never seen a pilot being rude, getting off the aircraft before our customers and so on.
I am begining to wonder whether you are a CSD now.

romans44
An easier way might be to copy and paste my post then delete the irrelevant bit. When you start posting, you find that your reply is in a grey box. Look at the top border and third from the right and you'll find the Quote button.

As for not answering your post, I suggest you read my post again because I did reply accordingly.

I reiterate I have experienced what Weather Map said, many a time in my 26 years! It is not an assumption but a fact. As Ottergirl said, I have had to have a quiet word with the individual crew member on the day and manage accordingly.
I don't have a low opinion of fellow crew, just the ones that bring BA into disrepute and themselves of course.

As for being a real CSD I'll let you be a judge of that. All I can say is that in all my years of being a CSD, I have enjoyed excellent working relationships with my crew and vice versa. Only yesterday, we had a Medical incident on my flight requiring us to openThe M5 Kit and everyone worked as a team with me, the other crew being Yes Voters and willing to Strike. One thing I have always done is to listen to my crew, inspire and motivate them and likewise, they have done the same to me.

I am BA Cabin Crew and the above represent my personal view and not those of my employer's.

[Cherwell]

Romans44

There’s a great deal of information on this forum.

Have you seen this post written from the perspective of someone outside looking in – a very succinct analysis.

There was not much comment on it because it was posted late at night and probably missed by a lot of people.

What do you think?

[Skipness One Echo]

There is much talk of BA returning to the table and negotiating with BASSA. However what I urge BASSA to get their heads around is that their position is not seen to be in any way reasonable by almost everyone looking in from the outside. That is a clue. The culture within BA CC is clearly heavily unionsed and they support each others beliefs that this is all the fault of WW and bad management.

It's not. The world of Lord King and Colin Marshall is gone. The world of Concorde and The World's Favourite Airline is gone. The world of BA operating in the UK outside of London is also gone. This is the world of better looking, younger and fitter cabin crew who don not sound like throwbacks from the 1970s. This is the world of Emirates and Qatar.
This is a world of Air France / KLM as part of a powerful SkyTeam.
This is a world of Lufthansa overtaking you in size years ago and partnered under the (soon to be) newest Terminal at your home base. This is the world where STAR have the newest and most modern facilities at Heathrow.
This is the world of Swiss back on GVA-LHR.
This is the world of SN Brussels back on BRU-LHR.
This is the world where both of the above are survivors on market rates and flexible business models, born out of the ashes of dead flag carriers.

Other people came along and did it for less, and in many cases they are doing it better. So you can hold onto your pampered salaries and fly those old Jumbos until they life expire because by God you will never make enough money to replace them with that pension deficit.

BA continues to get smaller every year. Gatwick's next for the chop. No way is WW going to replace those clapped out B737s. Once they're ready to go, Gatwick will go to, easyJet just moves in route by route with new A319s and a simpler more dynamic cost structure. The only place BA ever made money worth mentioning is Heathrow, and right now, your competitors are on the phone to all your Executive Club customers, mail shooting the travel departments and scmoozing the boardrooms.

This militant crap is destined to drag on through to February. Why in the name of God would anyone risk their summer holidays in such risky times by booking with BASSA Airways?

Time to dust off the BA Citiflyer AOC and do a Crossair.
Hint : Google Swissair post 9/11

[romans44]

Alpineskier

[quote]You posted " 91% of cc voted in favour ... "

Look , if you are going to use numbers you have to get them correct.
Alpineskier
sorry for the confusion
80% of the CC voted
92.49% voted yes ,take away the VR vote (assuming they were all yes) it came to 91.2%
7.51% voted no.
I think any parties in history would only be too happy if 80% of the population turned up to vote.
As far as a the new vote is concern, as I said b4, we should just sit and wait. no point in speculating..
Judging from what I heard and seen I'd expect another big turn out. Whether it will be a big yes or no we shall see.

[henkybaby]

TorC

Thanks for your reply.

You say that BA needs to find out why their employees feel this way, and to establish their interests and acknowledge them. While it's very clear that it's going to take one "side" to make the first move, I don't quite see why the employer should be the one to do so.

I am not picking sides. I am not saying that management should make the first move. In fact (to quote myself):

One of the two parties needs to stop arguing and start listening. Whomever does that first will benefit the most. That is negotiation practice, not a belief.

There is nothing lost to the first party that agrees to really listen. It does not have to be a match with a winner and a loser. It will take work, patience and before all courage to change this battlefield into a place where management and employees work together to solve the (undeniable) problems.

