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[L-AS] REVISED Pyramid Pay/Payroll Issues Update

This message is for pre-merger Alaska Airlines Flight Attendants

[Note: AFA has reissued this communication with additional information regarding pyramiding pay due to membership feedback.]

AFA is working daily on payroll issues.  In January 2018 we mediated payroll issues with management which was overseen by Arbitrator Horowitz.  Many of the payroll resolutions were published in the MEC Grievance Committee Update for Quarter 1, 2018 on February 23, 2018.  Here’s the latest update:

  1. The MEC appointed a Payroll Representative who works under the MEC Grievance Committee, Kiara Jenkins.  She began work on June 1, 2018 and is responsible for  advocating for Flights Attendants in regard to payroll issues. Please contact her if it is  believed there is an outstanding payroll issue that needs resolution.
  2. Grievance 36-99-2-208-17: Violation of §11.G.4 Compensation for Picked Up Reserve Days, was retroactively sustained.  AFA requested the payroll department audit the past three years of this violation and pay those wrongly denied 1 TFP if a reserve day is converted to ER, and s/he is subsequently not used.  The payouts are being paid out periodically since May 2018 and will continue until the full audit is complete.
  3. JCTE is not paying the greater of actual or scheduled for trips scheduled to release after midnight but that subsequently release prior to midnight. This seems to happen mostly when the original trip contains minimum pay rules (MPRs).  AFA is requesting that JCTE be programmed so that the value of the trip does not drop below the original value.  The fix is expected to be delivered to the payroll analysts for test next week.  If the test goes well the fix will be released into production in early August 2018.
  4. The ability for crew members to see rosters going back three months is still not programmed despite AFA’s continued requests.  It is a core Jeppesen change which is taking time. Management advised that this correction should be made sometime in Q4 2018.  Payroll is sending out notifications to all Flight Attendants’ company email to remind Flight Attendants to print her or his schedule prior to its disappearance.
  5. JCTE is incorrectly applying and/or removing minimum pay rules (MPRs) on trips that have been split at a SIP point.  The Company will investigate whether this issue has been fixed by the latest release of the program.  Crew Scheduling is going to handle this manually until fixed.  Management is researching a permanent fix date.
  6. As published in the last update, Activity Claim Forms will not be disputed by management if the screen shot is not provided, however, the Company reserves the right to research the underlying error and recover any overpayment form the Flight Attendant.  In Washington, this research mush be completed, and a decision reached, within 90 days of the pay issue date in dispute for funds to be returned to the Company.   Presently we are in dispute over the other states; for instance, in California funds, once paid, cannot be required to be returned to the Company without the employee’s approval.  There is a caveat for requesting pay however, if a Flight Attendant requests pay s/he is not due, s/he could be brought in for an investigation.  To protect the Flight Attendant’s interests, if it is possible, we recommend keeping evidence which proves the request the Flight Attendant is making.
  7. The Company was delayed in its reporting back on its position on pyramiding pay* issues. It eventually reported back on March 13, 2018, and agreed that all pay provisions of the Collective Bargaining Agreement pyramid** except for reassignments and over duty do not pyramid** with each other.  Presently we are working on restitution based on this agreement.  AFA is advocating for the quickest and most advantages outcome for all Flight Attendants.  We will report back when a final resolution is decided.

*     Pyramiding pay = A pay application in which hours (i.e. TFP credit) are counted more than once for the purpose of ‘overtime’ (i.e. premium pay).

**   Pyramid (verb) = To pay more than one premium based on the same TFP credit (i.e. to stack more than one premium pay application on the same flying/TFP).

Example:

A Seattle Flight Attendant flies a San Diego turn worth 6.0 TFP on a holiday. Due to delays, the Flight Attendant experiences a 12:45 duty day.

S/he will be paid 5.0 TFP at double time (2.0x) and pyramiding pay of 1.0 TFP at triple time (3.0x) because the double time (2.0x) holiday premium pyramids with the double time (2.0x) over-duty premium due to duty exceeding 12:30. (See Section 21.H [Compensation: Holiday Premium] and Section 8.F.1 [Hours of Service: Over-Duty Pay.)

Note that the pyramiding double time (2.0x) of holiday pay and double time (2.0x) of over-duty pay results in triple time (3.0x) and not quadruple time (4.0x) because the 1.0 TFP is paid only once at straight time (1.0x) but is counted separately for holiday premium and over-duty pay.

Here is the math:

Holiday pyramiding pay: 2.0x holiday premium – 1.0x straight pay = 1.0x holiday pyramiding pay

Over-duty pyramiding pay: 2.0x over-duty pay – 1.0x straight pay = 1.0x over-duty pyramiding pay

Total pyramiding pay: 1.0x straight pay + 1.0x holiday pyramiding pay + 1.0x over-duty pyramiding pay = 3.0x pyramiding pay

AFA is hearing chatter wondering why AFA isn’t filing lawsuits on the pay issues.  The reason is two-fold: first, we use the arbitration process pursuant to our collective bargaining agreement and the Railway Labor Act; and second, most if not all, payroll issues AFA brought forward to the Company were agreed to by the Company and that continues to be the case.

