Greetings,

AFA 66 eCommunication - Thursday, September 10, 2009

US Airways Announces Changes to Inflight Services
October Flight Attendant Bid
Annual Enrollment
401(k) Awareness Days

US Airways Announces Changes to Inflight Services

Director of Inflight Services, Hector Adler, announced changes to the organizational structure within the Inflight Services department this morning.  Following is a letter from Adler outlining the Company’s strategy and general information regarding changes within the department. 

“I am pleased to announce a new organizational structure for the InFlight division that will pave the way to achieve more consistent service delivery to our customers, increase the quality of our work product, and provide greater support to our flight attendants.
 
Key changes are as follows:
 
Wendy Stockton has been promoted to Managing Director, Base Operations and will oversee the day-to day activities at each of our flight attendant Bases.  This new leadership position will create streamlined focus and accountability.
 
John O’Brien has been promoted to Director, Northeast Bases.
 
Dining and Cabin Services will be lead by Stephen Kingsley with two specifically focused director positions:  Gary Simms, formerly of Frontier Airlines, has joined our team as Director of Catering Operations responsible for contract caterers and commissary performance.  A new Director position will oversee Catering Planning and Product Coordination with Marketing.  Cabin Policies, Procedures and Communications will also report to Stephen.
 
Two new positions will oversee onboard revenue and menu/product development.
 
Paul Kinsey, as Director of InFlight Administration, and Bob Hemphill, as Director of Training, will remain in their current roles.
 
Permanent staff will replace special assignment flight attendants in roles such as Product Specialist, on-line coach, and trainer positions.
 
New management headcount will reduce supervisor to Flight Attendant ratios ranging currently from 1:250 and 1:400 at certain locations to 1:175 at all Bases.  This will allow for the implementation of an on-board quality assurance program.
 
Thank you for your continued commitment to InFlight Services.
 
Hector Adler

During a conference call to AFA this morning, Adler pointed out that his main concern was to refocus the department not only toward providing a better quality product to the customer but also to provide consistent support, and a more positive relationship between the inflight Department and the flight attendant group.

As part of the restructuring of the department, Adler plans to replace the current work of 220 deployed flight attendant positions by creating 27 permanent, full-time positions within the department. The new positions will be open for application by any employee.

October Flight Attendant Bid

The October Flight Attendant bid was completed last Friday and is now available on FLICA.
 
There are no major schedule changes in October.  Minor US Airways schedule changes mainly affect the East bases that result from the pull down of European flying. There will be a reduction on one-day turns in the October bid and an increase in turns of more than 2 legs due to how the pairings were built for the month.

Overall, there are more two-day trip lines than in the past couple of bids. In the past, AFA could hand build combination turns with two-day pairings. However, the schedule of the mixed equipment file for October made it very difficult to build those types of lines.  Those combinations should return to a more normal status in November.

Within the A321/757 mixed lines, many of the one-day turns are mixed with two and three day trips.  This creates more variety in the lines and there are a total of 21 lines that have turns combined with two or three day trips.  However, within the A320/A319/737 lines, there were less turns available, so there are very few combination lines of turns with two-day trips.

Most of the long haul flying is scheduled on the A321.  October will show the disappearance of Cancun (CUN) and Guadalajara (GDL) turns, which will return in the November bid. 

Annual Enrollment

Annual Enrollment is just around the corner. This year’s Annual Enrollment will be held online at www.eBenefitsUS.com between October 15th – 30th, 2009. Benefit Fair events are scheduled for major locations near you September 30th - October 16th, 2009.



401(k) Awareness Days