Disabled and vulnerable passengers who need help navigating around Heathrow Airport and getting on and off aircraft could be hit by a major strike by 500 special assistance helpers during the busy Easter holidays unless the airport agrees to big pay hikes.
Heathrow Airport has a centralized team of workers who assist passengers with restricted mobility – known within the aviation industry as PRMs – across its four terminals, who walk an average of 13 miles a day, pushing wheelchairs or simply providing emotional support.
Airlines don’t have the choice to use their own assistance service for disabled or vulnerable passengers who request additional help through the airport; instead, they have to rely on the service provided by Heathrow, which is then subcontracted out to a company called Wilson James.
The workers employed by Wilson James at Heathrow are unhappy that special assistance helpers at Gatwick Airport doing the same job and employed by the same company are earning nearly 10% more, according to the Unite union.
“Wilson James and Heathrow are both highly profitable, so there is absolutely no excuse for these workers to be paid far less than their colleagues at Gatwick,” slammed Unite general secretary Sharon Graham.
If a deal can’t be hammered out at the eleventh hour, workers are set to start a four-day strike from April 5 to April 8, and further strikes are already being planned if the dispute cannot be quickly resolved, the union warns.
According to Unite, a lack of funding isn’t behind the company’s refusal to increase wages, as the company reported gross profits of £35.4 million for the year ending July 2024.
In 2022, Heathrow was blasted over its “significant service failings” in helping disabled passengers following an investigation by the Civil Aviation Authority.
Heathrow’s former boss later blamed a viral travel hack on TikTok for its failure to provide sufficient service to PRMs, saying that it had seen an uptick in able-bodied travelers requesting wheelchair assistance to glide through check-in, security, and immigration checks.
