Swissport industrial action at Brussels Airport

[sn26567]

News release from Brussels Airport:

UPDATE SWISSPORT STRIKE : Swissport and unions reach agreement, but operations still disturbed.

Yesterday evening, the Swissport management and the unions have reached an agreement. The unions have called on their staff to resume work. However, only part of the workforce has resumed work.

Therefore, handling operations are still disturbed. Most of the flights will take place, but the baggage handling is unsure. Passengers travelling with an airline handled by Swissport are advised if possible to travel mostly with hand luggage.

For the list of airlines handled by Swissport, click see http://www.brusselsairport.be/en/contac ... swissport/

Passengers who are waiting for the delivery of their delayed luggage are asked NOT to come to the airport. Please wait for airline instructions regarding the delivery of your luggage.

[air belgium]

What about the FHY flight to Antalya (Friday 17th May), dept. time at 06.05, leaving from Liège Airport?
Thanks for information.

Greetings,

Patrice

[sn26567]

Freebird aircraft flying for Jetair will arrive and depart in Liège airport this morning. Same for first Tailwind aircraft flying for Thomas Cook.

[SNam]

My conclusion after reading the previous posts is:

if you work in aviation you have to be fully flexible, working hours doesn't matter. You have to settle with everything the management comes up with. And if you don't like it please go find another job.

You work from 06.00 till 10.00 and then you come back 18.00 till 21.00, no problem because you get 20 Euros.
Even if you live in Limburg, Liege, Namur but you have no right to speak as you have chosen for this "lifestyle"??

You have to settle with everything the management comes up with. And if you don't like it please go find another job.

So this is no flexibility, a roster like this?: two days starting at 05.00, next day 07.30, the "split shift" and to end you can start at 13.00. I think this is also called flexibility, and then you are lucky as you only work 5 days in a row.

I am not defending the strike, i just want that these guys get some respect and okay they have time to rest but when they work they work like everybody else. If you work on a desk are you working all time?? Yeah right.

[BRU]

My conclusion after reading the previous posts is:

if you work in aviation you have to be fully flexible, working hours doesn't matter. You have to settle with everything the management comes up with. And if you don't like it please go find another job.

You work from 06.00 till 10.00 and then you come back 18.00 till 21.00, no problem because you get 20 Euros.
Even if you live in Limburg, Liege, Namur but you have no right to speak as you have chosen for this "lifestyle"??

You have to settle with everything the management comes up with. And if you don't like it please go find another job.

So this is no flexibility, a roster like this?: two days starting at 05.00, next day 07.30, the "split shift" and to end you can start at 13.00. I think this is also called flexibility, and then you are lucky as you only work 5 days in a row.

I am not defending the strike, i just want that these guys get some respect and okay they have time to rest but when they work they work like everybody else. If you work on a desk are you working all time?? Yeah right.

But getting everything together in one post and making a joke of it, is also not fair. Not everybody has to work all these shifts every day. We are also not asking that everybody has to give up all their rights. But: in case you hire new staff, you need some more flexibility (for example part time contracts to avoid splits) or when you loose a contract and you have to adapt, there should be an option to do so. That is the reality.

It would be unfair to make this look like everybody from tomorrow has to give up everything, has to work very flexibel al the time for no money. In a country as Belgium, there is so much legal protection (working hours, minimum wages, ...) compared to many other European coutnries, so I do not think people end up in conditions that are not possible. Because if so, where would they find the staff to work for them ?

[SNam]

I don't see the point were i am joking but anyway..

But 3-4 hour contracts, is that reality? That means if people wants a decent salary to cover all their costs they need 2 maybe 3 jobs? They have children, a house, a car.

"When you loose a contract you have to adapt"? How would you do that?

I don't think it is too difficult to keep those people working at the same conditions as before, the management just makes too much money right now, and that is what its all about.

[cnc]

being payed to do nothing is not of this time anymore so why should it be different in aviation?
ask a nurse what kind of hours she has to do and how much she earns.

[misterscavi2ooo]

I'm a red cup of Swissport in Barcelona. It's possible to have a contact of workers of Swissport in Brussels???

[teddybAIR]

I'm a red cup of Swissport in Barcelona. It's possible to have a contact of workers of Swissport in Brussels???

Hi misterscavi2000,

maybe I can help you, but then you'd first have to convince me that

1) you are a redcap iso a red cup at BCN
2) clarify your intentions with the info

Best regards,
bAIR

[Boeing767copilot]

translated by Google

Melchior Wathelet, State Secretary for Mobility, and Brussels Airport decided by mutual agreement to take a number of coercive measures to recover. Operations at Brussels Airport Wednesday reached unions and management of Swissport a protocol agreement signed by the social mediator. Despite this agreement, refuses to resume. Part of the staff work The agreement contains both concrete measures immediately take effect as a commitment of the Swissport-management in the coming weeks to continue. Necessary discussions It is therefore unacceptable that staff this agreement beside him lay down and refuse to resume work. Brussels Airport and the State Secretary for Mobility initially have the necessary time and space to the consultation and deeply regret that the agreement reached is not running all personnel. Not only does this extremely long strike since Sunday night for huge disruption for thousands of travelers, but suffers from Brussels Airport and its partners also an incalculable loss of image and this caused an immense economic damage for all companies at the airport and Belgium in general. The State Secretary for Mobility and Brussels Airport decided coercive measures and this from 14h today, namely:
- The seizure of Swissport material in accordance with the terms of their license
- The refusal of access to the tarmac and other secure areas to Swissport staff that refuses to resume work and therefore has no reason to enter these zones.
- The enforcement of a penalty if access to airport infrastructure is blocked and prevented / or airport operations.

