What’s going on between Aer Lingus and the Impact Union?

Update:  Further to our post of this morning, it seems as if the rot is indeed setting in.  There has been much more disruption today and in the last hour the company has stated cancelling European rotations tomorrow (Wednesday).   Customers can not understand how this fiasco has arisen and why contingency plans are not in place to keep important connections like Frankfurt, Amsterdam and Madrid running.

09.30 Tuesday

Aer Lingus and its employees have made great progress over restructuring in recent months.  It seems a terrible shame that agreement might founder over technicalities.   According to today’s Irish Independent, yesterday’s Boston rotation had to be cancelled over the absence of just one cabin manager and, depending on your perspective, either the refusal of any other staff member to step up to the role because of the Impact “work to rule” or the failure of management to find a substitute cabin manager .

Hopefully this was an isolated incident from which both sides will learn  rather than an indicator that the rot is setting in.  Either way it signals that the ongoing low level row over new rosters needs to be settled once and for all.  As a country, we need professional reliable airlines more than ever at this time as we try to boost growth and consolidate our economic credibility.

One can’t help noting the pity that the incident happened on the Boston rotation – maximising disruption for passengers.  If it had been on the New York route customers could most likely have been accommodated on an alternative direct service on the same day.