If there are any additional payroll issues that come to light, please don’t hesitate to reach out to Kiara Jenkins at payroll@afaalaska.org.

In Solidarity,

Your MEC – Jeffrey Peterson, Brian Palmer, Linda Christou, Lisa Pinkston, Terry Taylor, Mario de’Medici, Melissa Osborne, Tim Green, Brice McGee; and MEC Grievance Committee Chairperson Stephanie Adams

[L-AS] Parking Stipend Errors

This message is for pre-merger Alaska Airlines Flight Attendants

AFA was advised of management errors in processing the $75 parking stipend that is a negotiated part of the Joint Collective Bargaining Agreement (JCBA).  If you requested, but did not receive, your parking stipend for the months of May and/or June, please contact your base supervisor immediately and cc your LEC Officers.

As a reminder, if you were part of the WageWorks commuter program you should have been reimbursed for the month of May, which means your $75 stipend did not start until the payout month of June.

AFA is working with management to get the issue resolved as quickly as possible.

In Solidarity,

Your MEC – Jeffrey Peterson, Brian Palmer, Linda Christou, Lisa Pinkston, Terry Taylor, Mario de’Medici, Melissa Osborne, Tim Green, Brice McGee; and MEC Grievance Committee Chairperson Stephanie Adams

[L-VX] Introducing Your MEC Scheduling Committee Vice Chairperson – Legacy Virgin America

This message is for pre-merger Virgin America Flight Attendants

Your Council 18 and 35 Presidents as well as other members of your Master Executive Council (MEC) conducted interviews earlier this month for the new MEC Scheduling Committee Vice Chairperson—Legacy Virgin America position. The MEC would like to thank the candidates who demonstrated willingness to represent our Flight Attendants. After thorough deliberation, SFO-based Flight Attendant Bianca Dew has been appointed to the position.

About Bianca

Bianca began her position with Virgin America in 2015 as an SFO-based Inflight Teammate, which is also where she is currently based. After working on the line for some time Bianca upgraded to the role of an Inflight Team Lead, then proceeded to gain some more working knowledge as a Flight Attendant before upgrading to an Air Transportation Supervisor. Prior to coming to Virgin America, Bianca earned her AA in Behavioral Science and a BS in Kinesiology. Her previous role before becoming a flight attendant, was in finance as a mortgage loan specialist/banker. Bianca currently resides in Washington and in her free time she enjoys hiking, reading, a variety of outdoor activities, and traveling.

About The Position

The MEC Scheduling Committee Vice Chairperson – Legacy Virgin America works under the umbrella of the MEC Scheduling Committee and is responsible for working with management to advocate for Flight Attendant interests in all matter pertaining to Legacy Virgin America Flight Attendant schedules.  Additional information about the position can be found by clicking here.

In Solidarity,

Your MEC – Jeffrey Peterson, Brian Palmer, Linda Christou, Lisa Pinkston, Terry Taylor, Mario de’Medici, Melissa Osborne, Tim Green, Brice McGee; and MEC Scheduling Committee Chairperson Jake Jones

[L-AS] Open Time Grievance

This message is for pre-merger Alaska Airlines Flight Attendants

On May 17, AFA filed grievance #36-99-2-130-18, requesting that Alaska Airlines management investigate the circumstances regarding the Company’s alleged violation of Section 12.C.3 “Trading Procedures”.  The grievance contends that the Company’s Jeppesen Crew Access (JCA) Open Time Trading System failed to synchronize time across the system, resulting in some users being able to complete their tasks while others are temporarily blocked from trades, pick-ups and/or drops.

After investigating the concern, management provided the following email response:

Jeppesen found two issues that need to be resolved.  The first issue has to do with the worker processes that handle the request and what it thinks is the current time, which is stored in a variable Jeppesen refers to as “NOW”.  Each worker process has its own NOW variable and if a worker process has been idle, its NOW variable gets out of date and when the first request comes in, for example when Open Time trading begins, it still believes the Trade window is still closed because NOW lags behind the system time.    The second issue is the Transaction Report timestamp is the time it logs the transaction is logged and not the NOW time.

Jeppesen has proposed the following solutions to address these two issues. The first is the worker processes will ensure the NOW variable is updated with the latest system time, rounded down to the minute (Note:  The NOW time granularity is at the minute level), so if a worker process has been idle, it will have the current system time.   The second change is to add the system time used in the processing of the request to the message so the FA and the transaction log knows what the system time is.  For example “Trip window has not yet opened for 24198” will be changed to something like “Time HH:MM, trip window has not yet opened for 24198”.  Jeppesen and AS believes these changes will resolve the issue.

Jeppesen will be providing an update in the next week concerning the interim solution.  We are expecting Alaska Airlines management to sustain the grievance and work with us on improving your Open Time processing.

