Flight Attendants
 

Hello,

I was just curious about flight attendant seniority. By this I mean, do flight attendants that are more senior work in the more premier cabins or are there bids? Also how/what is their seniority based upon.

Thanks

-P

Flight Attendents
 

on what airline? On a unionized carrier, how to determine seniority is a heavily negotiated topic.

Fly on any US legacy carrier and you'll notice the choice routes (to LHR, CDG, FCO, etc) are taken by the 'battle-axes'. If you are looking for the young, fit, and bubbly cabin crew/stewardesses, take a Sunday 7am flight from SFO-LAX on UA.

Yes, I know this a massive generalisation!

Wow, talk about false and offensive gender and age stereotypes!

In the US, two issues affect flight attendants' assignments.

First, gender and age (among others) discrimination in employment was legally prohibited by the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Age Discrimination in Employment Act of 1967.

This means that in the USA it's no longer legal to employ people and then terminate them when they get married or have a child, or at certain arbitrary ages (45 has been common and still used at China Southern), which were built into airline hiring practices until these laws came along.

Today, airlines examine "BFOQs" - Bona Fide Occupational Qualifications. Flight Attendants are tested annually at least; if an FA is unfit and can't pass the tests or perform the duties required by the FAA etc. for the job, they must stand down from that job - but not because they reach a certain age or break stereotypes about physical appearance, for instance.

In a number of Asian countries, for example, airlines still discriminate (legally, in many instances) based on appearance, age and even marital status or pregnancy.

Unions in the USA fought the battles to make airlines toe the legal lines established by law.

They also, IMO, in a zeal to institutionalize retention, made seniority the prime criterion for flight selection in the typically used "bid" process. This means FAs "bid" on their predilect flights, often in concert with friends and those with similar work approaches - "buddy teams". (In my opinion, airline managers in the US shortsightedly exchanged supervision, job evaluation and merit in return for wage and benefit concessions to union members.)

Some FAs I know prefer certain flights - their station airport (so they don't have to commute) to, say FRA, HKG or NRT. Others prefer flights they can accomplish a "day's work" in one round trip: a previous #2 on AA's seniority list, for example, preferred DFW-SMF-SMF, because after that she enjoyed several days off and overnight end at home and not a distant hotel.

In the end, FAs have different preferences; some prefer premium cabins because there are fewer passengers, some settle on certain preferred destinations, others prefer working the galley, some get minimal extra pay to handle the necessary cabin paperwork ("pursers" in the US do that, whilst other, non-US airlines might have Cabin ServicevDirectors or others with lead / supervisory rôles), some prefer shorter routes allowing them to remain home off work.

Junior FAs, because of the bidding system get what their seniors don't want. Crowded cabins, unpopular routes, etc. and at one time, when expensive New York City was a station for those craving long, prestigious international routes the juniors who got "leftovers" and we're forced to rent tiny, cheap apartments shared with as many as seven others.

It's summarized by saying seniority rules, and the buddy system often means a "cabin culture" of FAs with similar approaches to things like work ethics.

Indeed. Such talk has no business on FT -- or elsewhere, IMO.

I try to fly around airlines which have such backwards thinking in their staffing.

It seems to only be the case with U.S airlines. I've heard from British and French FAs that even juniors get some pretty nice chances on good flights.

On some airlines, language skills can enable junior FAs to get more desirable flights.

From my experience, stations are assigned in order of join date. During the pre flight briefing, they would go down the list and the most senior (i.e. the attendant that has been with the airline longest) gets to take his/her pic. It usually goes 1A, 1B...etc, but one actually chose Y when her name was called, although there were still stations in the back of J available. Told me she loves F, but chooses Y over J on this flight full of OP-UPs...

Thank you all very much for the new information.

http://rantsofasassystew.com/wp-cont...if-you-can.jpg

When can we go back to this?

When we decide racial and sex discrimination in employment are good things.

1-ADAM-12 Roger.

Ahhhh. Well. Long gone are the days of airline jobs being glamorous.

Not necessarily. I've been told that on DL international, FAs do business class in one direction and coach in the other, with the purser (who works in business class) serving as the inflight service manager for coach in the other direction.

FAs with particular language skills would be assigned to certain positions too, sometimes serving the Asian meals or distributing landing cards but not spending all their time in the galley.

Fun movie reference.

As this is more general travel discussion, we'll try this over in a different forum, for now.

~beckoa, co-moderator Information Desk

I regret the passage of the day when simple appreciation of attractive appearance and behavior of one's fellow humans was regarded as neither offensive nor bigoted.

