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Jun. 4--Southwest Airlines Co. pilots rejected a proposed contract by a narrow margin, the union representing the pilots said Wednesday.
The Southwest Airlines Pilots' Association said 50.8 percent of pilots voting were against the contract, with 49.2 percent in favor. The vote was 2,774 for and 2,869 against.
"Our pilots have spoken, and the group has stated there is more work to be done," union president Carl Kuwitzky said. "This contract, despite some financial gains, contained too many other negative aspects to ratify it."
Chuck Magill, Southwest's vice president of flight operations, said that "we are naturally disappointed and acknowledge it was a very close vote."
He said the airline welcomes "the opportunity for our negotiating teams to re-engage and work toward an agreement that best meets the needs of our company and our outstanding pilots during these challenging economic times."
Union officials did not speculate about why a majority of its members turned down the deal. Kuwitzky said the contract, the pilots' first new deal in 15 years, had a lot of changes that would have affected scheduling, and other items also would have affected pilots.
However, "I don't think there's any one issue," he said. "I think there are three or four issues that we'll find after we go through the polling process that our membership disagreed with and rejected the TA [tentative agreement] over."
The rejected deal would have provided a 2 percent pay raise on Sept. 1, and retroactive raises for Sept. 1 of 2007 and 2008, with back pay. Pay increases in 2010 and 2011 would have been based on the carrier's profitability.
The union's negotiators had wrapped up contract talks in late March, while some pilots were unhappy about Southwest's plans to code-share with other airlines -- that is, putting Southwest flight numbers on flights to and from Canada operated by WestJet Airlines Ltd. and to and from Mexico on flights by Volaris.
Kuwitzky said the polling will determine how big a part the code-sharing played in the contract's rejection. "Scope" -- the principle that all flying done on behalf of an airline is performed by the airline's pilots -- is a contentious issue at many carriers.
"While this TA has some significant improvement in scope and code-share, the fact that our company is code-sharing to markets we can fly in Canada and Mexico just doesn't sit well with a number of our pilots," Kuwitzky said.
The pilots' contract rejection marks the Dallas-based carrier's first defeat in negotiations this year. Since Jan. 1, Southwest has signed new contracts with the unions representing its flight attendants; ramp, operations, provisioning and freight agents; and mechanics.
It also has a tentative agreement with its customer support and services and airport customer service employees, who began voting on that deal Monday
