AFA Committee Focus Month: Inflight Service

Welcome to November!  Every day, we step onto our aircraft prepared to handle any situation as first responders and trained safety professionals. At the same time, so much of the pride we take in our profession comes from the warmth and hospitality we deliver to our passengers on every flight. Delivering a memorable, welcoming experience for our passengers is central to who we are as Flight Attendants, and it directly fuels the ongoing success of our airlines and the long-term security of our careers.

For that passenger experience to truly shine, the onboard service specifications, procedures, and workflows created by management must be practical and realistic for working crews. Well-designed service flows allow us to connect with our passengers, support one another, and take genuine pride in our work without feeling overwhelmed or rushed.

This month, as part of our ongoing AFA Committee Focus Month series, we’re excited to spotlight our Inflight Service Committee! Throughout November, we’ll take a closer look at how our Committee Members—fellow Flight Attendants who volunteer to represent us—serve as our collective voice to management, protect crew well-being, support workload management, and ensure every service procedure is genuinely doable.

Bringing Frontline Perspective to Inflight Service

If you’ve ever been in the middle of working a flight and wondered how a new service procedure was put together, there is no doubt it was designed by management—though hopefully, they sought out feedback from our Committee and took our insights into consideration before finalizing their plan. That’s precisely where our Inflight Service Committee steps in: bridging the gap between management’s concepts and our shared, real-world experience on the line.

Our Inflight Service Committee is made up of our fellow Flight Attendants who volunteer their time to represent us. They’re our collective voice to management, working to ensure that frontline reality shapes every service decision. Working through your Local Committee helps build our collective power, turning individual experiences into unified strength across the system. Our Committee Members serve as subject-matter experts and direct liaisons to management, reviewing proposed menu updates, catering changes, cabin refreshes, and galley packing.

Our Roadmap For November

We’ve put together an engaging, four-week program throughout November to give everyone a transparent look into how our Committee advocates for us. Here’s what we have planned:

• This Week (Overview & Committee Roles): Get to know our MEC Inflight Service Committee Chairpersons, explore our representational structure, and review our committee’s duties and responsibilities.
• Week 2 (How We Advocate): Take a look inside our regular meetings with management, see how we navigate operational differences across our two distinct Collective Bargaining Agreements (CBAs) for Alaska and Hawaiian Flight Attendants, and explore how we push for solutions to catering and service pain points.
• Week 3 (What Is Feasibility?): Learn how our Committee evaluates new management initiatives, advocates for test flights staffed by working Flight Attendants, and works to fix outdated or broken procedures.
• Week 4 (Reporting & Tracking): Discover how Flight Attendant-submitted feedback directly powers our Committee’s advocacy, and learn how to use Block2Block catering reports, safety submissions, and direct committee communications effectively.

Watch: Introducing Our Inflight Service Committee

We invite you to kick off the month by watching our new intro video featuring MEC Inflight Service Committee Chairpersons Chase Vandergrift (Alaska brand) and Bianca McKee (Hawaiian brand). Chase and Bianca take us behind the scenes to show how our Committee evaluates service feasibility, advocates for realistic galley and cart setups, and uses Member feedback to support working Flight Attendants on every flight.

Building a Stronger Onboard Experience Together

Inflight service advocacy is all about making sure our daily work environment supports both passenger hospitality and our own well-being as Flight Attendants. Every time you report missing catering or give feedback using Block2Block on your IMD, you provide our Union with the exact data needed to support our push to fix the issues the keep us from doing our work effectively.

Our Union’s advocacy is strongest when we work together. We encourage everyone to keep filing Block2Block reports whenever catering or equipment issues happen, connect with your Local Inflight Service Committee, and stay updated on our Committee’s work by visiting afaalaska.org/inflightservice. If you’d like to lend your experience to our advocacy, we invite you to explore volunteer opportunities at afaalaska.org/volunteer.