In Solidarity,

Your MEC – Jeffrey Peterson, Brian Palmer, Linda Christou, Lisa Pinkston, Terry Taylor, Mario de’Medici, Melissa Osborne, Tim Green, Brice McGee; and MEC Scheduling Committee Chairperson Jake Jones

The Dues Pie Chart—Where Do My Dues Go?

Note from your Master Executive Council (MEC): This information was prepared by AFA International as a resource for Flight Attendants.

Click to enlarge

The Dues Pie Chart depicts where all funds at AFA are budgeted. About 80% of dues dollars are directly allocated to fund the work at each airline, i.e. Local Councils, Master Executive Councils, Negotiations, and System Board.  The remaining budgets at the International Office support Government Affairs, Air Safety, EAP, and Communications Departments, each of which provides expert services that are Flight Attendant focused and provide resources for the local leaders and committees of Flight Attendants at each airline. 100% of our dues dollars are allocated to priorities that provide Flight Attendant representation.

There are four distinct areas where dues money is spent:

Local and Airline-Specific

Each base has a Local Executive Council (LEC) with elected Officers who provide direct representation and deal with local grievances and other issues. These Local Officers will answer your phone calls and make sure member interests are represented in front of management. For example, in the event of discipline or a contract violation, Local Officers will address the issue where it happened and work to get swift resolution. Additionally, elected Master Executive Council (MEC) Officers provide representation at the corporate level. At both the LEC and MEC, there are committees that solve problems in areas such as safety, schedules, hotels, grievances, etc. These committees also enforce the contract specific to their area of expertise, produce newsletters, and participate in union meetings. The role of your LEC and MEC Officers and committee representatives at each airline is to ensure you are represented by Flight Attendants who know your job because they share it with you at your airline. AFA promotes this autonomy at each airline where your representatives, assisted by experts, negotiate with management and develop and maintain the relationship between airline management and the Union.

Negotiations

Bargaining for pay and working conditions is one of the core representation activities performed by the Union. We start with a membership survey, schedule meetings with management, conduct caucuses with the committee, develop contractual language, support membership engagement and information programs, and we work with AFA-CWA professional negotiators throughout the process including all direct negotiations/mediation with management. The end result is improved contractual language with higher pay, better working conditions, and improved benefits.

System Board (Grievances)

The first step in any grievance is to try to resolve the matter locally. Some airlines have negotiated an alternative dispute process for a faster, collaborative resolution. If that fails, then the final stage for resolution, whether disciplinary or contractual, is an appeal to a neutral arbitrator. An AFA-CWA attorney will work with our Grievance Committee to present our case to the neutral arbitrator. We defend the contracts we negotiate.

International Office Support

While your LEC is the face of the Union to local management and the MEC to corporate management, the International Office is the public persona and brand of the Union. Our presence and name recognition can legislate or improve federal regulations, remove obstacles from the bargaining table, better our position in negotiations and improve our experience on the job across the profession. The International Office maintains the professional staff of attorneys, negotiators, and other personnel that provide administration, accounting and membership services to members and elected leaders. We all work together to support the programs that encompasses our profession.

Questions?

If you have questions about AFA dues, please contact your LEC President.

In Solidarity,

Your MEC – Jeffrey Peterson, Brian Palmer, Linda Christou, Lisa Pinkston, Terry Taylor, Mario de’Medici, Melissa Osborne, Tim Green and Brice McGee

Sick Leave Survey Closing Soon

There’s just 1 DAY LEFT to complete the Sick Leave Survey that will help shape future provisions. Our JNC is eager to hear your thoughts on which elements of our paid sick leave policy are most meaningful to you, as we strive to improve our support for your needs. The survey is currently open and will remain available until Tuesday, November 11 at Noon PT.

Council 30 (ANC) LEC Officer Election Results

Polls closed at 12 PM PT today for the election of Council 30 LEC Officers, representing Alaska Airlines Flight Attendants based in Anchorage. The following AFA Flight Attendants have been elected to Local Council Officer positions: LEC President: LeiLauni ScheidemanLEC Vice President: Heather ReierLEC Secretary: Anne Madsen View the certified election results here >> These newly elected officers […]

Apps To Help You Save Money On Food

Our AFA Employee Assistance Program (EAP)/Professional Standards Committee recognizes that Flight Attendants may be facing increasing challenges when it comes to accessing affordable food, whether on the road or at home. We want you to know that you are not alone. In response to these difficulties, we have compiled a list of apps to help […]

What You Need To Know About The FAA Capacity Cuts

The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) has announced plans for a 10% reduction in flight capacity across 40 markets, starting this Friday. According to news reports, these schedule reductions will begin on Friday and will gradually increase throughout the weekend until they reach the full 10% by the following week. Reports also suggest that all Alaska […]

Council 47 (LAX pmHA) LEC Officer Election Results

Polls closed at 12 PM PT today for the election of Council 47 LEC Officers, representing Hawaiian Airlines Flight Attendants based in Los Angeles. The following AFA Flight Attendants have been elected to Local Council Officer positions: LEC President: Joshua AokiLEC Vice President: Paul IkiokaLEC Secretary: Beth Hayes View the certified election results here >> These newly elected […]

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