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- According to a decision rendered on July 5 by the US Court of Appeals in Washington, DC, the pilots who deliver your Amazon Prime packages took a break.
- These pilots work for Atlas Air Worldwide Holdings, a freight company that contracts with Amazon, the US Army, DHL and others.
- The union leaders of the pilots deny "categorically" denying having encouraged the pilots to appeal to patients, saying the increased pressure on Atlas had instead destroyed their health and increased their stress levels.
- In court affidavits provided to Business Insider, the pilots explained why they had taken sick leave on short notice. One of them said that the Boeing 737 where he had been assigned to work "far exceeded 100 ° C" and that he was "violently ill". Atlas then described his sick leave on short notice as a work stoppage activity.
- The pilots and their employer have been fighting for three and a half years to get a new work contract. Their pay is considerably lower than that of cargo pilots like UPS and FedEx.
- Visit the Business Insider home page for more stories.
Pilots who pilot some Amazon packages are struggling with a controversial battle with the airline that employs them in union negotiations and the fight is getting tough.
The pilots of Atlas Air Worldwide Holdings, a New York-based buying company that purchased 22 of its 114 aircraft from Amazon, fought for a new contract for 3½ years. Labor relations are so fragile that Amazon has threatened to sever relations with Atlas.
The efforts of Atlas pilots to lobby their employers for a new contract have been reported to the US Court of Appeals in Washington, DC, one of the most important tribunals. of America.
On July 5, the DC circuit ruled in favor of Atlas when it unanimously upheld a preliminary injunction against Teamsters Local 1224 and efforts being made by the union to urge their employer to sign a new employment contract. This decision had already been taken by the district court.
One of the tactics invoked by the court in its 27-page decision was the rise in the number of pilots calling ill without notice. Atlas stated that the pilots were unlawfully lobbying the company by calling hours of sick leave before scheduled flying hours, while short-notice calls were due to the increase in overtime and stress at the time. job.
Same-day sick calls jumped 42%
Pilots do not fly everyday and they usually call several days in advance to take sick leave. Calling the day of a flight can destabilize flight schedules and force the company to quickly find a replacement.
Before the contract negotiations began in January 2016, according to information presented by Atlas on the DC circuit, only 14.4% of the pilots' sick calls were made the same day the pilots were to fly. This number jumped to 20.4% between February 2016 and September 2017. Sickness calls made at least two days in advance have also decreased.
Although the number of same-day calls has surged, sick calls, in general, have not changed during this period.
"We (categorically) reject the fact that we have done something to influence the number of sick calls or the type of sick calls," said Atlas Air Pilot's Business Insider, Daniel Wells, President of Teamsters Local 1224.
According to Atlas, the pilots' union "did more than just remind pilots not to work sick". The day the Teamsters notified renegotiation of contracts to its members, according to the lawsuit:
(L) the host of an ABC cat told viewers that he had been sick because of a high fever, and then had pulled out a hot water bottle. water under his shirt. The conversation is over with the following reminder: "This is your CBA, they signed it, you use it."
However, Wells stated that the increased stress experienced by pilots in 2016 and 2017 – including increased numbers of inexperienced pilots and increased pressure to work overtime – has likely led to more and more pilots using disease.
Read more: Pilots who use Amazon Air earn 33% less than their colleagues at UPS and FedEx for using exactly the same plane.
"When these schedules are completely rushed and changed daily, it definitely has an impact not only psychological but also purely medical on our crew members," said Wells. "The increasing stress and tempo of the operation undoubtedly lead to an increase in the number of sick calls, that is no doubt." It's a proven fact in the whole of sector, and we absolutely did not want us to do such a thing. "
These pilots fly for Amazon, which leases 20 of 112 Atlas aircraft, as well as for the US Army, DHL Express and Nippon Cargo Airlines. Amazon is Atlas's largest customer and holds 20% of Atlas share warrants. Amazon is also authorized to appoint a non-voting observer to the Atlas Administration Board.
Amazon, which does not directly employ these pilots and contracts their workforce through Atlas Air and other carriers, has made no comments on the decision of the DC circuit.
Some pilots say they called patients because of harsh working conditions
In several affidavits provided by the union to Business Insider, the pilots explained why they had taken sick leave on short notice. Atlas told the DC circuit driver that each of the pilots 'cases was evidence that the pilots' union had intentionally pushed for a sick leave, even though the pilots who made these early-disease calls were not doing the same. 39, subject of no disciplinary measure.
One of them, whose name has been redacted, said the Boeing 737 in which he had been assigned to work lacked air conditioning at the end of July, resulting in a cockpit temperature. well above 100 degrees ". As he described to the DC circuit:
After about ten minutes in the cockpit doing my pre-flight tasks and sweating profusely, I became very nauseated. I decided to go out to see if it could relieve my nausea. It helped me a bit, but as soon as I got back up and into the cockpit, which was still extremely hot, I started to feel sick again. After a few minutes, I fell violently ill in the toilet, where I vomited in the form of a projectile. The captain made sure that I did not need an ambulance, and called the sick to get on the plane. The company made sure I received transportation at the hotel and offered to send a doctor if I wanted to.
