[FDOS_UK]

MrMichael

As I understand it, the base salary is £12k and MAY rise above £20k with variable pay, including a performance based element.

There are a lot of sales people out there on similar deals and presumably a high turnover if they cannot earn the full package.

Here is the job advert – it is not deceptive.

https://jobs.ba.com/jobs/vacancy/cabin-crew-london-heathrow—mixed-fleet-0466/484/description/

If the crew cannot live on this package, then they need to leave and find better work (and I am sure many have already). This is no longer a vocation (as the pre-97 contracts were), but a short term job to see a bit of the world (and work your socks off for your trouble).

[MrMichael]

Copied from the website:-

“As Mixed Fleet Cabin Crew you will have the potential to earn, on average, a reward package of between £21,000 and £25,000 per annum. This comprises of a starting salary of £12,192 per annum, an hourly payment when you are flying, bonuses for achieving your performance targets and commission for Inflight Retail sales. Annual leave starting at 30 days per year rising to 34 days per year.”

Somewhat misleading maybe. Performance targets and commission are often a way for unscrupulous employers to pay a pittance while advertising a good salary. It would be interesting to know what % of staff hit the 21-25 as advertised. This has unsettled me greatly, I detest exploitation in all its forms. If this is BA taking advantage of young impressionable people hoping to see a bit of the world for a couple of years then they should hang their heads in shame. Let’s hope BOB is a good thing for these staff with them earning a fair few bob from it.

[rferguson]

Just IMHO. It seems the majority of the Mixed Fleet crew that are making the most noise about the (admittedly dreadful) pay, terms and conditions are those that have now done around five years or so. The irony is, the package was designed as it is precisely for this reason – once people have done five years, leave and get replaced by new crew.

The money on Mixed Fleet is appalling. It is generally viewed as the worst package in the industry in the UK. You can earn more at Virgin, Qantas, Ryanair, Easyjet….pretty much any airline. When I joined it was every stewards aspiration to eventually ‘make it’ to BA. Now other airlines crew know to stay put – unless they are desperate for a silver tie. Some just want the prestige of working for BA. A lot still live at home with their family so aren’t so bothered about the money. They just want to travel. And a good proportion live in ‘crew houses’ around LHR – basically housesharing with five, six, seven other crew. I’m told the ‘sweet point’ the company desires for Mixed Fleet retention is two years – then move on or as some will do move up.

The company struggle to get experienced BA (legacy) Main Crew to apply for the Mixed Fleet Customer Service Manager role because that is a pay cut. Yup, even the CSM’s on Mixed Fleet are paid appallingly. They are taking home less than a regular cabin crew stewardess on the legacy contract. Not to mention working more hours.

But again….this is all by design. Our CEO was quoted as saying when he was in charge at Vueling that the 46%p.a (!!) turnover amongst cabin crew at Vueling was also ‘by design’.

But why is high turnover so desirable? Several reasons. As crew stay longer and the gloss and excitement of travelling the world fades they want more remuneration for doing so. If you are a ‘career stewardess’ you expect a decent pension. Good union representation. As you get older you may wish to have a family – and take advantage of all the type of leave and in work benefits available for you to do this. Then you want the airline to be more accommodating for child care needs etc. You reach your late 40’s/early 50’s and you start needing more time off for illness. Looking after elderly parents. Etc. Employ a group of predominantly young people who just want to see the world for a couple years before moving on before replacing them with another bunch and these situations are pretty much circumvented. Recruitment and training is tax deductible.

It’s worth remembering when Virgin Atlantic crew balloted for Industrial Action a while ago – Virgin offered them a one off payment of £400 to end the dispute and they accepted it. I can see a similar ending to the dispute with MF at BA. They’ll throw a few pennies their way and they’ll think they’ve won the lottery.

**My personal opinions only**

[FDOS_UK]

rferguson

I agree with all your points.

MrMichael

With all due respect, you are coming across as naive.

The advert is what it is – it doesn’t promise ‘x’% of people will make the package, it just says ”

As Mixed Fleet Cabin Crew you will have the potential to earn, on average, a reward package of between £21,000 and £25,000 per annum.”

That seems perfectly clear to me – ‘potential’ is the key word.

[JohnHarper]

There’s something wrong at BA when a member of mixed fleet crew earns less a year than Wee Willie earns in a day. This is exactly the sort of thing I understand Theresa May will target and the sooner the better. It stinks of injustice and greed.

I hope the crews concerned do strike and I hope their colleagues across the other BA fleets join them. There’s only strength in them sticking together.

[sparkyflier]

JohnHarper +1 I thought of the Theresa May context last
night. Well said.

[AlanOrton1]

I very much doubt Cruz and Walsh are alone in the airline CEO club in earning more in one day than their crew earn in a year. (Not that I think this is a good thing).

As for a politician changing this, I have zero belief this will ever happen and is little more than a sound bite.

[FDOS_UK]

[quote quote=774181]There’s something wrong at BA when a member of mixed fleet crew earns less a year than Wee Willie earns in a day. This is exactly the sort of thing I understand Theresa May will target and the sooner the better. It stinks of injustice and greed.

I hope the crews concerned do strike and I hope their colleagues across the other BA fleets join them. There’s only strength in them sticking together.

[/quote]

John

I agree entirely. But not just at BA, at amny large corporates, where executive pay is completely out of all proportion – I do hope Mrs May follows through on this – I found the spectacle of BHS vile.

[canucklad]

Interesting point about BOB supplementing their income. If that is the case,will it mean us having to endure lengthy sales pitches over the intercom system?
And I’ll pose this question….
What is actually missing from this low pay model ?……think of similar jobs at that pay scale, aka taxi drivers,restaurant staff , bar staff, hotel cleaners etc!!

