PAL assures passengers

By Paolo Montecillo
Philippine Daily Inquirer
First Posted 20:18:00 08/13/2010

FLAG CARRIER Philippine Airlines (PAL) has assured its passengers that its flights would proceed as scheduled, despite threats of work stoppages by two labor unions representing the bulk of the company’s workforce.

In a statement, PAL president and chief operating officer Jaime J. Bautista assured passengers that labor strikes—especially in public utilities like PAL—do not happen overnight.

“There is a legal process involved which all parties must respect and adhere to, before any lockout or strike can materialize,” he said.

In case a strike does take place, PAL said it had put in place several measures to ensure that operations go smoothly.

This includes an arrangement with partner airlines to take in the passengers that PAL will not be able to serve as a result of the work stoppages.

“In case of flight disruptions, our passengers can rest assured that we can transfer them to these airline partners,” Bautista said.

He said PAL has a total of 134 interline partners—12 airlines in Southeast Asia; 11 in the United States and Canada; 25 in Europe; 12 in the Middle East; 3 airlines in Japan; and 10 airlines in China.
Earlier this month, PAL flight attendants, or 1,600 of the company’s 7,000 workers, threatened to go on strike following the management’s refusal to adjust their retirement age of 40 years old.
PAL’s ground crew also plans to go on strike to protest the company’s plan to outsource the jobs of 2,600 workers in the company’s in-flight catering and airport services operations.

But despite strike threats, Bautista said he remained hopeful that, with the help of the Department of Labor and Employment (Dole), PAL can still find a peaceful and amicable solution to the labor problems.