Lay offs
 

Was chatting at length with a pilot friend tonight and he says the 777 and 350 pilots will be getting told very soon who will be laid off along with about 30% of ground crews and cabin staff.

It would be all the pilots being told and cabin crew not only 777 and 350 pilots as the contracts stipulate a Seniority system for promotion and redundancy, I.e the longer you have been there then you get promoted to Captain first and vice versa you get laid off last.

Doesn't matter what you fly, the company will just have to retrain whomever is left to fly whatever aircraft they have in the fleet. All being equal I am sure that everything possible will be done from both management and the unions to avoid redundancies. It is not a good time for anyone right now and let's hope that things pick up soon.

Exactly. Last in / First Out.
Most of the CX and KA Conditions of Service have this clause, some of the newer ones do not.
The point is the older and more costly crew cannot be dumped by the type they fly. CX has to lay off by seniority.

If Cathay wants to play hardball, they will cancel all contracts and present new terms and conditions to their pilots. Take it or leave it. CX could get sued for this, but it will go through the courts for years and years, and HK law does not protect the employee.

For once, almost everything is stacked in the airline's favour and undoubtedly they will take advantage of this, not only for the health of the company, but to unshackle themselves from legacy contracts. I don't agree this is the right way to treat employees, but there is a different reality in place now.

CX already has the PR machine out to start conditioning: https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/...es-uncertainty

I thought they are already offering early retirement to senior flight and cabin crew?

And after they tally the numbers who take it up, they will still have too many staff.

The SCMP article is laying the groundwork for a British Airways style change (i.e. fire and rehire), as mentioned by sxc, this approach will be far cheaper and whilst it may destroy labour relationships what's the alternative, probably go work for a Chinese carrier.

Let's hope that the hints about service reduction don't follow the BA standard, route consolidation is obviously required for a period.

Well - it's 'at least' last in - first out.

When Emirates was sacking roughly 1250 of their 1900 A380 pilots the criteria were obviously many with 'extensive' sickness records out (like a longer one time off due a cancer treatment or broken leg); many from the top of the seniority list (as too expensive - same approach applied by Qatar at the moment), or having any records of non-compliance e.g. internal reports of fatigue during flights.

Source: please have a look on the pprune forum for first hand reports.

What the above indicates about the airline's safety culture - make your own call.

A common view is that international travel will not reach a significant level (say 50% of pre-Covid level) in the next 2 to 3 years. Miracles can happen, but some predictions are even more gloomy.

CX will be more affected than most other airlines as it does not have domestic flights.
I don't think that CX can follow contractual rules like "last in/first out". Survival dictates drastic action as HKSAR will not put up much more money..
The outlook has worsened since June. As SXC suggested, reality will hit hard. Survival is not certain.

Agree. Just look at the EK approach. Given they cut the number by half of their A380 pilots I think its reasonable to expect that they might only fly 30-50 of their A380s over the next 2 years. Sir Timmy said they'll keep all 115 but let's see....

That being said, I think EK might be even stronger hit than CX given the large number of wide bodies and the strong reliance on hub and spoke (not sure if there is an airline which is actually harder hit by Covid than EK but there are better experts to judge)

Sad for everyone loosing his/her job though.

[QUOTE=littlevoices;32614155]The SCMP article is laying the groundwork for a British Airways style change (i.e. fire and rehire), as mentioned by sxc, this approach will be far cheaper and whilst it may destroy labour relationships what's the alternative, probably go work for a Chinese carrier.

I don't think there is much 'labour relationship' left in CX, both pilots and crew have been at loggerheads for years.
If they go down the route of fire and rehire, it will make BA look angelic in comparison !!

Cx are probably very happy they never bought A380s right about now, they always argued that it was too much aeroplane in the event of a downturn and you couldn't cut half an A380 but you could cut LHR 777 service from 5 a day to 3

Testing

Yes, it's testing for all involved.

You are right that EK and QR will be very badly hit. But they have powerful backers.

There is little alternative to keeping A380s as there is no secondary markets for these birds.