British Airways - CC Industrial Relations Mk V

[FlexSRS]

This is what the present issue boils down to;

Pilots: £2.79/hr. Tend to pretty much always go out and have dinner, even on a 12hr30 nightstop. Receipts exercise showed this. Hence 79% of hourly rate is tax free as that is what HMRC see as reasonable.

CCrew: Meal based allowance system. Tend not to go out, especially on SH. On a ZRH standover, about £500 allowances. Cost of a few pot noodles = £5. Hence only 1% spent, hence 99% taxable. Ok, so this is an extreme example to show the kind of numbers at one end of the spectrum. At the other end is an African trip where the whole amount may well be spent. So, you might end up with an average of about 50% being spent, but taking in to account all those crew who didn't even bother to participate, for various reasons including the fact that commuters don't pay tax so lots of them didn't bother, and in a very varied and disparate community there is not much desire to sacrifice a months allowances for the greater good. (its all about ME), I think the crew are about to get clobbered by the tax man.

You could see it coming a mile off. How were crew ever going to spend a GVA lunch payment on a there and back, never stepping off the plane, especially when most of them weren't even bothering, and most of the others weren't willing to help them out.

You reap what you sow...

[FlexSRS]

And a secondary point;

I can't believe BASSA still hasn't told crew their new tax rates!
(actually, I can very well believe it, sadly )

The only reasons I can think of are;

1) They are waiting to announce it at the rally on Monday, to help get everyone riled up and angry at BA. It will somehow be blamed on BA, BALPA or the Pilots. (who will be accused of getting a sweetheart deal)

2) They are waiting till after the rally, so that when crew realise how they have been let down, and let each other down, they won't be able to ask embarrassing questions of the leadership

3) They are still trying to think who they should blame, and are hoping the whole thing will go away.

Anyone care to email LALA lady and find out?

(just out of interest, does she pay uk tax..?)

[IYCSWICSWICW]

..actually Flex, you reap what has been sown by the elected reps..

..BASSA, have, yet again, failed their members. And this time they can't spin a victory, surely?

GF

[617sqn]

It's ok though, BASSA know all this


Frankly that is what I find so terrifying about all this mess.

BASSA have always resisted the idea of hourly rate.If it turns out cabin crew would have been better off on this and that would have been a more tax efficient way of being paid then that is disgraceful!!

Thank you for all your replies.Backed up what i thought actually but just wanted reassurement.

[La Pouquelaye]

No doubt it's a conspiracy between HMRC, Price Waterhouse Coopers, Willie Walsh, and the pilots anyway.......

Not to mention the shareholders, the communications media, the public at large, the disgruntled passengers, the banks, the man in the moon . . .

[ottergirl]

Back from work now so here goes a catch up

Ironically being 'cut loose' tends to mean, 'I'm tired, I'm going to bed' downroute on SH.

Sweeping generalisation! For what its worth I would estimate that I go out and eat 80% of the time. Sometimes the 'rapport' in the team doesn't quite justify it or I've done 3 sectors and spent 9 hours talking to several hundred people and am talked out. This month I have dined in BCN, ZRH, HAM and MAD. I am not, however, a post 1997 crew member struggling to pay my mortgage and am always careful not to put any pressure on my crew to go out in case they can't afford to. Cut loose to me means nightstopping without pilots! Next time one of my crew needs telling their uniform is too tight or their attitude below par I'll find an ex-military FO to sort them out!

You've always struck me as one of the more articulate posters on here. Could I ask you if that was a flippant comment, or if you understand why the future of JAL is actually quite important to BA and its partners?

In my experience, "losing face" is such a puerile third world concept.

Thank you, I think!? Yes Desertia, mainly flippant but the message stands. As for JAL, as a Customer Service Trainer I deliver business updates to the Cabin Crew community so feel confident I have a grasp on the issues and benefits to our alliance. In my experience, losing face is a global concept, here in the west we don't always acknowledge its impact. It is probably a key feature in gang behaviour.

Would cabin crew be better off on hourly rate?

