Grievance Committee

• Our Grievance Committee works to protect all Flight Attendants from arbitrary and unjust disciplinary action and to uphold our collective bargaining agreement.  This update provides a short summary of the committee’s work over the past few quarters.
• Management has issued discipline lately for a variety of reasons.  Read on for more information about the reasons why management is disciplining and terminating Flight Attendants.
• If you’ve faced a situation that you believe might be a contractual violation, please report the issue through the AFA Alaska Online Support Center.  AFA Representatives review each report submitted and will follow up to help you determine options and a course of action.

Our Grievance Committee has been very hard at work ensuring disciplinary due process and contractual compliance on your behalf. The contract requires a minimum of 13 arbitration dates yearly to dispute discipline/termination cases and contractual issues. Termination cases are usually given first priority in order to return a Flight Attendant back to work as soon as possible; however, we seek a balance between discipline and contractual cases. AFA and management mutually decide which cases to arbitrate next based on many factors. 

Steps of discipline are confirmation of oral warning (COW), written warning (WW), suspension (varied number of days) to termination. COWs, WWs, and suspensions remain in a Flight Attendant’s file for 18 months, and then are removed. If a Flight Attendant is in a step of discipline and gets another violation, the new violation will build on the previous violation.  Management doesn’t always progressively travel up the steps of discipline. If management investigates a Flight Attendant for theft or abuse of sick leave, for example, management will terminate the Flight Attendant if there is evidence to support its findings; if there is no evidence, then the Flight Attendant will most likely be issued a record of discussion (ROD). A ROD is not considered discipline. There is no middle ground for certain violations.  

Many Flight Attendants are under the impression that if they’ve been an overall good employee, have no to low attendance points, good kudos, decent seniority, etc., that they will not receive discipline. This is not the case; regardless of any good work qualities you may have, if management believes the Flight Attendant committed an offense, they will receive discipline.

If a supervisor or manager calls and asks questions pertaining to a flight, work issue, or disciplinary issue and no AFA representative is on the call, you should assert that you would like an AFA rep on the call. 

Subject of Most Recent Discipline

• Sick leave and FMLA abuse. Terminations are on the rise due to travel audits among other things. Anything written in the comments/remarks on posted trip trades and personal drops can be seen, even if eventually deleted. If management determines abuse it results in termination.  
• Theft. Removing anything from the aircraft other than an opened/used bottle of water, unused pilot crew meal or purchased food will result in termination.  
• Timecard fraud. Examples: Intentionally delaying boarding door closure to obtain sit pay.  Management has terminated for this violation.
• Reserve “Roulette”. Not being within two hours of base for your Reserve Availability Period (RAP) and calling in sick only once given an assignment. The Company considers this a terminable violation. Management regularly reviews the trip trade postings and history related to sick calls. Even deleted trade history or postings can be seen by management.
• Lying in an investigation
• Drug/Alcohol violations
• Harassment
• Reserves commuting during Reserve Availability Period (RAP) even if self-assigned a trip and/or not being in base for the entirety of reserve period. Management has terminated for this reason several times. Management regularly reviews commuting history and whether a Flight Attendant is in base for their RAP.
• Social media violations including sending friend or follow requests to passengers on social media based on information gained from Block2Block.
• Commuter Violations
  • Flight Attendant released from DHD and used D8Y home
  • Flight Attendant used D8Y when they picked up out of base
  • Flight Attendant used D8Y to/from incorrect cities
  • Flight Attendant used D8Y for pleasure travel.  

Commuter audits are conducted monthly.

• Lost IMD or other required items
• Failing to complete CBT even if FA just forgets to hit the close out x at the top to switch it from in process to complete.
• Uniform Issues. Flight Attendants can and have been pulled from working their flights without pay for uniform non-compliance.
• Late to gate/flight delay

Recent Arbitration/Mediation

September 2022	Disciplinary Grievance
October 2022	Contractual Grievances
November 2022	Disciplinary Grievance
December 2022	Disciplinary Grievance
January 2023	Disciplinary Grievance
February 2023	Contractual Grievance
March 2023	Contractual Grievance

Recent Grievance Settlements

Grievances 36-99-2-1-22, 3-22, and 4-22 Christmas 2021 Grievances:

Grievance No.: 36-99-2-1-22-Violation of §8.D Check-In and Release. This grievance alleges the Company’s violation of Collective Bargaining Agreement §8.D [Hours of Service:  Check-In and Release], past practice, and all related sections of the Collective Bargaining Agreement when its Block to Block (B2B) check-in system doesn’t allow a Flight Attendant to check-in if they have an unacknowledged trip change requiring them to report as originally scheduled.

