Southwest Airlines has reached a tentative labor deal with its flight attendants after the first agreement was resoundingly rejected by crew members in a controversial ballot that the union claimed was open to fraud.
At present, very little is known about the latest tentative agreement, and even flight attendants at the Dallas-based carrier won’t find out the details until March 25, when the TWU 556 union will publish details of the deal.
In a statement, the union said the tentative agreement had been approved by “unanimous consent” and that Southwest’s 20,000 flight attendants would soon have the opportunity to take part in a new ballot.
The TWU 556 union reached a similar tentative agreement with Southwest management after a deal was hammered out at a secretive meeting in Chicago last October, although the proposed contract proved less than popular with the union’s members.
Flight attendants resoundingly rejected the tentative agreement, with just 36% of eligible flight attendants voting in favour of the deal.
Several days later, however, the integrity of the voting process was called into question over allegations of potential fraud due to an issue with the third-party vendor that set up the ballot.
The union threatened legal action and talked of rerunning the ballot but, in the end, decided to accept the result of the vote. Union negotiators went back to the airline to hash out a reworked agreement, although talks were delayed due to the availability of federal mediators.
Earlier this year, Southwest’s pilot voted in favor of approving a new contract, and the airline says it has managed to ratify agreements with nine workgroups since 2022.