A person can be attractive to others at any age, with any ethnic or racial background. Their behavior can be bubbly and pleasant at age 21 or age 75. Likewise if a person is on the lookout to find themselves "oppressed" or a "victim," they're not going to be enjoyable company.

It wasn't an improvement the day the PC crowd decided that surly and easily offended is the new normal.

Granted. However, it's important to remember that airlines in the USA used to maintain staffs of attractive, pleasant FAs by enforcing onerous rules regarding sex, age, and marital status. It was a given that an important part of the FA's job was to be attractive to men.

It still should be an important part of the FA's job. And equally important is that the FA should be attractive to women.

I'm not sure those old rules were as onerous as the current PC crowd likes to claim. My business flights back in the mid-1970s were staffed with stewardesses (yes, that was the correct term) of a broad range of ages, both married and single. The difference was that none of them was fat, sloppy or surly. And I see no reason for supporting fat, sloppy, surly flight attendants of either sex.

If anyone thinks I'm engaging in "weight-ism" here, you're right. If you're offended, push back from the table earlier. You'll live a longer and happier life, and you can save your opprobrium for really important stuff like blood diamonds and human trafficking.

LOVE THAT MOVIE!!!!

http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/...PL._SY606_.jpg

I'm not sure who exactly you are ranting at, but I've had pretty terrible experiences with skinny FAs and great ones with fat ones.

Your nostalgia for the employment practices of the 1970s is nice and all. If you want to fly exclusively on airlines who aren't forced to comply with the collective standards that American society has endorsed via wage and hour protection and antidiscrimination law, feel free to fly Etihad and Emirates.

Being a flight attendant is a job, not a form of concubine service for men who were traveling for business 40 years ago.

The issue with FA's is not their age, gender, ethnicity, or body type, it's unions and how well the airline treats them. Obviously someone new (again, no matter their age, gender, ethnicity, or body type) is going to be more cautious/nicer to passengers because they aren't so "in" with the union. Someone who's been working and in the union for years isn't going to care about how well they treat other passengers, co-workers, or their job because short of murder, the union is going to defend and allow them to keep their job.

Now there are some exceptions, such as how well the airline treats them and if they like their job. For example, Southwest is heavily unionized yet most of their flight attendants go above and beyond. Likewise, over at United, they have many flight attendants that only do the bare minimum, if even, because of how they feel the company treats them.

Whilst I sympathize with those who have been treated badly by their employer, I simply don't see why those who work for USA airlines (United in particular) feel the need to take it out on the customers. The fact that they are also generally deeply unattractive (and attraction has a lot to do with attitude) just adds insult to injury.

Your suggestion that I believe the role of stewardesses to be (or once to have been) concubines is ridiculous. I've never suggested such a thing; only said I think FAs should be attractive in all the metrics that apply to "attractiveness" in a business sense. But the tendency of the PC crowd is to take a simple comment and extrapolate ad absurdum.

Likewise, you've suggested I favor abandonment of "wage and hour protection and antidiscrimination law." Not sure how you have inferred that from anything I've written here. Straw man.

In my experience, it's almost all to do with attitude.

Flight Attendants
 

Wow isn't this an interesting thread. I've been flying longer than many of you have been alive, you might have been a lap child on one of my flights. That being said, I work for a unionized airline in the US but it doesn't make me perform my job any differently. I still enjoy going to work and have a great time with my passengers. I treat people the way I would like to be treated and I will bend over backwards for my passengers. I prefer to work in Y as do many of my coworkers around my seniority. Air travel has changed for all of us over the years and you just have to learn how to roll with the punches. I know it's a lot more stressful for passengers and I have a lot of empathy for them. I'm the mother of two grown children so I know how hard it is to travel with kids and I'm always happy to help parents. I don't feel like I'm an exception to the rule, most of the people I fly with have the same attitude and values. Do I fly with "Attitudy Judy"? Of course I do from time to time, and it usually make the rest of us work twice as hard to make up for their shortfalls. None of us are perfect, but many of us will work our tails off to make your confinement in the metal tube as painless as possible.
Safe travels to all, and I hope to have the privilege of flying with some of you in the years to come.

Thanks for a view from the FA's perspective. Your story illustrates what the airlines and their passengers lost in the old days when marriage or aging beyond thirty would have cost you your job.

Thank you for posting that. Fortunately, I have had the pleasure in 90% of my air travel to fly with fellow FA's like you who love their job and treat passengers as you hope to be treated in return. Unfortunately there are some less-traveled people out there who group the 10% who are only working there because of the union in with you guys who still act professional and kind despite whatever back of the house problems are happening.

Thanks for this great post, GalleyWench. You have had the last word.
Obscure2k
TravelBuzz Moderator