Norwegian’s Boeing 787 Gatwick crews asked to slash hours or take unpaid leave

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• Prins Polo says:

  7 May7 May 04:42

  Do any of these wetleased planes have J product (so that people who have booked Norwegian’s Premium product would be better off)?

  • Doug M says:

    7 May7 May 06:26

    Good to see you focused on the human cost.

    • Shoestring says:

      7 May7 May 06:37

      Harsh 🙂

      I guess countries with employment laws as employer-friendly as the UK will see a disproportionate amount of ’employee pain’ than countries where employee rights are protected much more strongly (virtually every other European country!)

    • AndyL says:

      7 May7 May 07:56

      Agreed – more stories with this angle would be welcome and quite revealing to many readers, I imagine.

    • Leo says:

      7 May7 May 08:03

      +1

      • Steve Shaw says:

        7 May7 May 08:40

        A lot of this will depend on how the pilots contracts are drawn up. If they are via an agency then they have little choice, if they are employed directly by the company then the choices should be put to all pilots and the Gatwick pilots should also have an option to move to another base.

        • Lady London says:

          7 May7 May 11:02

          The 12 months leave ‘option’ should not involve a break in service this has wider consequences for the individual down the line. It should be amended to 1 day less than 1 year and continuity of service should be specifically confirmed.

        • Lady London says:

          7 May7 May 11:05

          Agency staff have the Agency Workers Directive that keeps them in many respects same as permanent. If they are subcontracted/via a ‘project’ delivery company (been told Google in London is doing this for big numbers of workers ) or via umbrella/Ltd etc, then not protected.

• Phil says:

  7 May7 May 06:03

  After particularly shabby service from Norwegian last September I’m hardly likely to fly with them again. It’s a case of buy cheap by twice.

  Whilst I am sympathetic to the staff, this is possibly the tye beginning of the end of a struggling airline. IMHO the sooner it’s put out it it’s misery the better.

  • Shoestring says:

    7 May7 May 07:24

    or not buy twice

  • TGLoyalty says:

    7 May7 May 07:58

    And if they didn’t do that all of these staff may have been out of work full stop as their employer was no longer a going concern.

    • Andy says:

      7 May7 May 08:12

      Yeh but it’s generally the staff ‘at the bottom of the tree’ who are expected to make the sacrifices

      • Alan says:

        7 May7 May 09:25

        They are usually the easiest to replace and the cheapest to get rid of.

        Whilst UK employment law may be more employer friendly than the rest fo the EU it is way more employee friendly than US employment law.

        • Lady London says:

          7 May7 May 10:59

          That’s very true but IMO US employers have behaved relatively decently and beyond things like their ‘at will’ contracts, at least for professional staff when letting them go. Someone told me recently that’s only because they want to avoid higher potential of being sued.

      • Lady London says:

        7 May7 May 10:55

        And those bottom level staff are probably gone already. Pilots are a harder item to replace. That’s the only reason this is being proposed.

  • Michael says:

    7 May7 May 18:59

    Except that Norwegian being a thing has probably driven down the cost of your BA/Virgin/Delta/United seat to New York too.

• Bonglim says:

  7 May7 May 06:04

  Are rolls Royce not paying compensation for the whole affair.
  Not to underestimate Norwegians problems, if they are fully compensated for the costs incurred should they not be able to continue paying staff.

  I think (someone please correct me) that they took a quicker but cheaper settlement from RR to sure up their balance sheet because they were struggling for other reasons. If that is the case then perhaps the company deserve slightly less compassion and the staff deserve to be more angry.

  • Doug M says:

    7 May7 May 06:27

    Very interesting if this is true. I suppose they’d argue that did help to keep the staff on any terms.

  • Shoestring says:

    7 May7 May 06:56

    RR won’t be full consequential losses, no.

    • Shoestring says:

      7 May7 May 07:24

      *paying

    • Jonny says:

      7 May7 May 08:32

      Why not?

  • Steve Shaw says:

    7 May7 May 08:37

    Norwegian took a quick settlement from Rolls Royce, however what they also seem to have done is to not learn from how Primera went bust waiting for their A321LRs, and that is to sell and lease back some of their aircraft and therefore forfeiting any further compensation being dished out.

    • Rob says:

      7 May7 May 08:47

      Looking at the recent Rolls statement, compensation seems to be around $35m per aircraft. No idea what Virgin paid to lease the airberlin planes but the refurbishment alone was £10m IIRC.

      • ChrisC says:

        7 May7 May 10:30

        There is a report on v-flyer that all the VS 787s are now back in operation.

