July 13, 2023

Participants for AMFA
Bret Oestreich – National President
Pat Amore – National Vice President
Earl Clark – Region I Director
Will Abbott – Region II Director
Jarod Mills – Local 14 Airline Representative
Jeff Heard – Local 32 Airline Representative
Lucas Middlebrook – Legal Counsel

Participants for Alaska Airlines
Jenny Wetzel – VP, Labor Relations
Sonia Alvarado – Managing Director of Labor Relations
Don Wright – VP, Maintenance & Engineering
Scott Harmon – Managing Dir. of Maintenance
Kelly Welch – Senior Corporate Counsel
Denise Kliskey – Labor Relations
Karen Themelis – Labor Relations

The AMFA-Alaska Negotiating Committee (the “Committee”) is providing this update to the Membership at Alaska Airlines (“Alaska”). This is the only official authorized source of negotiating communications by the Committee.

The parties held a three-day bargaining session July 10-12 in Seattle to continue bargaining toward a successor collective bargaining agreement (CBA).

The parties agreed to add language to the previously TA’d Article 7 – Holidays to include language requiring the Company to make every reasonable effort to provide additional individuals off on recognized holidays in order to improve the quality of life associated with holiday usage. Following this addition, the parties re-TA’d Article 7.

The parties also reached TA on Article 8 – Field Service & Special Projects. The Article 8 TA includes improvements, such as:

• Company will reimburse employees working field trips with meals and incidental expenses (M&IE) per diem in accordance with U.S. Governmental Services Administration (GSA) rates.
• Employees will be compensated for all hours from the time they depart their home station on a field trip until the time they return to their home station. The rate of payment will be negotiated as part of economic discussions.
• Employees assigned to work during a holiday on a field trip will be compensated at the holiday rate of pay for the holiday worked.
• If an employee’s tools are delayed upon return from a field trip, the technician will not be required to perform work tasks requiring the use of those tools unless the tooling is provided by the Company.
• The Company must dispatch covered employees on field trips when restoration of the aircraft for return to service has an estimated repair time of three hours or more; the arrival time of the technician will not delay the estimated return to service time of the aircraft; and a rotable part is required to restore the aircraft to service and is sent from ANC, SEA, PDX, SFO or LAX. The Company may still send covered employees outside of these parameters, but this language will require covered employees to be sent under these circumstances.

The parties were also able to TA Article 5 – Hours of Service. Some of the improvements included within the Article 5 TA are:

• Employees will be allowed up to six events of clocking in up to six minutes after their scheduled shift start time in a 12-month period without being considered as having reported late for work.
• Language clearly defining the scheduled starting times for regular shifts as follows:
  • Day shift will start no earlier than 4:30 a.m. and no later than 9:00 a.m.
  • Afternoon shift will start no earlier than 12:00 p.m. and no later than 4:30 p.m.
  • Night shift will start no earlier than 7:00 p.m. and no later than 11:30 p.m.
• Language that provides for day and shift trades, including that employees may (for pay purposes) use earned vacation and/or banked holiday hours in conjunction with an approved trade day off, and language providing that trade day off hours will be counted as straight time hours worked for the purpose of vacation accruals, sick leave accruals, and insurance premium eligibility.

The parties also spent time discussing Article 9 – Seniority, and the Union passed its first proposal on Article 2 – Scope, which included language intended to protect against any future reduction in force by the Company.

The next bargaining session is scheduled for August 15-17 in New York. Your Committee would like to thank all the observers that attended this session. If you would like to be an observer in future negotiation sessions, please communicate with your ALR.

And remember, stay engaged, remain informed, and continue to provide the Negotiating Committee with ongoing support, which increases the Committee’s ability to bargain a CBA you deserve.

Fraternally,

AMFA–Alaska Negotiating Committee