Details:  On February 11, 2022, I sent my original grievance response as follows: “In reviewing this grievance, we attempted to look into this alleged issue within B2B. Without an example however, we couldn’t determine that this was in fact what happens in B2B if a Flight Attendant has an unacknowledged trip change requiring them to report as originally scheduled. As such, this grievance is denied.” 

I am now amending my grievance response to Grievance 36-99-2-1-22 [Violation of §8.D Check-In and Release] to the following: We are aware of two Flight Attendants who were not able to check-in on Block to Block (B2B) during the last week of December 2021 because they had an unacknowledged trip change requiring them to report as originally scheduled. These two Flight Attendants’ circumstances were discussed and remedied shortly after the Company became aware of what happened and neither AFA nor the Company believe any further action is required to address this grievance other than to sustain this grievance under these narrow set of facts. 

Grievance No.: 36-99-2-3-22-Violation of §10.S Pre-Cancellations. This grievance alleges the Company’s violation of Collective Bargaining Agreement §10.S [Scheduling: Pre-Cancellations], past practice, and all related sections of the Collective Bargaining Agreement when on or about December 26, 2021, it did not accept or process Flight Attendant calls in a timely manner thereby usurping the Flight Attendants’ ability to utilize the contractual pre-cancellation language allowing them to receive and decline an alternate assignment; and it allowed the Company to reassign Flight Attendants. 

Details: My original grievance response, dated January 28, 2022, stated “In reviewing this grievance, we are aware that with 300+ flight cancellations during this timeframe, and the resulting call handling volume Inflight Crew Scheduling was working through, that some Flight Attendant calls were not accepted or processed in a timely manner. We are unaware of any specific situations where due to not having their phone call processed or accepted timely, a Flight Attendant wasn’t able to utilize the contractual pre- cancellation language allowing them to receive and decline an alternate assignment.” 

I am now amending my grievance response to Grievance 36-99-2-3-22 [Violation of §10.S Pre- cancellations] to the following: We are unaware of any Flight Attendant who attempted to call Crew Scheduling between approximately December 26, 2021 to December 30, 2021 regarding a pre- cancelation, and then was unable to get through due to increased call volume from irregular operations. During this time period, Alaska Airlines experienced hundreds of cancelations which forced many unplanned calls between Schedulers and Flight Attendants thus jamming up the phone lines at certain times. We are aware that some flight attendants were not able to immediately get through to Crew Scheduling during this period of time due to the increased call volume. If a Flight Attendant attempted to call Crew Scheduling as required regarding a pre-cancelation (10.S), and was unable to get through, we would sustain this grievance under these narrow set of facts. 

Grievance No.: 36-99-2-4-22-Violation of §8.D Check-In and Release. This grievance alleges the Company’s violation of Collective Bargaining Agreement §8.D [Hours of Service:  Check-In and Release], past practice, and all related sections of the Collective Bargaining Agreement when its designated check-in application (Block2Block) on the Flight Attendants’ Infight Mobile Device (IMD) displayed cancelled trips that were not cancelled in Crew Access thereby inhibiting check-in for their trips and assessing them a No Show and 3 (three) attendance points.  Flight Attendants were unable to check in manually via a call to Crew Scheduling as it had excessive wait times

Details: AFA will withdraw this grievance due to no identifiable harmed parties.