        I also read, though can’t remember where, that VS got a good deal on their 4 year leases on the A332s

  • Anna says:

    7 May7 May 09:12

    This is what I was thinking, how can people effectively be losing their jobs because of an equipment fault caused by a completely different company?

    • ChrisC says:

      7 May7 May 10:40

      Unfortunately it happens all the time.

      A fire at a factory owned by company A that makes parts used by company B means B can’t make its products so they have to get rid of staff and so on down the line. There is only so much you can do to ameliorate situations like this. Short time working / unpaid holiday can be a quick solution in the short term but not in the long term.

• Halo says:

  7 May7 May 07:42

  Contrast their situation with the situation of Elizabeth Line train drivers who are employed even though the line won’t open until 2020, if then. It shows the different between working for a commercial company and a state owned enterprise.

  • Halo says:

    7 May7 May 07:42

    /difference

  • TGLoyalty says:

    7 May7 May 08:01

    Unsustainable for any enterprise really but I suppose state owned services have different challenges.

    Normal circumstances If you have zero income for far longer than anticipated and huge outgoings eventually everyone will be unemployed.

  • Sinclair says:

    7 May7 May 08:27

    Crossrail drivers are employed by MTR which is a commercial company, albeit one owned by Hong Kong.

    • Charlieface says:

      7 May7 May 09:33

      …which I believe is being paid subsidies to run the line as well as compensation for the delay.

  • Rob says:

    7 May7 May 08:49

    There is also a full complement of maintenance ataff etc sitting around on full pay somewhere, I think.

    • Lady London says:

      7 May7 May 10:53

      I’ve been told by a member of a major London Transport train maintenance depot that a lot of their days are ” make work” days or not enough to do for them anyway.

      Legacy of anything that was owned by taxpayers or ratepayers is hard to shift. Even worse in Europe.

    • Doug M says:

      7 May7 May 19:33

      This must be repeated in Berlin with the trains to BBI. I understand the trains have to run to ventilate the tunnels despite the airport not opening anytime soon.

  • RussellH says:

    7 May7 May 10:22

    Do not take stories from the press at face value – some have political axes to grind!
    Most of the drivers /are/ driving trains – including some from Heathrow to Paddington. Also Liverpool Street Shenfield etc.
    Others are employed on training runs on new rolling stock, as well as testing the new rolling stock.

  • Thomas Howard says:

    7 May7 May 11:37

    Crossrail drivers are employed by MTR Corporation (Crossrail) Ltd, they’re being paid because they’re in a trade union and pulling the sort of trick Norwegian are here would likely result in London wide strikes.

• Mark says:

  7 May7 May 07:45

  Surely Boeing / RR will be picking up a large BILL

• Alex W says:

  7 May7 May 07:51

  The Trent 1000 problems have cost Rolls Royce over £1 billion, this is having a knock-on effect on jobs across the defence industry as well.

  • Shoestring says:

    7 May7 May 07:57

    But £1b is chickenfeed compared to the actual losses the airlines are suffering

    • Shoestring says:

      7 May7 May 08:08

      ‘The Trent 1000 issue forced the airline to wet lease alternative capacity, which Kjos said has proved “very damaging” to the business. “You get [expletive] aircraft, but you did not hear me say that,” he asserted. On-time performance dropped dramatically and led to NOK1 billion ($120 million) in costs for compensating passengers under EU passenger rights rules. “This is NOK1 billion more than what we expect to get back in compensation payments from Rolls,” Kjos said.’

      • Steve Shaw says:

        7 May7 May 08:38

        I am not sure what Kjos is referring to in this statement; on time performance is a business issue, despatch reliability is a technical issue.

• Simon says:

  7 May7 May 08:42

  Feel for the cabin crew, who probably won’t be that well paid anyway. Some of the options effectively mean encouraging them to get new jobs and not coming back. Sadly, they will be easily replaceable.

  How would a month on/month off work if there are no planes to fly?

  • Rob says:

    7 May7 May 08:44

    I am guessing there are a few 787 routes still running out of Gatwick.

• James says:

  7 May7 May 09:09

  If this isn’t a forced move then these options are pretty standard across the industry for fliying crew. In my personal experience a lot of cabin crew will take the opportunity whenever it is offered to reduce their contractual hours in one way or another. Being able to do so for a short period will suit both sides where crew are keen. (I don’t have experience of the other side of the door so can’t comment on how pilots might see this)

  Some will not be able to do this of course and I hope that Norwegian are offering this voluntarily for those that want it to protect those who can’t afford to take less hours. Whilst it is obviously worrying for all those involved that this has had to happen, it isn’t necessarily a totally bad move.

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