A View From Inside American Airlines
Beat of Hawaii is fortunate to have such wonderful readers.
Following the recent post on our “first impression” experience with A.A., we heard from a reader, who is also a working American Airlines flight attendant. I found this candid take compelling and wanted to share it, front and center:
Let me fill you in on a few items from the other side of the dolly trolly. Other work groups (as well as flight attendants) are now on their 5th year of pay cuts that were forced upon us by our own unions and accomplished by holding back SEC filings by managment. Flight Attendants took an actual pay cut of 17%, with benefit cuts it comes closer to 30%; conversely, AA executives have had bonuses EVERY year. All work groups are in contract negotations that may take years before settled. Why have we been holding on? The economy (where are we going?), the hope that we may get retro pay, we need the contractual raise so that we can complete our “best of 4″ (your retirement is based on your best 4 years of work plus other factors), and of course some of us actually like to fly.
Now, why is service not up to par onboard? We are down to FAA minimums of flight attendants working the flight, a marketing department that can’t make up its mind what it wants to sell on board, the Flight Attendants working your flight are suffering from lack of sleep, no food, having to work twice as much to make ends meet. You try to be chipper and glee when passengers treat you like crap and you work for a company that treats you worse.
Make it better for yourself on any airline. Be responsible for your own belongings, bring a sandwich, a bottle of water and a polar fleece jacket (no mater where your traveling!). Don’t let children travel alone, buy a seat for your child (yes, I mean all children- lap children are not fair for those sitting around you and it is unsafe) . Don’t treat the airplane like an open garbage can. No one wants to hear your audio – no Jr. can not play Barney out loud! Don’t wrap your coat around the back of your seat – that space belongs to the guy behind you.
It’s a different time. Travel has changed. It will get better someday – but it’s will never be like it was.
Aloha – thanks for the vent.
Thanks for the fabulous report from inside AA!
First To Report the Web's Best Hawaii Deals Plus Industry News and More. We Are All Travel, No Ads, Hawaii Based. 
I, too, am a flight attendant for a major U.S. carrier. The author really hit the mark – I agree with all of his/her comments. I would also add that because of the 30% pay cuts, most of us fly a lot more than our base schedule. So the majority are flying 7- 10 days at a time with 12-15 hour workdays and usually very short layovers (often too short to get any where near 8 hours of sleep). So the workforce is actually literally exhausted and fatigued. Yet most of us seem to have found a way to ‘fake it’ and still do our jobs – maintain our safety duties and also remain courtious to the public. No raise in 5 years on top of a 30% pay cut. It’s tough, but I think we’re all hanging on for things to get a little better because though we may dislike the profession as it is today, we loved the profession before 9/11 and the chaos that followed for our industry.
Chris