Try to set the scene in your mind… You’re a flight attendant for one of the biggest airlines in the world, and you’re halfway through a long duty day. You’ve been up since the crack of dawn, and you won’t finish until late. The flights you’ve been working on have been busy, and the passengers are cranky.
Unsurprisingly, you’re tired, and when the opportunity finally presents itself, you sit down on a spare seat for a few minutes and shut your weary eyes while chatting with a colleague.
At that moment, one of your fellow crew members, someone who you should be able to consider your friend, takes a photo of you on their cell phone.
You are none the wiser to what has just happened. You finish your working day, saying goodbye to the flight attendants you’ve been working with for the past 12 hours before going your separate ways. You made it through another tough few days at work.
Several weeks pass, and suddenly, you are called in to see your manager. An allegation has been made that you were sleeping on the job, and your manager has apparent photo evidence of your fatal transgression.
You call your union for assistance – after all, if you were to listen to some people, aviation workers in the United States are far too protected by powerful unions.
Your union rep fights your corner and tries to explain that you were simply resting your eyes. You were awake, alert, ready to assist passengers or to respond to any kind of emergency that might suddenly occur.
Their efforts, however, are to no avail. You’re terminated… or, in flight attendant speak, your wings have been clipped.
This is exactly the scenario that one Dallas Fort Worth-based flight attendant shared in a Facebook group dedicated to cabin crew. The name of the group has been withheld to protect the identity of the ex-crew member.
The flight attendant in question says she has considered her appeal options, but her outlook on life in the airline industry has been ‘tainted’ by what happened.
After all, landing a job at one of the so-called Big Three airlines in the United States is no easy feat in the first place. To think that your job and livelihood can be snatched away so quickly and easily must take some processing.
What’s even worse, however, is that it was crew member’s colleague that reported her.
Most unions have internal units specifically designed to prevent these kinds of reports from getting to management. The idea is that flight attendants can safely report policy and procedure infractions to the union, which will carry out its own investigation and coach the subject of the report.
Some crew members, however, bypass this step and go straight to the airline.
The truth of the matter is that it’s not only hard to secure a job as a flight attendant, it’s just as hard to keep the job.
In 2022, the union that represents flight attendants at American Airlines warned that the Fort Worth-based carrier had tripled the number of disciplinary cases with a view to terminating crew members.
The airline was allegedly taking disciplinary action against flight attendants for all manners of infractions, and in many cases, managers were being asked to proceed with termination rather than ‘attempts at mitigation.’
The Association of Professional Flight Attendants admitted that AA was attempting to tighten enforcement of regulations that had, until recently, been allowed to slip, although the union feared that managers were too keen to push the termination button.
It’s not American Airlines that has taken a tough stance with disciplinary action against flight attendants. At United Airlines, using a cell phone (an everyday activity that the vast majority of people don’t think twice about) could result in a flight attendant being sent packing.
And let’s not even start on points-based attendance policies that could see flight attendants being terminated through no fault of their own – a policy that APFA described as ‘disrespectful’ given the fact that constantly working in a metal tube is likely to end up with sickness from time to time.
So what’s the takeaway? It can be pretty precarious being a flight attendant for some of the most well-known airlines out there. Your job could be snatched away at a moment’s notice, and there are plenty of people who are ready and willing to take your place.
What’s perhaps worse is that the big airlines know this. The Delta Air Lines careers website was put under so much strain when it reopened flight attendant recruitment that it kept on crashing. Tens of thousands of people are expected to apply, but only a very small percentage will make it all the way through.
But be warned… getting through the recruitment campaign is only half the battle.
LOL. Michelle please. Weren’t you drunk?
It is my understanding that the flight attendant in question. Her mother had just died and she had a migraine from dealing with the stress of it all which is why she closed her eyes for a second. The flight attendant that turned her in had lunch with her that day and she thought they were friendly with the flight attendant consoling her. For this flight attendant yo then stab her in the back is wrong on every level.
Absolutely disgusting. Shame on AA and Shannon XX aka Shannon XX of class XX for initiating the entire thing.
Hi Jackoff. Is this the name of the FA who snitched on the person who lost their job?
I’m truly sorry to hear of anyone losing their livelihood, especially if it can potentially be permanent. Falling asleep when the safety of others is at stake is serious business but so it being a good neighbor. The colleague should have nudged with a warning. However, if the flight attendant had a history of not living up to her share of duties, she/he might of had it coming. There’s no easy answer, but truly, a fair warning should have been given before escalating to corporate. That’s simply not the type of person one should want to be. I hope you find other employment in the airline industry soon and be sure you’re well rested before your shifts.
I hears she smelled like booze.
What an awful co-worker. People can be such dirt bags.
It is a big deal. Sleeping can and should get you fired in many occupations. I think that AA should continue to terminate, even pick up the pace, for service and safety infractions. Too many FAs make up their own rules and it’s a job with specific duties. Like the rest of the workforce, complete your job duties or find a new job.