Grievances Recently Mediated

Grievances 36-99-2-230-21, 234-21 and 233-22, COVID Grievances: 

Grievance No.: 36-99-2-230-21- Violation of §16 Sick Leave/On the Job Injury. This grievance alleges the Company’s violation of Collective Bargaining Agreement §16 [Sick Leave/On the Job Injury], past practice, and all related sections of the Collective Bargaining Agreement when it announced beginning on or about August 31, 2021, that it would grant pay protection per §21.M [Compensation: Pay Protection…] to vaccinated symptomatic and/or COVID+ Flight Attendants for scheduling obligations removed due to Company-directed quarantine in response to high-risk COVID-19 workplace exposures and deny pay protection under similar or the same circumstances for unvaccinated Flight Attendants or for Flight Attendants who decline to disclose their vaccination status and would instead require them to be removed from their scheduling obligations by forcing them onto sick leave and paid through their sick leave bank or accrued vacation pay if the sick leave bank was depleted. Neither §16 nor §21.M contains any exceptions or distinctions based on vaccination status, yet the Company failed to bargain with the Association and unilaterally implemented such non-contractual exceptions or distinctions inequitably across the collective bargaining unit.

Details: There were different provisions for different dates, vaccination status and symptom status. Management agreed to true up sick leave and points in some instances. Full details can be found in the LOA.

Grievance No.: 36-99-2-234-21-Violation of §21 Non-Negotiated Compensation. This grievance alleges the Company’s violation of Collective Bargaining Agreement §21 [Compensation], past practice, and all related sections of the Collective Bargaining Agreement when it announced on or about September 2, 2021, that it would pay $200.00 to each vaccinated Flight Attendant who provides proof of vaccination to the Company by October 15, 2021. Section 21 does not contain any exceptions or distinctions based on vaccination status, and the Company failed to bargain with the Association and unilaterally implemented such a non-contractual exception inequitably across the collective bargaining unit.

Details:  Management agreed vaccinated FAs can keep their $200, but they would not agree that unvaccinated with or without a medical or religious exemption would get $200.  

Grievance No.: 36-99-2-233-22-Violation of §16 Sick Leave/On the Job Injury. This grievance alleges the Company’s violation of Collective Bargaining Agreement §16 [Sick Leave/On the Job Injury], past practice, and all related sections of the Collective Bargaining Agreement when on or about May 11, 2022, it unilaterally implemented disparate quarantine procedures without adequate notice by posting and/or updating the Company intranet (“Alaska’s World”) with different quarantine requirements for symptomless vaccinated versus symptomless unvaccinated Flight Attendants. Alaska’s World articles do not provide adequate notice of a policy change to Flight Attendants, whereas such changes are communicated to Flight Attendants via required bulletins that must be read within 24-hour period prior to beginning of pairing, recurrent/requalification training, or reserve. Under this new policy, the Company requires symptomless unvaccinated Flight Attendants to be removed from their scheduling obligations by forcing them onto sick leave and paid through their sick leave bank or accrued vacation pay if the sick leave bank was depleted. Section 16 does not contain any exceptions or distinctions based on vaccination status, yet the Company failed to bargain with the Association and unilaterally implemented such non-contractual exceptions or distinctions inequitably across the collective bargaining unit.

Details: The Company agreed it will notify Flight Attendants of any changes to COVID-19 quarantine policies and procedures through required (“must-read”) bulletins. 

Grievance No.: 36-99-2-458-22- Violation of §8.D Check in and Debrief. This grievance alleges the Company’s violation of Collective Bargaining Agreement §8.D.1 [Hours of Service/Check in and Debrief], past practice, and all related sections of the Collective Bargaining Agreement when on July 22, 2022, it delayed flight 263 IAH-SEA by nine minutes to adjust for one crew member’s 24/7 violation.  While doing so it did not change the other three Flight Attendants’ scheduled check in time on their roster thus requiring them to report for the start of the duty day 54 minutes prior to the new adjusted flight time rather than the required 45 minutes.    

Details:  The parties agree that in the case of a FAR illegality affecting one or more Flight Attendant(s) on the same flight, the Company may either:  1. Change the schedule departure time (to a later time) and adjust the report time of all Flight Attendants; or 2. Keep the scheduled report time. At Crew Scheduling’s direction, the Flight Attendant(s) affected by the illegality may report fewer than forty-five minutes (:45) prior to scheduled departure.