[LJ]

But 3-4 hour contracts, is that reality? That means if people wants a decent salary to cover all their costs they need 2 maybe 3 jobs? They have children, a house, a car.

Some people do want these contracts.

"When you loose a contract you have to adapt"? How would you do that?

Reducing the number of staff. Why do you need the same amount of employees when your loose contracts. Maybe you can ask the new company to take over your employees, but in any industry you size the company to the amo9unt of work there is.

[misterscavi2ooo]

teddybAIR I ve answered in private to your message, I hope to convince you.
Saludos

[cnc]

flightcare had a forum on the intranet, swissport doesn't? altough i've never seen much activity on it its the perfect way to communicate between stations

[SNam]

Reducing the number of staff. Why do you need the same amount of employees when your loose contracts. Maybe you can ask the new company to take over your employees, but in any industry you size the company to the amo9unt of work there is.

Okay but i was asking that question keeping in mind that you could keep the staff but i guess that is not possible anymore these days.

But do you really think this is sustainable for the future working with fewer and fewer personnel in every industry?

[cnc]

But do you really think this is sustainable for the future working with fewer and fewer personnel in every industry?

where do you get this from? swissport had the same amount of workers and flights as flightcare these last years, now they lost 10 to 15% of their flights so you think its not normal to shrink the workforce by 10 to 15%?
you also think its normal to employ 100 full time workers doing only one peak and then do almost nothing because you need 50 in the morning and 50 afternoon while its possible to do it with 50 flexible workers?
where is your logic?

[SNam]

What i just want to say is: for example you have 2 full 738 JAF flights.

For each JAF 738 you need let's say 4 loaders, so you need 8 loaders. At Flightcare they plan nowadays 6 loaders for the same work. So loading will go slower, or faster but with loss of quality and less safer because of the pressure of JAF and Flightcare because the flight has to leave on time.

This is a real situation. And it happens everyday. And that is what i meant maybe i was not clear enough.

[Acid-drop]

But do you really think this is sustainable for the future working with fewer and fewer personnel in every industry?

You do what you can do, and at the end of the day you go home, work done or not.
A good boss will always ask 110%, so he gets 105%.
Now if you want to work only 100% it's up to you.

For each JAF 738 you need let's say 4 loaders, so you need 8 loaders. At Flightcare they plan nowadays 6 loaders for the same work. So loading will go slower, or faster but with loss of quality and less safer because of the pressure of JAF and Flightcare because the flight has to leave on time.

What kind of pressure ?
you do your job, as well as you can.
I doubt they will fire you if you do it well, but just 100% and not 110%.
It's up to you to decide if you get stressed by your boss or not.

[cnc]

SNam in theory this sound as a great argument but if you know those people you'll notice they will not work any faster.
they load/unload/pushback and if they cause a delay they don't care, its GOC's problem they say.
to be good swissport should sack more then 50% and hire new people to get that bad old mentality out.
an aircraft waiting next to them to get power and chokes? oh let them wait untill an other team arrives at the stand.

oh btw, not only SN is looking at its options to change handler. what will the strikers say when swissport is losing even more clients because of them?
i really hope my employer doesn't go through with switch to swissport

[Flanker2]

But do you really think this is sustainable for the future working with fewer and fewer personnel in every industry?

That is the question!
I think that Europe is headed for big sh*t with government over government, high taxation and speculative real estate prices.

A real estate crash is looming as banks have stopped loaning money and Basel III will make them even more conservative. Italy, France and Belgium are currently all separately being hit by real-estate crisis at the same time, I wonder if it's not a coordinated strategy to deflate the bubble. They couldn't have chosen a worse time.

Now Wathelet and BRU want to force Swissport to restore service. Sorry BRU and Whatelet, it's your own policies that make these things happen. If there were more handlers at BRU, you wouldn't have this problem, as employees would be able to choose which company to work for and the effects of strikes would be more marginal.

Go strikers!

[RoMax]

Now Wathelet and BRU want to force Swissport to restore service. Sorry BRU and Whatelet, it's your own policies that make these things happen. If there were more handlers at BRU, you wouldn't have this problem, as employees would be able to choose which company to work for and the effects of strikes would be more marginal.

Ok, let's say 3 handlers for the same amount of traffic. So more competition. So the handlers want to be as cheap as possible. More pressure on their staff to work more and faster for the same amount of money.
Not going to help (except for the fact that the effects of a strike would be smaller, but there will be more strikes anyway).