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AFA
Legislative Victory
Flight Attendants Will Be Certified
Historic Milestone Reached for Flight Attendant Profession
After nearly a yearlong battle, Congress recently passed an
FAA Reauthorization bill that includes provisions to certify
flight attendants for our role as safety professionals. This
is an important milestone for all flight attendants - it will
help strengthen our role as air safety professionals and
better define our status onboard the aircraft, to passengers
and crew alike. AFA hopes to continue building on the success
of this victory to ensure many more safeguards and
improvements for our profession.
In
fact, AFA's Constitution and Bylaws specifically list
certification as one of the primary objectives of the union.
According to the Constitution and Bylaws, AFA's Objective
#4 is:
"To
promote the interest of the profession and to safeguard the
rights, individually and collectively, of the members of the
Union by securing the long-range goal of flight attendant
certification."
We
have finally achieved that "long-range goal" and can
now build upon this success to improve our profession even
further.
Until
now, all work groups overseen by the FAA have been certified
to perform their jobs. Upon completion of their training,
every employee from pilots to parachute packers receives a
certificate, which is required to perform their jobs. But
flight attendants - who receive extensive safety training, and
now, in the post September 11th world, are required to act as
security personnel in the aircraft cabin - had never been
certified. Our lack of certification allowed us to be
categorized as second-class employees and continue to be
viewed - despite our extensive safety and security training -
by our companies, the government and the flying public as
merely "waitresses in the sky."
But
no more. With passage of this legislation, we have finally
been recognized as the professionals we are and received the
respect we have long sought and deserved. No more will the
government, our employers and the public be able to simply
view us as servers in the air. We have finally been recognized
for our safety roles and will forever be considered primarily
as safety professionals onboard the aircraft.
Aside
from the overdue respect and recognition we will now receive,
certification provides a number of other important benefits.
It will help lead to the portability of our jobs and make us
more marketable to airlines that may be hiring, as it will
standardize our profession and create incentives for airlines
to hire experienced flight attendants over other applicants.
An airline that hires a certified flight attendant would no
longer have to send them through the entire initial training
program; the airline specific training would suffice because
the flight attendant's certification would serve as proof that
they had completed initial training.
Our
certification will provide us with the ability to earn further
recognition at the bargaining table. Management will now be
forced to recognize that our professional role is an important
piece in the safety of the entire aircraft.
Certification
will also help improve our training. Currently, carriers are
granted too many waivers, which allow them to skip or 'water
down' crucial safety training. We hope to build on the success
of certification to provide a level playing field for all
training. When certified, flight attendants should receive the
same level of training, regardless of the whims of their
carriers.
Most
importantly, certification would not require flight attendants
to receive any new training or medical clearance. Flight
attendants will simply receive certification for the training
we are already required to complete. Nothing new will be
required.
According
to the new law, all current flight attendants will continue to
serve as flight attendants; within one year of the law's
enactment, the FAA will issue certificates to all current
flight attendants. In addition, the FAA has 120 days to issue
certificates to flight attendants hired after enactment of the
law or upon completion of recurrent training. The certificates
will appear similar to those issued to pilots, and will
contain each flight attendant's appropriate information such
as name and address, and will include the airplane group for
which the flight attendant is certified.
Congratulations
to everyone on this important victory and thanks to every one
who kept the pressure on Congress and made this AFA victory a
reality.
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AFA Local Numbers
- Council 40 PIT 724-695-3329
- Council 41 DCA 703-690-6859
- Council 69 BOS 978-352-7401
- Council 70 PHL 215-492-0840
- Council 82 LGA 201-803-6141
- Council 89 CLT 704-527-0325
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New Hotline Number 12/17/03 Toll Free: 866-USA-AFA2
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