Grievances Recently Filed and Denied

Grievance No.: 36-99-2-458-22- Violation of §8.D Check in and Debrief. This grievance alleges the Company’s violation of Collective Bargaining Agreement §8.D.1 [Hours of Service/Check in and Debrief], past practice, and all related sections of the Collective Bargaining Agreement when on July 22, 2022, it delayed flight 263 IAH-SEA by nine minutes to adjust for one crew member’s 24/7 violation. While doing so it did not change the other three Flight Attendants’ scheduled check in time on their roster thus requiring them to report for the start of the duty day 54 minutes prior to the new adjusted flight time rather than the required 45 minutes.

Grievance No.: 36-99-2-60-23-Violation of §19.A and §7.B Disciplinary Meetings and Probationaries. This grievance alleges the Company’s violation of Collective Bargaining Agreement §19.A & §7.B [Grievance Procedures:  Dismissal and Disciplinary Procedure; Probationary Period:  Discharge, Discipline or Furlough], past practice, and all related sections of the Collective Bargaining Agreement when it refused to conduct investigatory, work performance, disciplinary and dismissal meetings with probationary Flight Attendants per the contractual meeting requirements with regard to pay, scheduling and union representation. 

Grievances Recently Filed, Denied by Management and Currently Awaiting Arbitration Dates

Grievance No.: 36-99-2-22-14-Violation of Required Maternity Leave.  This grievance alleges the Company’s violation of Section 15.D. and all related sections of the Collective Bargaining Agreement when it failed to require Flight Attendants to begin Maternity Leave after the 28^th week of pregnancy.   

Grievance No.: 36-99-2-55-17-Violation of §21.V Winds Aloft Adjustment of Sit Pay in JCTE. This grievance alleges the Company’s violation of Collective Bargaining Agreement §21.V [Compensation: “Scheduled” or “Actual” For Minimum Pay Rules (MPRs) and/or Sit Pay], past practice and all related sections of the Collective Bargaining Agreement when its Jeppesen Crew Access (JCA) trading system displayed each posted trip as a static ‘snapshot’ taken at the time of posting rather than a ‘live’ view, thus denying the Flight Attendant the ability to determine whether a trip is eligible for 1.0 TFP of Sit Pay due to an automated scheduling adjustment (e.g. by the Winds Aloft program).

Grievance No.: 36-99-2-40-19-Violation §25.B Failure to Provide a Safe and Healthy Workplace. This alleges the Company’s violation of Collective Bargaining Agreement §25.B [Air Safety, Health and Security: Safe and Healthy Workplace], past practice and all related sections of the Collective Bargaining Agreement when it failed to provide a safe and healthy workplace when it installed new bulkheads on the retrofitted Airbus (“Aura”) aircraft that effectively renders the aft assist handles near doors L1/R1 as unusable and unnecessarily increases the likelihood and potential severity of Flight Attendant injury during an emergency evacuation.

Grievance No.: 36-99-2-41-19-Violation of §25.D.2 Failing to Notify MEC President and ASHSC of Reconfiguration or Re-design Prior to Final Decision. This grievance alleges the Company’s violation of Collective Bargaining Agreement §25.D.2 [Air Safety, Health and Security: Safety Information], past practice and all related sections of the Collective Bargaining Agreement when it failed to notify the MEC President of a decision to reconfigure or re-design the interior of the Airbus aircraft and when it failed to discuss with the ASHSC the parties’ interests and concerns for inflight safety prior to making a final decision on the reconfiguration/re-design. 

Grievance No.: 36-99-2-162-19- Violation of §12.C.1 Real-Time Trading Procedures Grievance 36-99-2-28-17 Mediated Settlement. This grievance alleges the Company’s violation of Collective Bargaining Agreement §12.C.1 [Exchange of Sequences: Trading Procedure], past practice, its mediated settlement of grievance 36-99-2-28-17 and all related sections of the Collective Bargaining Agreement when it agreed but failed to adhere to its July 5, 2017, mediated settlement of grievance 36-99-2-28-17:  To have AFA and Alaska representatives meet with Jeppesen to explore the capabilities of the system and how to align the front-end with the “real time” experience of the back-end user.  This is a continual violation as such meeting did not take place in a reasonably timely manner, and sufficient action was not taken to rectify the underlying system issues.    

