Hawaiian Airlines and their nearly 1,000 pilots, as represented by their Air Line Pilots Association (ALPA) Union, have tentatively agreed on a new 4-year employment agreement. It includes hefty pay increases in addition to bonuses and better flexibility in scheduling.
Hawaiian Airlines pilots were said to earn on average from $227/hour to $337 per hour depending on seniority and aircraft type. That is before the 33% pay increase associated with the tentative agreement. If approved, that would bring pilot pay at Hawaiian Airlines to between $302 to $448/hour over the next four years.
The agreement also provides industry-leading pay rates for pilots in the new Amazon cargo operations, which starts this fall. A final vote to approve the contract is set to take place beginning January 27.
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The agreement includes an average 32.9 percent pay increase over the duration of the deal for HAL’s five aircraft types, including an average 16.6 percent increase on date of signing. It adds a signing bonus, raises company retirement contributions, creates a new health reimbursement account, increases schedule flexibility, and improves pilot quality of life.
ALPA union president Larry Payne, a Hawaiian Airlines pilot said,
“We believe this industry-standard agreement represents a monumental step forward in terms of overall compensation and quality of life gains,”
“Hard-fought negotiations between the Negotiating Committee and the Company have now yielded what the MEC believes to be an agreement that accomplishes the goals our pilots set for us when we opened talks two years ago.”
One of the highlights of the proposed agreement is the pay rate for Hawaiian’s future fleet of Airbus A330F freighters, which it will begin flying for Amazon in 2024. The A330F rates will be the highest in the industry, surpassing existing rates at cargo giants UPS and FedEx Express.
Due to the new Hawaiian Airlines/Amazon cargo deal is also featured in the contract, they will now make more than comparable positions at FedEx and UPS.
The pilots’ agreement is comprehensive of all aircraft in Hawaiian’s fleet, including the interisland Boeing 717 and the mainland and international Airbus A321neo and Airbus A330-200. It will also cover the soon-to-be-acquired Boeing 787 Hawaiian Dreamliner fleet.
The HAL ALPA MEC unanimously approved sending the tentative agreement to the airline’s 1,000 pilots for ratification and will open two weeks of ratification voting on January 27. If ratified, the agreement would take effect March 2.
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