As a passenger I would benefit from a solution that means I have both a happy, well trained, enthusiastic cabin crew and a healthy airline I can rely on.

Lets not call each other names or use negative exceptions to "prove" points. Separate the people from the problem. And no, the people are not the problem.

HumanFactor

Something is telling me you did not choose your handle by mistake.

They did until a couple of years ago. That was one of the reasons we're in the state we're currently in.

That is a shame. Maybe you need to work on how to select the right person for that job. It will always be difficult. Power corrupts. That is a very good reason to always have checks and balances in place for them. Realize that even for union leaders it is hard to put personal interests aside.

[Skipness One Echo]

And no, the people are not the problem.

I would say the culture is the problem and that is hand in glove with the people. They've swanned around thinking they were better than everyone and were worth way more money. Events and public reaction have shown that to be utter fantasy.

[Perry-oaks]

The Truth about the court case

Three-day strike at BA looming after union vows to reopen ballot -Times Online

In her ruling, Mrs Justice Laura Cox found that 811 crew members who had taken voluntary redundancy had wrongly been included in the ballot count. She singled out the chairwoman of the local branch of the union for wrongly advising staff who knew they were leaving BA that they could still participate in the ballot. The judge said that Lizanne Malone, the chairwoman of Unite’s cabin crew section — British Airlines Stewards and Stewardesses Association (BASSA) — had wrongly posted a statement on the BASSA website encouraging those staff to vote.
That crucial piece of evidence and Unite’s decision to defend the BA injuction caused some misgiving among cabin crew members.

romans44

The quoted text must start with the word [QUOTE] and end with the word /QUOTE in square brackets [] for the quote box to appear!

[henkybaby]

Originally Posted by Skipness One Echo

I would say the culture is the problem and that is hand in glove with the people. They've swanned around thinking they were better than everyone and were worth way more money. Events and public reaction have shown that to be utter fantasy.

I would dare to say that the culture can be changed if necessary with the same people. I've done it. It is hard, but doable.

I refuse to believe that BA CC are arrogant idiots.

(Please do not come back with remarks about the meetings and the voting, that is simple mass psychology and we are all vulnerable to that. Think football.)

[Juan Tugoh]

Look , if you are going to use numbers you have to get them correct.
Alpineskier
sorry for the confusion
80% of the CC voted
92.49% voted yes ,take away the VR vote (assuming they were all yes) it came to 91.2%
7.51% voted no.

From The Times

In her ruling, Mrs Justice Laura Cox found that 811 crew members who had taken voluntary redundancy had wrongly been included in the ballot count

So if 811 members equates to 1.29% that would make the total BASSA membership 62,868 - pretty impressive for a company where only c14000 CC work.

Tricky things numbers. Please try a little harder.

[romans44]

There’s a great deal of information on this forum.

Have you seen this post written from the perspective of someone outside looking in – a very succinct analysis.
Cherwell
I have already read and replied to the post.

[romans44]

Juan togoh, those are the numbers....I was at the high Court when the lawyer read the ballot to the Judge. I am not making numbers up.
If you don't want to believe it I am afraid that is your call..

[Perry-oaks]

Quote:
And no, the people are not the problem.

I would say the culture is the problem and that is hand in glove with the people. They've swanned around thinking they were better than everyone and were worth way more money. Events and public reaction have shown that to be utter fantasy.

I think its more of a power struggle by the Bassa reps desperately trying to cling on to the influence they currently have.

In my opinion there may also be an element of revenge from the reps possibly at the accusations by BA of Bulling (allegedly), also the loss of the 'crew friendly' scheduler may have affected the number of money trips they operate (allegedly).

Either way the crew are being used as pawns in a futile power struggle with BA.

[Tiramisu]

Skipness One Echo,
Thanks for post #6383.
An interesting article.

[finncapt]

It has gone quiet on the February court case.

I am beginning to wonder whether BASSA has been advised that they are unlikely to obtain a favourable settlement.

That may explain why they went for the nuclear option of a 12 day strike over Christmas.

They may have hoped that events would turn so that they won before the court action.

[Sgnr de L'Atlantique]

Heads In The Sand!

Why do I get the impression that most people here on this forum are not open for a reality check, and they still want to believe the union BS the likes of BASSA and Unite want to make them belive.

Open your eyes people! And read Skipness one Eco's post CAREFULLY.

There is much talk of BA returning to the table and negotiating with BASSA. However what I urge BASSA to get their heads around is that their position is not seen to be in any way reasonable by almost everyone looking in from the outside. That is a clue. The culture within BA CC is clearly heavily unionsed and they support each others beliefs that this is all the fault of WW and bad management.