According to the affidavits, Atlas later described this same-day illness call as being motivated by union-driven work stoppages. However, the company never punished the pilot for his illness call.
"After feeling that I had spit all my stomach into the aircraft toilets and still felt the effects of extreme heat, I could never have paid my bills. tasks safely, "said the pilot in affidavits. "I have not reported any illness due to the pressure of a pilot or his peers, as part of a plan or a plot of the pilots of the aircraft. Atlas, instructions from the Union or pressure from the Union or one of its representatives. "
Another Atlas pilot, whose name was redacted, was on a flight between the United States and Germany with 340 passengers on board. He stated in the affidavit provided to Business Insider that several unexpected schedule changes had occurred prior to the flight and that he was not able to take adequate rest.
The pilot called in fatigue. "Until the complainants (Atlas) file their complaint in this case, Atlas had never questioned the legitimacy of my fatigue appeal," said the pilot in the affidavit. "If Atlas thought that I had intentionally falsified my legend, he could have initiated a process of counseling and disciplinary proceedings against me."
He added, "How (Atlas Air's Senior Vice President of Air Operations) Jeff Carlson can now hold this call of fatigue against me and the union goes beyond me, and for me, it seems to me against its own directives, favoring dangerous operations. "
Atlas Air Worldwide CEO Bill Flynn told Business Insider that the case was not rooted in any particular case, but rather "focused on soaring calls to fatigue – many of which were actually questionable – and supported by comparative data ".
"This is compounded by the sheer volume of communications from union leaders to pilots encouraging them to not fly sick or tired in the context of collective bargaining," Flynn said in a statement.
In the end, he noted, the DC circuit unanimously upheld the preliminary injunction of the lower courts to prevent the Teamsters from encouraging workers to lobby Atlas to ensure that the courts would be able to do so. he negotiates a new employment contract.
A long and controversial legal battle for a new contract
Since January 2016, Atlas Air Worldwide has been grappling with a controversial battle around collective agreements with its drivers, represented by Teamsters. The pilots are in two Atlas Air Worldwide-owned services: Atlas Air and Polar Air Cargo Worldwide. The contract sets pilot salaries and other crucial working rules for at least five years.
Contract negotiations lasted three and a half years. Negotiations with the pilot unions are often lengthy – the last FedEx pilot negotiations lasted two years, while those of UPS lasted three and a half years.
But these pilot contract negotiations, unlike the Battle of Atlas, do not usually lead to the DC circuit – often called the most important court in America outside the Supreme Court.
In the official website of information on Atlas contract negotiations, the company indicates that after its acquisition of Southern Air in 2016, the Pilots' Union has not followed the provisions relating to the merger which would result in a collective bargaining agreement for the Atlas and Southern pilots. The union leadership said the arbitration-negotiated JCBA would hamper the group's ability to negotiate better wages and working conditions.
"If the union leaders had simply followed the terms of the contract, the drivers would have already benefited from a substantial increase in total compensation," said a spokesman for Atlas Air Worldwide at Business Insider.
Atlas pilots do far less than their peers from other airlines
A shortage of pilots has recently forced airlines such as Alaska, FedEx and Delta to pay huge salaries. But as the contract for Atlas pilots has not been renewed since 2016, they have not seen a pay rise for more than three years.
Pilots flying for Atlas told Business Insider that the lack of demotion had led to a drop in the number of airline candidates and the loss of experienced pilots.
"This has the very obvious consequence of preventing the company from maintaining a sufficient number of pilots to expand, let alone maintain their current operations," Wells told Business Insider in July.
The first Atlas officers with the most flying experience on Boeing 767 earn $ 125 at the hour. At UPS and FedEx, this same level earns respectively $ 219 and $ 222 at the hour.
Atlas captains with the maximum experience on Boeing 767s earn $ 179 per hour. FedEx captains of the same size earn $ 313 an hour and $ 309 an hour at UPS.
"There is no standard compensation in the aviation sector – this is the case in the passenger and air cargo segments," said Business Insider spokesperson d & # 39; Atlas. "Carriers have different business models – and compensation systems reflect the nature of these models."
The spokesman added:
We are committed to negotiating a contract for our pilots that pays them at competitive rates "at market conditions". The market is based on companies with similar business models, revenue streams, workforce and business models. We have a radically different business model and revenue stream, and we do not compete with FedEx or UPS. We are a $ 3 billion company with a pilot workforce of 2,000. FedEx and UPS are much more important in terms of revenue and workforce. We compete with a different set of competitors who do not pay the same rates as FedEx and UPS because of their size, revenue sources and business model.
But, as one Atlas Air driver pointed out on Twitter, Atlas earns much more per employee than its more well-known carriers. According to the Fidelity Stock Comparison Tool, Atlas generates 85 cents of revenue per employee, compared with 15 cents at UPS and FedEx.
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