Do me a favor, Americans, and DON'T FLY NO MORE!!!!!!!
Make the airlines scream in agony and maybe the "terror" bullshit and the shitty service will stop.
If not, no loss -- you won't be flying anyway!!
(Sorry I was gone so long today; computer went down, had to replace part; several posts wiped out before posted)
"Airline, loser in suit, fails to deliver promised pay raise; Workers get deep wage cut from American" by Jonathan Saltzman, Globe Staff | May 29, 2008
American Airlines failed to deliver on a promise to raise the hourly wages of skycaps at Logan International Airport after the airline prohibited them from receiving tips for checking in luggage at the curb, two of the skycaps and their lawyer said yesterday.
But while the lawyer said the airline had reneged, American Airlines attributed the shortchanging to payroll mistakes and promised to correct it quickly.
Pffffftt! Excuses!!!!
By the way, what ever happened to the $15 BILLION DOLLAR BAILOUT the airlines got after 9/11?
On May 1, the airline said its Texas-based payroll subcontractor, G2 Secure Staff, would immediately raise the hourly wages of its approximately 18 skycaps at Logan to $12 as part of a controversial policy barring passengers from tipping there. Most of the skycaps were earning $5.15 an hour at the time, well below the state's $8-an-hour minimum wage.
WTF?! How are these people supposed to get by on $5.15/hour?
I mean, really! And then to DENY them TIPS?
But when several skycaps looked at their paycheck this week, they noticed their wages had actually plummeted to $2.63 an hour, said Ritson Desrosiers of Mattapan, a skycap for 15 years. The paycheck that skycaps received two weeks earlier was for $10.75 an hour, he said, still below the promised $12.
Shannon Liss-Riordan, the Boston lawyer who represented many of the skycaps in a recent successful lawsuit against the airline in US District Court, said the carrier had shown "gross indifference" to the employees.
"What is really outrageous is that American claimed to the court and to the public that it was going to raise the skycaps' wages when it instituted this no-tipping policy," she said. "And what we have now learned is that the skycaps actually got a wage cut, so they're making less than minimum wage and they're not allowed to receive tips."
Does the robbery never end?
.... Told by the Globe last night in a subsequent interview that the airline was blaming technical problems with the payroll, Liss-Riordan responded: "I think it's ridiculous. American is responsible for getting aircraft across the country and across the world every day. And it can't implement a pay raise?"
Yeah, that is stretching it a bit, isn't it?
Otherwise, planes would be getting "hijacked by terrorists" and "crashing" all the time, huh?
The shortchanging marks the latest twist in a running feud between the skycaps and the airline, which is struggling to stay solvent in an era of record-high fuel prices.
Oh, boo-hoo for the puke airlines!!
On April 7, a federal jury awarded a group of nine American Airlines skycaps at Logan more than $325,000 for tips they lost after the airline in September 2005 began charging customers $2 a bag to check in luggage at the curb.
The jury concluded that those fees belonged to the skycaps, who testified that their tips plunged because passengers mistakenly thought the employees kept the $2 and were reluctant to tip on top of it.
On May 1, the airline said that it planned to appeal the jury's verdict and that it had taken another step: It was prohibiting the tipping of American Airlines skycaps, although only at Logan.
Is that a PUNISHMENT or what!!!
The airline said the ban, plus a decision to raise the pay of most skycaps to $12 an hour, would remove the workers from the list of employees who are covered by the state's tips law, which protects gratuities for waiters, bartenders, and other service workers. The skycaps disputed that the raise would remove them from the list.
WTF is this garbage?
By "protecting" they are talking about TAXING THEM!!!
This is an outrageous description, readers.
I live in Massachusetts, and waitresses make the $2.63/hour the the alleged 15 or 20% gratuity that is factored in for tax purposes -- whether the server received it or not!
This is where I really like Ron Paul. He says TIPS should NOT BE TAXED -- and I AGREE!!
See what I'm saying about Massachusetts kind of sucking for its liberal reputation?
And what's with the elite richers at the paper falsely describing the situation for the poorer, hard-work... never mind, answered it!
The lone skycap who works directly for American, Don DiFiore, was supposed to get $15 an hour but said yesterday his pay has not changed from $10.66 an hour.
"How hard can it be for American Airlines to figure out how to give me five dollars more an hour?" he said...."
Well, when the execs are pocketing it...