I think I may just have opened a can of worms!!

Not a can of worms but there are certainly differing opinions. I belong to the CC Union which voted to accept it in principle but the deal wasn't quite the same as that offered to the pilots. As I recollect, theirs was tied up in a rationalisation of pay rates which shared the salary points out more evenly. Our rate was never finalised as the other union chose not to explore it. Certainly on Eurofleet, we have had occasion to be pleased about that since the 'sterling to Euro' rate fell out of bed as we would have lost out overall. For WW I believe that hourly rate is the only way that BA can envisage a bidding system having any chance of success so there is another incentive apart from HMRC. Have e-mailed Amicus to ask what our rate will be. As there was never an hourly rate negotiated, it's impossible to tell who would have won or lost!

Pausing for breath to read some more.

[Human Factor]

As I recollect, theirs was tied up in a rationalisation of pay rates which shared the salary points out more evenly.

Something like that. From the cabin crew point of view, other parts of their pay would probably need adjustment to retain the current "take-home" whilst moving to a pilot's type of "Time Away From Base" pay at the same rate as the pilots (no point in asking for any more as Gordon will get most of the extra).

This "adjustment" was one of the things on offer to BASSA before they stormed off last year and would have ensured that the average remuneration cabin crew member would not lose take-home pay. However, the above average remuneration cabin crew (senior lot doing high box payment trips) would potentially lose a fair bit. I'd be surprised if it is offered again by BA.

I wonder how the sums would have stacked up given the changes to tax levels? More importantly, I wonder if anyone in BASSA bothered even looking at it?

[yaletown]

I can just tell you in the States where they have the hourly rate, having worked there after leaving BA, one is lucky to earn $500 a month in hourly per diem pay. In Canada we still earn meal allowances and make quite a bit more. I used to slip in CDG as a french speaker, and under the American system my allowances did not even pay for my meals, and I wound up subsidizing my allowances with my pay in order to buy the cheapest meals in Paris. I would work 4 trips a month, being away from base for an average of 72 hours which would work out to $144 at $2 each hour away from base. Their per diem rates have not really changed much. It was crap. So for those of you who think that the hourly per diem rate is at all lucrative, you are sadly mistaken.

[malcolmf]

It's worth remembering that we pilots amalgamated some of the old allowances into our salaries, so they are visible to the taxman and therefore fully taxed.

[TopBunk]

MalcF

It's worth remembering that we pilots amalgamated some of the old allowances into our salaries, so they are visible to the taxman and therefore fully taxed.

Yes, but against that, they are also pensionable, and teh increased basic is paid whether on leave or sick and hence the bottom right hand corner of the pay slip varies much less.

[617sqn]

Which is why I asked why they would be taxed differently.

The amount taxable would vary but would they be treated differently?
Would the individuals' tax rate be the same for both schemes?
Why would allowances be taxed more harshly than hourly pay wouldn't the same tax band apply?

Friday night had a G and T so maybe that has muddled my thinking!!

[TopBunk]

BB

If someone can post the figures on here when they get their letter from HMRC that would be most helpful. My guess is LHR shorthaul 40% tax free, LHR longhaul 50% tax free, LGW 30% tax free. Quite a drop from the 82% crew have enjoyed to date. New rates effective 1st Feb 2010.

I don't believe that they enjoy 82% tax free to date. My recollection from the old days (pre-TAFB) was that LHR Shorthaul pay tax on 41% and Longhaul on 36%. To put into the same basis, all Flight Crew pay tax on 18% rising to 21% from Feb 1st after the receipts based exercise.

So your guess for Cabin Crew would be LHR Shorthaul to 41%-> 60% and Longhaul to 36% -> 50% taxable.

[Flap33]

Malcolmf...

... you are absolutely right, however the BASSA spin will be that once again the pilots have been given a "sweetheart" deal. BASSA will no doubt create this diversion in order to take attention away from their failings!