[rferguson]

I support the crew. And I have no doubt that the overwhelming majority will put an ‘X’ in the box to ballot for strike action.

But….IMHO I think the chances of any action is somewhere between nil and 1%. BA will roll out the usual fear rhetoric, removal of anything ‘discretionary’. You’ll lose your staff travel, you’ll lose any incentive payments. Perhaps they’ll offer a small increase. They’ll likely throw a one off payment of around £500 their way a la Virgin. And for skint young crew offer a lump of cold hard cash and they’ll grab it with both hands.

I wouldn’t be surprised if this has been in the equation since the launch of MF six years ago. BA are prepared to pay a total package of let’s say £22K. So for the first few years we’ll pay them £18K which will save us £xM. Once the rumbling starts we’ll increase it to £20K.

The cracks are beginning to show with MF. I’ll be the first to say that on the whole they seem a lovely, enthusiastic, pro active group of people. But fact is BA have exhausted the ‘experienced cabin crew pot’ from other airlines. Unlike years ago very few will leave the airline they are at to join BA. Word has got back that its ‘not REAL BA on Mixed Fleet’. So basically you are finding 747’s crewed with 14 stewards and stewardesses with an average age of 25 and an average length of service of 18 months or so. The service is slow to deliver, efficiency and slickness is not there – especially in the premium cabins. ‘Experienced crew’ with a years service are helping out the one/two/three+ crew that are on their first flight/first week/first month.

What none of us can really understand is why after six years there has still been no moves to integrate the Mixed Fleet crew with the legacy crew. Mixed Fleet crew would continue to fly to their own pay, T&C’s but alongside their more experienced colleagues. This has happened in the past with ‘LHR temps’ (the forerunners of MF) and the new Chinese based crew. The winner really is the customer – what MF crew lack (experience, maturity) WW crew possess. And most definitely vice versa. MF would give a huge injection of youth and enthusiasm to WW some of whom can appear to be ‘going through the motions’.

**Personal opinions only**

[AnthonyDunn]

Frankly, I am surprised that this has taken this long to come about bearing in mind the sundry observations that have been made to me by the various crew fleets over the past couple of years. The knowledge that it is one set of rules for Walsh (and his coterie of managerial “super stars”) whilst it’s another entirely for the proles is something that is very well understood and deeply resented by no few BA personnel I’ve come across.

Bearing in mind that finding a replacement for Walsh ought to be quite easy whereas finding replacements to fly and crew all those aircraft would be considerably harder, I would have thought that the answer is blindingly obvious. It would also give BA staff morale its biggest fillip in years!

[TominScotland]

I fully agree with everything said about deplorable pay levels, especially in a London context. The basic pay on offer must be close to minimum wage territory. It is very much the crewing model used by the ME carriers and rferguson’s images of crowded ‘crew houses’ is very similar to what I have read in relation to Doha and Dubai. It is a ‘fun’, young person’s thing to do for a couple of years before getting an education and/or a real job – typical ‘lifestyle’ employment as an alternative to a gap year.

Yes, fully agree that executive pay needs to be curtailed and certainly not just at BA, as FDOS points out. Canucklad, maybe we should tip Mixed Fleet on leaving the aircraft???

At the same time, BA are under competitive pricing pressure – many contributors to this Forum criticise them for their high prices and ‘sale prices’ that are not low enough. Something has to give and Mixed Fleet are a soft target – senior executive pay and legacy fleet remuneration seem to be untouchable. Not sure that strike action will really help – there will be many more young people willing to join the Mixed fleet to offer what, in my experience, can be decidedly mixed service, to replace them. After all, we are a low-wage economy here in the UK and, despite the hopes, I cannot see Brexit altering this. Worth remembering that 25% of 2004 university graduates earn as little as £20,000 over 10 years after graduating – https://www.theguardian.com/education/2016/aug/13/quarter-of-graduates-are-low-earners

[FDOS_UK]

Tom

I agree with the thrust of your post – no good will come from this proposed strike action, for the company, employees or BA passengers. Although I don’t think legacy crew are untouchable, BA has just let several hundred go under a voluntary redundancy deal.

The whole point of mixed fleet has always been to pay low remuneration for youngsters wishing to see the world – that’s why there is (allegedly) a career path into the business from mised fleet.

The pendulum has swung from one side to the other at BA, I remember the days of BASSA only too well, with aggressive union leadership and management often giving concessions to appease them; now the opposite is true – it will be interesting to see if any volunteer cabin crew are sought in the event of action – and perhaps, more interestingly, how many would come forward now.

I cannot support BA until it realistically looks at all aspects of its operation, including executive and senior management packages.

[seasonedtraveller]

Taken from the advert…. These statements made me smile, or grimace….just a bit 😉

No wonder the crew are pissed off (putting the pay issues on one side), when BA make statements like those below but the crew see the actual day to day reality.

Customers are at the heart of everything we do at British Airways

to make great things happen for our customers

with customers at the forefront of your mind.

taking care to provide experiences that set us apart from the competition.

[seasonedtraveller]

[quote quote=774181]There’s something wrong at BA when a member of mixed fleet crew earns less a year than Wee Willie earns in a day. This is exactly the sort of thing I understand Theresa May will target and the sooner the better. It stinks of injustice and greed.

I hope the crews concerned do strike and I hope their colleagues across the other BA fleets join them. There’s only strength in them sticking together.

[/quote]

Completely agree with you JohnHarper

[Author]

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