American Airlines Says No To Union's Early-Out Proposals

American Airlines has turned down two early-out options submitted earlier this month by the Transport Workers Union. The airline says the options are too expensive.

On February 15, 2012, the TWU presented a plan to offer early outs to employees under two plans:

Plan A: Retirement eligible:

• 10 years of service and age 55 or greater
• Incentive payment of $75,000 (one time lump sum payout)
• Continued air travel as provided for current retirees
• Continue medical coverage as provided for early out participants and current retirees
• Lump sum payment for all accrued vacation and unused sick time

Plan B: Early out only, not retirement eligible (age):

• Eligibility: Minimum 10 years of service with AMR and age 45 or greater
• Incentive payments same as plan A payout
• Air travel; same as plan A, after reaching retirement age
• Medical insurance coverage: 18 months of COBRA subsidized at the current active employee rate
• Lump sum payment for all accrued vacation and unused sick time (same as above)

Union workers and their supporters plan to hold protest demonstrations at airports across the country Wednesday morning.

"We're standing firm for our families and for the future," said TWU International President James C. Little.  "AMR's draconian plan to offshore maintenance work and outsource other jobs is bad for American and bad for America and must be challenged."

2/15/2012 Related Story: Union Offers American Airlines Alternative To Massive Layoffs In Tulsa, Elsewhere

American says it has carefully evaluated the union's two proposals.

"Last week, the APFA and TWU presented early-out incentive proposals to try to mitigate employee reductions that are necessary to support American's business plan to successfully restructure. We have carefully evaluated the unions' proposals.  As currently structured, these early-out incentives would significantly increase costs and do not address the company's need for sustainable cost savings and efficiency. We are open to discussing any creative solutions that help us reach the targeted cost savings for each workgroup and pave a viable and successful path forward. American has a long-standing record of mitigating involuntary reductions through voluntary programs and remains willing to explore alternatives, at the appropriate time in this process, that don't exacerbate our cost challenges. We remain focused on reaching consensual agreements with our unions in the next few weeks." – Bruce Hicks, American Airlines spokesperson.

AMR announced on February 1, 2012, that it planned to cut 13,000 jobs company-wide, including 9,000 from work groups represented by the TWU.  Those cuts would include 2,100 jobs at the Tulsa American Airlines' maintenance base.