• THEY FINALLY GOT ONE THING RIGHT

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THEY FINALLY GOT ONE THING RIGHT

US Airways was officially granted a single operating certificate yesterday by the FAA (see the story below). In what one FAA official called a, "model of how mergers can be done in the future", the Company officially began operating under one certificate at 12:01 am PHX time.

What does the single operating certificate actually do for the individual Flight Attendants of the two carriers? Nothing.

For Flight Attendants and passengers the "virtual" merger of the two carriers will continue until the single agreement contract negotiation are completed for Flight Attendants and other labor groups and the agreements are ratified by the memberships. The Flight Attendant Transition Agreement separating the flying by East and West metal will continue as will the current contracts of both Flight Attendant groups.

Unfortunately the Company has not put the same commitment into reaching an agreement through negotiations as they have in obtaining the single operating certificate. The Company has also failed their customers through poor performance this summer.

The Company needs to recognize that we are not in concessionary bargaining anymore and will have to put just as much effort and money into negotiating a single agreement for the Flight Attendants at US Airways.

The Company also must quickly improve operations or the people who pay all of our salaries won’t come back and FLY WITH US.

Both of these tasks must be accomplished before anyone else can say this is a “model of how mergers can be done in the future.”

Thank you,

Mike Flores, President
The US Airways Master Executive Council
AFA-CWA

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US Airways Receives Single FAA Certification
FOS/DECs transition completed
Sept. 26, 2007

Today is the first day….as of 12:01 a.m. PHX time, one day shy of the two year mark of the America West/US Airways merger, the new US Airways is now operating under a single FAA operating certificate – completing a project that an FAA official called a model “for how mergers can be done in the future.” 

Receiving the certificate comes on the heels of transitioning West-metal flights to FOS, an extremely detail oriented process that has been in the works for the past two years and is the culmination of the dedication and hard work of 250 people. The vast amounts of data needed prior to the first pre-merger America West dispatched in FOS moved properly and paperwork was transmitted as planned. Minor challenges occurred, namely printing flight releases and a few ACARS bells and whistles that aren’t quite functioning at full potential on pre-merger America West flight decks, but these are manageable bumps in the road. Fixes for airport employees have been communicated to supervisors and work is already underway to iron out the rest.

US Airways Chairman and CEO turned over the AWA operating certificate in a small ceremony at CHQ today, with dozens of US Airways employees and team leaders looking on. Senior Vice President of Technical Operations Hal Heule and US Airways CIO Joe Beery thanked the team for completing a project that produced, as Hal put it, “the finest set of safety standards out there.”  And the FAA’s Bill Banks, manager of the FAA’s US Airways Certificate Management Office, praised the airline and FAA teams for extraordinary collaboration, which he described as a model for mergers in the future.  Banks remarked, “We are looking back at a safe merger -- that's a testament to everyone in this room.”

CEO Doug Parker congratulated and thanked the team behind the single certificate process by saying, “This team was ready to go at 18 months.  This was an amazing team effort.” Planning for the certificate merge involved combining procedures, manuals, IT and more.

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AFA Local Numbers

Council 40 PIT 412-245-1214
Council 41 DCA 703-212-8090
Council 69 BOS 781-289-8454
Council 70 PHL 215-492-0840
Council 82 LGA 315-736-3483
Council 89 CLT 704-527-0325

New Hotline Number Toll Free: 866-USA-AFA2
US AIRWAYS Benefits Information 800-872-4780

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