American Airlines to Recall 2,500 Pilots Over Next Five Years
AMR Chief Thomas Horton:
American Airlines plans to recall 2,500 pilots over the next 5 years, according to a letter by CEO Tom Horton.
American announced last week that they plan to hire 1,500 flight attendants as part of their growth restructuring.
The following is the letter Horton sent to American employees:
Dear American Team:
The new American is getting closer every day. Today, we announced an important step on our path to sustained, profitable growth. We plan to offer new service from Dallas/Fort Worth to Seoul, South Korea and Lima, Peru; from Chicago to Dusseldorf, Germany; and from New York JFK to Dublin, Ireland, along with expanded domestic reach from our DFW and Chicago hubs. These routes are further evidence of progress and momentum. More than that, these are signs of more good things to come for our customers and opportunities for our people as we put American back on top.
Today’s announcement builds on the foundation for success we put in place before beginning our restructuring eleven months ago. We strengthened our network around markets with large numbers of the most discerning customers who are critical to our success, and fortified our alliances with the best international partners. We are rapidly building the youngest and most efficient fleet in the industry, with 550 new aircraft on their way. We’re also investing again in our products, services and technology to create a world-class travel experience.
Thanks to all of your efforts, this strategy is paying off. As our third quarter results showed, we have outperformed all of our major domestic competitors in year-over-year revenue growth for six straight months. Once the full cost savings of our restructuring begin to flow through, American will be strong and profitable, competitive with any airline in the world.
The new service we announced today will further strengthen our network. We will connect our largest hub, DFW, to Seoul, a top global premium market. This service, which will be part of our transpacific joint business with Japan Airlines, will allow customers traveling from South Korea to access more than 200 destinations in the U.S. and Latin America.
Dusseldorf, a hub served by our partner, airberlin, will give our customers access to many additional international markets and feed customers to our network. JFK-Dublin also holds much promise. Both European routes will be part of our transatlantic joint business with British Airways and Iberia.
And, building on our oneworld partnership with LAN and our strong position in Latin America, where we are the largest U.S. carrier, Lima offers us a rapidly growing destination though which customers can access 30 destinations to Central America, Mexico and South America.
As we further diversify our network, the new American will be doing even more international flying, providing greater opportunities for career advancement and increased income for our people. As part of our plans, we expect to hire at least 1,500 new flight attendants over the next year and create approximately 2,500 new and recalled pilot jobs over five years, which we think will lead to about 1,300 Captain upgrades.
Above all, the new American will always put customers first. With that in mind, I am pleased that we’re seeing significant improvement in our operations from the challenges we faced over the past few weeks, and I am very grateful for your commitment to our customers during a difficult stretch.
Thanks for all that you do!
Sincerely,
Tom
Category: Airnation
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- American Airlines and Pilots Reach Tentative Agreement | November 10, 2012
A Translation
Dear beloved American Team xoxoxo:
Now that we screwed our shareholders, we introduce to you, a newer, tastier, carrot on a shorter stick and the pie in the sky will be coconut cream instead of rubbarb.
Fine print;
1. If said pie is ever reached – 99% is reserved for me and my buddies and our friends “the banksters”, the fund for the preservation of the Railway Labor Act(**)(even though we’re not a railroad nor do airplanes ride on tracks), the preservation of taxpayer funded aviation infrastructure(**)(FAA,TSA,ATC,Airports…..but were not “PUBLIC” transportation, no sir nor should government regulate us) and our other friends in the legal profession(mostly labor and bankruptcy law).
2. If pie is not reached(GOLDEN PARACHUTE CLAUSE) I and my staff reserve the right to split the carrot.
(**)-polititions
Thanks for all that you do!
Sincerely,
Tom
And don’t forget, you will work cheaper and longer without benefits and that only my cronies and me will benefit from when we retire.
Don’t believe that for a minute sky….the current employees will throw you, as a retiree, under the bus…or, aircraft, as it were, to keep and enhance their own pay and benefits. Believe me, it has happened many times before.
SOME FACTS
1. “AA still has 1,685 furloughed pilots, of which 650 have yet to be offered recall. The rest have deferred recall”(that’s because most are not coming back, by choice). http://www.airlinepilotcentral.com/airlines/legacy/american.html I have a friend who deferred because he makes more flying corporate. His brother has no college runs a small business and earns triple his pay. He often tells me that if given a second chance at youth he would not become a pilot, sad.
2. “A previous flow through agreement with American Airlines allows for over 3,000 current American Eagle pilots (as of October 2011) to flow to American”.(to make up for retirements over the years) http://www.airlinepilotcentral.com/airlines/major-national-lcc/american_eagle.html
These are the contractors that where offered carrots not to abandon ship after their overloard(AA), whose passengers they fly, declared bankruptcy. The HIDDEN RACKET is that alot of Eagle pilots are high seniority now 10-20 years(=higher payscale) and since you can’t cut bone,(some contractor airline pilots qualify for food stamps)it was only natural to throw them a bone instead of money.(street smarts, unfortunatly, is not a prerequesite for pilot credentials but it seems to be for MBA’s, banksters, lawyers and politicians) AA, then gets to outsourcingly hire pilots at the lowest pay entry point, lowering the average seniority at Eagle and by default operating cost.
The stick part of the racket is, if senior Eagle pilots don’t get lost, Eagle becomes too costly and they’ll spin it off or sell it and outsource to a new airline with fresher meat.
3.Mandatory retirements – Over the next five years AA will loose about 750-1000 pilots to retirement.(The airlines managed to delay that storm by greasing the wheels in washington-the mandatory retirement age was raised from 60 to 65 about five years ago “because most people start a family and buy their first home in their golden years”)
Sumary;
All “real” new hiring will be at the outsourced level(the ones that qualify for food stamps). International expantion will mostly occur through codesharing/alliances.
Retirement, don’t count on it, in another 30 years they’ll be tucking tail to see the bankruptcy judge again(round and round we go)