Airlines unions say the summer holiday season could be three months of continuous flight delays and cancellations as travel demand pushes crowds to levels not seen since 2019.
Flight attendants and pilots at American Airlines, Southwest Airlines and Spirit Airlines have launched scathing criticism of their superiors for not fixing what they say were operational problems that began last summer and continued through winter and spring.
Despite staffing efforts, labor shortages have caused airlines to run short of essential staff for staff flights already scheduled for the summer season.
“It would be an absolute circus,” said Arthur Whitton, director of labor studies at Cornell University in New York. “I think they would be in nothing but a complete wall-to-wall crowding.”
Last week, American Airlines pilots sued the company over changes to training procedures caused by a lack of instructors, and the Southwest Airlines Pilots Association criticized their company for stressing pilots, threatening safety.
During peak periods, airlines offered overtime pay to discourage workers from taking days off. JetBlue recently offered $1,000 bonuses to flight attendants for working full schedules during their spring travel period.
Workers say they are exhausted after a full year of banding together to make sure airlines have few employees.
However, despite a year of difficulties with cancellations, Bank of America analysts Andrew Deedora and John Hakunda say airlines are better at resolving problems when they occur and future problems shouldn’t be as costly as they have been in the past.
“Although this is difficult from a major perspective, airlines seem to have learned from previous operational issues with most cancellations retracting after three days,” Deedora and Hakunda said in a note to investors. “As such, the cost impact is likely to be less than what was seen during summer/fall 2021 and around Omicron.”
Both the new chief executives of Southwest and American Airlines said they are focused on running a more reliable airline as they emerge from the pandemic.
Southwest Airlines said: “We, along with the industry, continue our progress toward returning our operations to service and staffing levels that existed prior to the pandemic, which will foster improvements in our ability to deal with unexpected operational disruptions, and reduce the impact on employees. and clients.” A spokesperson for Chris Maines.
US and Southwest Airlines and Spirit are also in tense negotiations with unions over new contracts. While airline workers cannot go on strike without federal approval, a breakdown in contract negotiations has slowed carriers in the past as disgruntled workers stopped working overtime.
All this comes as airlines face their biggest passenger volume test in more than three years. The increase in demand comes as a result of lower health restrictions, higher vaccination and booster rates and pent-up demand from travelers who have grounded since the start of 2020.
“We have more people buying tickets – 15% higher – even though we have less inventory, despite no international travel, on the board,” American Airlines Chairman Doug Parker said on a conference call with investors. Although business trips are down. On March 15th. “It just means, if nothing else, the demand for travel is really strong.”
Airlines are making plans to meet that demand, which has union workers worried.
The Big Four US airlines are planning summer schedules that are 4% to 20% higher than last year. According to flight schedule tracker Diio by Cirium, Fort Worth-based American plans to be the largest airline in the country between June and August with more than 550,000 flights. That’s one-sixth more than the next largest airline, Delta.
Dallas-based Southwest Airlines is planning the biggest increase from 2021 with a 20% increase in flights this summer.
In many ways, airlines have improved their on-time performance rates over previous years, according to Department of Transportation statistics. American Airlines has shifted long stretches of flights on time and low cancellations making it look like the airline has overcome reliability problems that prevailed before the pandemic.
But earlier this month, a string of airlines suffered after a thunderstorm swept through central and southern Florida, causing hundreds of flight delays that eventually turned into thousands of cancellations for American, Southwest, Spirit and JetBlue.
Lynne Montgomery, president of the Local 556 Transport Workers’ Federation, which represents 14,600 flight attendants in the Southwest, said these kinds of meltdowns have been occurring in the Southwest since 2014, but staff shortages and operational problems have become more frequent over the past year.
“There is a lot of frustration with this happening over and over again,” Montgomery said. “There is an understanding that it does happen sometimes, but it does happen on a regular basis.”
Cornells Whitton said work issues aren’t unique to airlines, but travel is a more risky deal than dining in a restaurant.
“People who travel already have hotels booked, tickets to Disneyland and rental cars,” Whitton said. “Airlines are under tremendous pressure to get people to their destinations.”
The biggest disruptions occurred during periods of heavy travel. Southwest and a few other airlines were hit by a staff shortage shortly after New Year’s Day which led to hundreds of flights being cancelled. Another came on Columbus Day weekend, when many schools in the South were letting students out for fall vacation.
The most recent occurred during the first weekend of April in the middle of spring break.
The common denominator in each case was a busier than usual travel weekend, along with minor weather challenges or technical issues that would normally cause only small disruptions to airlines. Instead, staff shortages and tight schedules lead to back-to-back failures as flights across the country are canceled because planes, pilots and flight attendants are out of place.
These kinds of malfunctions have left flight attendants and pilots without hotel rooms and transportation, compounding the problem because crew members need enough rest to fly legally. Southwest Airlines pilots have reported a record number of fatigue calls over the past 12 months.
Last week, Spirit Airlines flight attendants protested at DFW International Airport, demanding changes to help mitigate what they say are problems with how the low-cost carrier operates.
“Right now, our biggest concern is the process,” said Don Reno Intiglia, Vice President of the Flight Attendants Association at Spirit Airlines. “We need to fix this before the summer.”
Association leaders have warned that operations may not withstand heavy passenger loads during the summer period.
American Airlines responded by bringing in four new flight simulators for pilot training and hiring 600 pilots this summer. American also confirms that it had some of its best on-time prices in history during March, even with the big spring break crowds.
“We have taken steps to ensure we are well prepared for delivery to our customers during the busy summer travel season,” said American Airlines spokeswoman Shannon Gilson. “Our summer preparations began last year with demand returning and we haven’t slowed down. Recruiting and onboarding. We have recruited thousands of new team members throughout the process, including pilots, flight attendants and airport team members.”
Gilson said the carrier is also bringing in extra workers to deal with issues with scheduling hotel rooms and taxis during trouble periods.
But Eric Ferguson, president of the Allied Pilots Association, stresses that Americans are not ready.
“Obviously the management was unwilling to bounce back in air traffic and was selling tickets for flights that the airline might not be able to operate due to a lack of suitably qualified pilots, despite management’s recent assurances to the contrary,” Ferguson said.
Some airlines, including Delta, have taken the opposite approach, with smaller flight schedules heading into this summer. “The priority is to operate reliably and the other priority is not to exceed demand,” Delta President Glenn Haunstein said Monday.
However, the Delta Pilots Syndicate also complains of burnout and scheduling issues, the same problems that American, Southwest, and others have had.
“Delta management must address our concerns and make substantial changes to improve our schedules,” the union shared in a tweet.
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