Also, as had been mentioned in a previous post the concept of an hourly rate would benefit the vast majority of crew that would be much better financially positioned if their income was more stable each month rather than the eratic style they have at the moment. I know that on long-haul crew use their request trips for NRT, HKG, SIN in order to give themselves a "good month". The crew who would be worse off are those who regularly visit the above destinations.... the Reps!

You couldn't make it up, will be interesting to see how BASSA play this out.

[flybymerchant]

Hourly rate

Sorry Yaletown, but I think you may have missed the point....

This is not about what the [I]actual[I]hourly rate would be...that would be entirely negotiable (sorry there's that word again!)....OK then...BA would IMPOSE an hourly rate (will we complain about positive financial imposition, it is imposition after all?!) very similar to what the pilots get, which is £2.79/hour, which is well over twice what you were getting when you worked in the U.S.

Also, if Paris was your trip of most hardship on those allowances, (where they didn't [I]quite[I]cover your meal costs) I'd bet that you feasted like a king and took spare cash home from the majority of other trips.

The point of the hourly rate is that it averages out the allowances. In BA now there is much speculation as to why the BASSA reps and other very senior CC members only seem to fly to highly lucrative destinations (£1000 allowances) whilst the other 12,000 crew who abide by the rules, maintaining their integrity (and not effectively stealing money away from fellow 'colleagues') get paid sometimes as little as £100 allowances (figure compiled by hearsay) and NEVER get to go to the high(er) paid destinations as they do not know/bribe the people in rostering.

Also, your 4 trips a month, averaging 72 hours 'away from base' works out as 18 hours per trip.....which would only work out as a 'there-and-back'. I'm thinking your time away from base is not only less than 50% a generous as BAs, but also seems to stop paying out when you're off the aircraft. Our most benevolent company (which many fail to recognise as a particularly generous and considerate employer) pays our time-away-from-base allowance all the time that we are...errrr...away from....err base.

BA pilots are very happy with their pay structuring - it's only BASSA and the guys who stand to lose the most (those who only fly big-allowance trips) who told the BA Cabin Crew to be scared of it.

[wobble2plank]

Next time one of my crew needs telling their uniform is too tight or their attitude below par I'll find an ex-military FO to sort them out!

Ahh, Ottergirl, that's nothing to do with leadership that is your job!

Anyway enough of that rubbish, back to the debate!

When exactly are BASSA planning to break the good news to their membership I wonder?

[ottergirl]

Stop Press

Eurofleet current tax rate paid on 46% of allowances.

[Matt101]

Originally Posted by TopBunk

BB

I don't believe that they enjoy 82% tax free to date....

Possibly talking about LGW where the hourly rate is currently only 18% taxable.

To be honest I'd be surprised if LGW came off badly from it as they do tend to spend their allowances however if this was represented in the month HMRC were checking... who knows...

[wobble2plank]

Eurofleet current tax rate paid on 46% of allowances.

Hmm and flight crew on a different tax rate! 79% verses 46%, I wonder how long the spin machine will take to claim that HMRC is in the pocket of BALPA this time!

[yaletown]

Flybymerchant,

I was with Continental as a French speaker where one exclusively did CDG and BRU only. We would do 4, 3 day trips a month. Flying from EWR, it is not a there and back, but a 3 day trip as it was long haul. How allowances are paid in North America on the hourly system is this, you get your $2 an hour from check in until check out. That is how it works. One would check in for CDG at EWR on a Friday lets say at 1700, then clear back at base at 1530, just as an example. So from 1700 on the Friday until 1530 on the Sunday, you would be earning $2 an hour in allowances and that was it.All flying in the States is paid allowances this way..from check in until check out. I think you may want to familiarize yourself with this wretched system they are under in the States, because that is the model Mr Walsh is trying to emulate as it is the one that is the cheapest and worst.

Cityflyer is at 2 quid an hour; where do you think they are getting this per diem template from? They got this whole hourly per diem idea from the States where they cheaped out on their crews years ago. Wake up.

[Human Factor]

Yaletown,

That is the system that the pilots and LGW cabin crew are on, albeit the amounts differ.