It's not. The world of Lord King and Colin Marshall is gone. The world of Concorde and The World's Favourite Airline is gone. The world of BA operating in the UK outside of London is also gone. This is the world of better looking, younger and fitter cabin crew who don not sound like throwbacks from the 1970s. This is the world of Emirates and Qatar.
This is a world of Air France / KLM as part of a powerful SkyTeam.
This is a world of Lufthansa overtaking you in size years ago and partnered under the (soon to be) newest Terminal at your home base. This is the world where STAR have the newest and most modern facilities at Heathrow.
This is the world of Swiss back on GVA-LHR.
This is the world of SN Brussels back on BRU-LHR.
This is the world where both of the above are survivors on market rates and flexible business models, born out of the ashes of dead flag carriers.

Other people came along and did it for less, and in many cases they are doing it better. So you can hold onto your pampered salaries and fly those old Jumbos until they life expire because by God you will never make enough money to replace them with that pension deficit.

BA continues to get smaller every year. Gatwick's next for the chop. No way is WW going to replace those clapped out B737s. Once they're ready to go, Gatwick will go to, easyJet just moves in route by route with new A319s and a simpler more dynamic cost structure. The only place BA ever made money worth mentioning is Heathrow, and right now, your competitors are on the phone to all your Executive Club customers, mail shooting the travel departments and scmoozing the boardrooms.

This militant crap is destined to drag on through to February. Why in the name of God would anyone risk their summer holidays in such risky times by booking with BASSA Airways?

Time to dust off the BA Citiflyer AOC and do a Crossair.
Hint : Google Swissair post 9/11

[TorC]

Originally Posted by henkybaby

As a passenger I would benefit from a solution that means I have both a happy, well trained, enthusiastic cabin crew and a healthy airline I can rely on.
.....................................
Lets not call each other names or use negative exceptions to "prove" points. Separate the people from the problem. And no, the people are not the problem.

Henkybaby

Yep, I see your reasoning. Indeed, we would ALL benefit.

I wish I felt that I had the means with which to try and attempt the kind of base-level change you are talking about. Perhaps the next time I encounter a moaner, I could try to get to the root cause of their unhappiness, if I have the time. The trouble for me is, the moment the moan starts, I close-off, as I'm sick and tired of hearing it so often. If these moaners could put even half the energy into actually doing their job, as they do moaning, we would have more awards than places to put them.

I wonder how the kind of change you talk of might be achieved in our environment where we have a "remote" workforce where one can go for months without meeting someone you have previously worked with. We also work under a different "manager" (ie: CSD or Purser) pretty much everytime we come into work. And with there being 13000 or so of us, whatever messages are put-out can so easily become distorted.

I guess this thing would maybe have to start-off with small numbers of enthused people, willing to take the message out and spread it around, explain it and to try and get others onboard. But it really is very very difficult to say anything pro-BA at the moment.

We are talking of huge fundamental changes here, the sort of thing companies probably pay experts in this field a lot of £s for. Is there any literature that you can suggest? I really would like to try and understand this more, if only for myself.

At the moment, as much as I'd welcome such changes, I do tend to agree with Skipness One Echo.

I would say the culture is the problem and that is hand in glove with the people. They've swanned around thinking they were better than everyone and were worth way more money. Events and public reaction have shown that to be utter fantasy.

His post does sadly reflect the behaviour of quite a sizeable number of my colleagues.

[plodding along]

I hate to agree but moaning is a way of life for BA cc, not in a nasty way, many joke they get training in it!

Every flight is too early or too late, too long or too short, too busy or too quiet. Not worth enough money, on the wrong day, to a rubbish hotel etc etc.

They can't help it, bit like I moan about everything else in life, especially after reading the hate mail.

A friend of mine is one of life's happy people, he copes with a life of back pain by saying at least he's not a Rwandan refugee!

It's a cultural thing, very hard to change, especially when having to adapt to the current economical climate.

Any BA crew, go stand by the CRC coffee bar for 10 minutes and see how some of the crew treat the staff, then watch to see how many can be bothered to clear their cups and mess from the tables afterwards.

Go on try it for 10 minutes, you may be surprised.

[AlpineSkier]

@romans44

Initially I found your posts worthwhile and with some attempt to convey a different side to the argument, but since this nonsense with the numbers that both Juan Togo and I have have attempted to put to you, I really don't know if you are semi-numerate or just simeone dispatched from the CC forum to play the fool.

[cloudbasezero]

Good pint Finn Capt

The stakes were high, the rolled the dice.

I think maybe they are going to be left with red faces in the long term, and I dont mean red with anger.