Big change at Thomas Cook
 

Rumours in the industry are saying that Thomas Cook are about to impose large cuts to the pay and conditions of its pilot and Cabin Crew workforce. This in addition to already announced substantial redundancies and demotions.
It seems that the company may have withdrawn from discussions with the Pilot union Balpa.
Indeed there is belief that the company may actually close down the UK airline entirely and buy capacity on other carriers and thus divest itself of the costs of owning its own airline.
This could well be one of the main cost cutting strands of Group Chief Executive Officer Harriet Green. Indeed Christoph Debus Group Head of Air Travel in a communication with the Cabin Crew union over a reduction in their conditions said "If our in-house airlines cannot offer air travel at competitive rates then I will source that air travel elsewhere"
It remains to be seen whether there is truth to these rumours and what the workers response will be.

TCX people were waiting for the letter today; it didn't come.

Response to the rumoured proposals? What do you think?

So what is the letter going to say.....? Someone must have had a sneak preview...

If they close down the airline where are they going to find the hundreds of thousands of seats ?! £40million plus revenue from the cabin ?!
Not going to happen !

The out sourcing to Ezy may have pointed them in that direction....I hope not.

Sounds like they're playing hardball to attempt a watering down of the existing t&c's. the big question is will the workforce accept it for long term job security or fight for short term gain?

You make it sound like decent T's and C's and job security are mutually exclusive? The airline and pilot workforce were not the reason why the tour operator got in trouble and handing a few concessions to the management will not make a jot of difference to the survival or otherwise of the group. And I hardly call holding on to what we already have as short term gain, do you?

....because management know that winning industrial "negotiations" is a given these days when Balpa are representing the other side.

Flight crew t's and c's are easy meat that yield high cost savings with very little time wasted on brinkmanship. Tell Balpa that the airline is struggling in these hard times and they roll over in fear that their pension pot won't be topped up by subs of potentially redundant pilots.

Result = management productivity bonus + balpa final salary pension demise averted. Phew!

Join the PPU, make a difference and stop the rot!

I'm not so sure that would work. If you knew the individuals who tire endlessly on behalf TCX pilots...wonderful people.

Maybe, but you don't know the guys behind the PPU!! First rate people I can assure you with a very proven track record.

It would be really helpful if you could give some good examples of their proven track record?

Well at least some of them were responsible our inflation busting pay uplift of 2003.

I was really looking for something a little more recent?

Not exactly sure what you are after. A number of these guys served on various VACC's and achieved some good to excellent results. They have been inactive, from a union point of view, to now. Realizing that BALPA is, or at least has become a dinosaur of an outfit interested far more in feathering their own nests and looking after their very handsome gold-plated pension schemes rather than acting in their members best interests, they felt that change was needed. This change comes in the form of the PPU.

Will this work? time will tell. I know the people involved and under their leadership it has as much chance as any other and more than most. Guess we will have to wait and see.

Only a couple of problems.

A)TCX pilots can't join the ppu yet.
B) PPU isn't recognised at TCX so can't negotiate.
C) PPU won't even attempt to intervene until they have 75% membership.

Apart from that....

Oh and I don't fancy my legal advice coming from a call centre in Cyprus.

Assuming the postman delivered some of these letters today, was the news as bad as expected? An update from the OP (or any other TCX pilot) would be appreciated. This kind of T&C's "rewrite" is just not acceptable and could effect us all in the long run. Hope Balpa is going to show some backbone here and stand up to TCX.

Keeping my fingers crossed for you that it's not as bad as predicted.:uhoh:

I don't claim to be an expert but worked for one Uk Company long ago where they tore up the old contract and "offered" the pilots a new one - we had little choice but to accept or leave!

No, I guess it could have been much worse.

I don't think I'm giving any 'sensitive commercial information' away by writing nibble, nibble, nibble at Ts and Cs.

The crews just do not deserve it.

Put together what the atrocious management have already taken and are now proposing to take, the erosion of terms is significant! It won't look too great for any new joiners when they recruit ( if ever)