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Hawaiian Airlines is going to pay $5 million in retroactive profit-sharing to its union members for the period of time when they were negotiating new labor contracts.
Under terms of Hawaiian’s collective-bargaining agreement, profit-sharing doesn’t accrue when an old contract expires and a new one is being negotiated. It kicks in only after the new contract begins.
But the airline said Monday it wanted to reward its employees after a successful year. The profit-sharing recipients include the company’s pilots, who have demanded retroactive profit-sharing as a part of their still-unresolved contract negotiations. The Air Line Pilots Association contract ended Sept. 15, 2015. The old terms remain in place during negotiations.
Other unions that will receive profit-sharing payments are the Transport Workers Union (dispatchers) and the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers, which consists of IAM-Mechanical and IAM-Clerical. The flight attendants, represented by the Association of Flight Attendants, already are receiving profit-sharing because their contract doesn’t end until January.
“We are closing the books on the most successful year in our company’s history,” Hawaiian spokeswoman Ann Botticelli said. “To recognize our employees’ contributions to that success, we have decided that employees whose collective bargaining contracts precluded profit-sharing payments for all or part of 2014 and 2015 will receive a lump sum that reflects what they would have received during the period that their contracts were amendable. The pilots will also receive profit-sharing for 2016, even though this is outside of the scope of their contract.”
Hawaiian notified their employees of the development Friday and announced it Monday in a regulatory filing. The company expects to set aside $20 million for its proposed contract with the pilots.
The state’s largest carrier also said delivery of its first three A321neo aircraft has been delayed three months by manufacturer Airbus, and the airline now expects to receive the planes in the fourth quarter of next year.
In addition, Hawaiian revised upward its forecast for fourth-quarter operating revenue per available seat mile and increased its expected cost per available seat mile, excluding fuel and special items, due to $6 million in additional profit-sharing for its 2016 plan.