Do flight crews not get paid for delay time?
 

My flight yesterday that was supposed to be a 3 hour flight took off 2.5 hours late and then ended up being a longer flight due to a couple of holding patterns. When the original delay was announced, the flight attendants were trying to figure out what the cause of the delay was--looking in the computer at the gate--and one of them said, "Great. Now we're not going to get paid." What is that all about? Do flight crews not get paid for time waiting around in a delay?

This would perhaps explain why they were uniformly rude throughout the flight--or maybe they are always like that.

I'm not certain, but I think flight crews start to get paid when the door is shut. Even if they "find" a cause of delay after the door is closed, they get paid. But if the pax wait in the terminal, they do not get paid because they are not yet "on duty".

That is why they rush you to get on the plane and take your seats, close the door and (then) discover a problem that takes maintanence 1 hour to fix. They get paid for that delay. But if it was "discovered" before the door was closed, they would not get paid for the delay. :rolleyes:

True, it would be more comfortable for the pax to wait for an hour in the terminal or bar, but the crew would not be earning $$$ during that time!

.....Flight crews are paid, once the aircraft MOVES. The aircraft door has to be closed and the brakes released. Upon pushback, ground movement, flight and blocked in at the destination gate is FLIGHT PAY.
.....Rudeness? Just because you dont like the answer a flight attendant gives you sometimes, doesnt make it RUDE!

It varies entirely by the contract of employment.

Projecting much? Who said anything about answers?

Actually, they wouldn't, from what I've been told several times by FA's. Close the door and re-open it = no pay. Only from final closing of the door before take-off do they get paid. So your "theory" :rolleyes: on intentionally delaying addressing a maintenance issue is hogwash.

In terms of flight attendant rudeness
 

It started when we boarded the plane after a 1.5 hour delay. My son, who is 7, got on the plane just ahead of me. He was very sleepy since he had been up since 4AM Pacific time. The male flight attendant said hello to him, and my son didn't answer, and the flight attendant snapped at him, "You say hello back when someone says hello to you."

That was just the beginning of a loooong flight.

From talking to many FA's it seems that most of their contacts are based on when the door of the plane is closed.

Bet he wouldn't have tried that on an adult customer. I'm sure people ignore him when he says hello all the time (which is rude and annoying of them.) but taking it out on a 7-year-old is unprofessional.

Many airlines are paid on "block time" which is the scheduled time for the flight...so even if there is an in air delay, they will only get paid for the scheduled time of the flight. During a delay, if they are away from their domicile, they are usually getting perdiem. Perdiem is anywhere from $0.75 to $3.00 an hour, depending on airline and contracts.

So before the doors are closed and after the doors are opened again they still have to work (help customers to their seats, distrubute pillows and blankets) but don't get paid? Sounds like exploitation to me.

The analogy would be for people working in a store to be told to arrive at 7 am to stock the shelves and stay until 9 pm to finish counting the money, but only get paid from 9 am to 7 pm while the store is open to the public.

I don't doubt that employers would love this, but until now I couldn't imagine that this would hold in a court of law. I thought slavery had been abolished some time ago.

HTB.

It's inappropriate to say that for work done during non-flying time the crew "don't get paid", as the payment for flying hours is designed to average all this out. It is only a means of calculation.

So the captain gets paid say £4,000 for a month's flying. This is typically 80 hours, which sounds low but that is flying hours. In fact you report for all the work associated with say 10 x 8 hour flights in the month, and that is what you get paid for, at £50/hour. You could include all the preparation etc time as well, find it was say 160 hours, be paid at £25/hour, and end up with the same.

That's how it is in aviation. There's always a long queue for job applications so many must like it this way.