Alaska Flight Attendants Told To Ratify New Contract, Or Else

For the past couple of years, we’ve seen flight attendants at most major US airlines negotiating new contracts. Prior to this, flight attendants largely didn’t have pay increases since before the pandemic, and are understandably looking for significant raises, to reflect the inflation we’ve seen in recent years.

So far, we’ve seen flight attendants at Southwest and American ratify new contracts. Delta flight attendants aren’t unionized, so they get proactive pay raises. United flight attendants are the least far along in negotiations, and are super frustrated.

Anyway, the new flight attendant contract situation at Alaska is getting interesting. The union presented a tentative contract in June 2024, but the membership voted against it. Now a new tentative contract has been presented, and the union is essentially telling members to accept it, or expect no raise.

The contract Alaska flight attendants voted against

For some background, in June 2024, the Association of Flight Attendants-CWA, which represents Alaska’s flight attendants, had reached a tentative agreement with Alaska management for a “record contract,” as the union described it.

The union stated that this tentative agreement had been reached with the help of the National Mediation Board (NMB). Negotiations took place in Washington, with AFA International President Sara Nelson and AFA General Counsel in attendance, along with Alaska Chief Operating Officer Constance von Muehlen.

Per the details of the proposed contract, flight attendants would receive an average pay raise of 32% in the long run. This would include an immediate hourly pay bump of 18%, plus 3% pay increases in the two subsequent years. Flight attendants would also receive boarding pay, plus retroactive pay going back as far as late 2022.

Below you can find the proposed Alaska flight attendant pay scale, showing the current pay, plus the pay after the first raise, second raise, and third raise.

Having a tentative contract at all was already big progress. Back in February 2024, Alaska flight attendants voted to authorize a strike, with 99.5% of participants voting in favor of a strike (and 93.5% of flight attendants participating in the vote).

Unfortunately for all involved, the actual membership wasn’t as enthusiastic about the new contract as the union was. In August 2024, it was revealed that the new contract was rejected — 92.4% of flight attendants participated in the vote, and 68% of votes were against the new contract.

Alaska flight attendants get new tentative contract

Over five months after the previous contract was rejected, the Association of Flight Attendants-CWA has returned to Alaska flight attendants with a new tentative contract. Here’s how it’s described, and as you can see, it comes with a pretty clear warning:

After a short but vigorous fight at the bargaining table, the Negotiating Committee (NC) is pleased to present a successor Tentative Agreement (TA2). You were very clear about specific disappointments of TA1 after it was voted down, and your NC listened closely and addressed many of those issues in TA2 bargaining.

Further, our federal mediator and the National Mediation Board have been direct in their communication to us that should TA2 not ratify, they would be unlikely to devote further resources to mediating a “TA3.” Management also indicated they will allocate their bargaining resources toward merger considerations and JCBA negotiations.

The choice before us is clear; your vote will either solidify the enhancements secured in TA2 or it will indicate your desire to retain our current contract without any improvements in pay and working conditions until the end of JCBA negotiations, which is likely to take years.

So yeah, the union is basically telling members to accept the new contract, or expect to not get a new contract at all. This latest contract is similar to the previous one, with some minor improvements. The biggest difference is around boarding pay, as those rates have been bumped. The new contract also provides increases in pay premiums.

It seems highly likely to me that Alaska flight attendants will approve this contract, given the warning from the union. Alaska has always been a tricky airline when it comes to employee pay rates.

Alaska flight attendants argue that their bases are in some of the highest cost cities in the United States, which is true. However, historically Alaska hasn’t exactly had the best pay in the industry. The airline has paid much better than ultra low cost carriers, but not consistently to the same level as carriers like Southwest.

Alaska flight attendants obviously want industry leading pay, which I can’t fault them for — who doesn’t? But that’s not what the airline was historically going for.

Bottom line

Alaska flight attendants have just been presented with a new tentative contract, after rejecting the previous contract in August 2024. This contract comes with some mild improvements over the last one, but perhaps most importantly, it comes with a major warning. The union is telling members that if they don’t approve this contract, odds are that they’ll be stuck with their current contract.

I have to imagine that this contract will be ratified. We’ll find out for sure at the end of February 2025…

What do you make of this new tentative contract for Alaska flight attendants?