Grievance No.: 36-99-2-36-20-Violation of §25.B ANC Training Facility.  This grievance alleges the Company’s violation of Collective Bargaining Agreement §25.B [Air Safety, Health and Security: Safe and Healthy Workplace], past practice, and all related sections of the Collective Bargaining Agreement when it conducted Recurrent Training (RT) drills in Anchorage, Alaska in the Ross Aviation Hanger, and on or about February 16-19, 2020, the external temperature ranged from 18 to 46 degrees Fahrenheit and when the hanger door opened, frequently without notice, the internal hanger temperature dropped to as low as 46 degrees.  After the external hanger door opened it took approximately two hours with a loud heater to get the internal temperature back up to the low to mid 60s.  

Grievance No.: 36-99-2-207-20-Violation of §10, §11.D & §24.L Bundled Scheduling Notifications. This grievance alleges the Company’s violation of Collective Bargaining Agreement §10 [Scheduling], §11.D [Reserve:  Scheduling/Notice of Time to Report] and §24.L [General and Miscellaneous: Company-Provided Inflight Mobile Device (IMD)], past practice, and all related sections of the Collective Bargaining Agreement when its Jeppesen Crew Access (JCA) scheduling system sent bundled scheduling notifications to Flight Attendants on their Inflight Mobile Devices (IMDs) or directly in Crew Access, requiring Flight Attendants to batch acknowledge or ignore such notifications and thereby resulting in Flight Attendants potentially waiving multiple contractual protections via an extra-contractual point of contact (i.e. Crew Access scheduling notifications).  

Grievance No.: 36-99-2-384-20-Violation of §10.S Scheduling Notifications.  This grievance alleges the Company’s violation of Collective Bargaining Agreement §10.S [Scheduling: Pre-Cancellations], past practice, and all related sections of the Collective Bargaining Agreement when it used non-contractual scheduling notifications sent to Flight Attendants via the Crew Scheduling system in order to communicate and assign alternate flying or an obligation to call Crew Scheduling within a specific window of time. If a Flight Attendant accepts such non-contractual scheduling notification(s), which is neither contact by Crew Scheduling via Company email nor via primary phone contact as defined in §10.S.1.a, the scheduling notification(s) violates the contract by abrogating the Flight Attendant’s ability to: (1) decline the alternate assignment and waive pay protection (§10.S.2.b), (2) decline the “out of original footprint by more than two hours” alternate assignment and call Crew Scheduling between 6:00 PM and 8:00 PM (local domicile time) the night prior to the start of the original sequence (§10.S.2.c), or (3) waive pay protection and be relieved of any further scheduling obligation (§10.S.3). 

Grievance No.: 36-99-2-386-20-Violation of §8.Q & §8.R Contactability and Notification of Delay or Cancellation. This grievance alleges the Company’s violation of Collective Bargaining Agreement §8.Q [Hours of Service: Contactability] and §8.R [Hours of Service: Notification of Delay or Cancellation], past practice, and all related sections of the Collective Bargaining Agreement when it used non-contractual scheduling notifications sent via the Crew Scheduling system in order to communicate and assign revised flying to Flight Attendants who were off-duty on a remain overnight (RON). Such scheduling notifications are in violation of the contractually defined means of contact and/or the Flight Attendant’s obligation to respond pursuant to these provisions.

Grievance No.: 36-99-2-84-22-Violation of §21.J Ground Delay Pay.  This grievance alleges the Company’s violation of Collective Bargaining Agreement §21.J [Compensation:  Block and Ground Delays], past practice, and all related sections of the Collective Bargaining Agreement when it did not pay ground delay pay accumulatively, requiring each delay to go over 11 minutes to be eligible for pay, when a flight (same flight number/same routing) returns to gate one or more times.

Grievance No.: 36-99-2-176-22-California Family School Partnership Act Violation of Past Practice and Roberts Award.  This grievance alleges the Company’s violation of past practice, the Roberts Award 36-99-2-49-03, and all related sections of the Collective Bargaining Agreement when it unilaterally disallowed the California Family School Partnership Act for those Flight Attendants based in Los Angeles (LAX); then reinstated, with no notice, the state law for LAX based Flight Attendants only, but not for the other California based Flight Attendants in San Diego (SAN) or San Francisco (SFO), and not for the rest of the Flight Attendants based in our system, Seattle (SEA), Portland (PDX) or Anchorage (ANC), in violation of Roberts.