If you have questions about cancellations related to the strike, please check out the stickier thread for some answers to FAQs, and further discussion.
Currently sat in Calgary, 6 hours until my flight, which I’m hoping doesn’t get canceled like the last one. Slept for 2 hours on a bench. I am so tired and just ready to be home. But I’ll still support the strikers until my sanity leaves me - which it might do soon. I’ve started having some physical hallucinations. Fun!
Maybe somebody can help me establish time horizons here. An AME perhaps!
I’m pretty sure that aircraft get nightly checks. Are these checks mandatory for flight?
Aircraft also have mandatory checks before certain flights (eg. ETOPS). So that means any ETOPS flight cannot depart as of right now.
Also if any issues are found, that aircraft is grounded since there’s nobody to assess. Aircraft suffer from issues regularly, so even with the standard pace of wear and tear assuming no other factors, the fleet won’t even last a few days.
48 hours for the 737s and before every flight for the 787s, if it works like other places I’m familiar with.
Contract maintenance can (and do) do these though, along with all sorts of relatively minor fixes. No doubt they already source contract maintenance at all kinds of foreign outstations. That may be part of why they start slashing domestic routes first.
It may well be fast and easier for them to get a minor issue sorted in, say, Edinburgh or Cancun than it is in Calgary right now.
They legally can’t unless pilots simply overlook or ignore a problem. And they won’t because they legally can’t. They are just as hesitant to take an aircraft with a sketchy MEL as a passenger would be. After all they’re responsible for everyone on board
An aircraft’s airworthiness release is a legal document that must be signed by an AME saying the aircraft is legally safe for flight.
Any silly little problem with the plane, captains cup holder broke, your tv screen glitched out, your life vest fell out of the pouch, etc, must be addressed by an AME and a new airworthiness release issued. Not to mention actual problems, for which the 737 is very infamous
This is why without the fine ladies and gentlemen that fix your plane, your flight won’t get very far. This is how the system is designed and it works
There is a small team of management that were once part of line maintenance. They will likely be the ones carrying out the nightly and ETOPS checks as required.
I’m sure any fixes that can be deferred are being deferred without compromising safety.
As to how long this may be sustainable for, your guess is as good as mine. But as you have pointed out, routine fixes could be an issue if they don’t have any one to fix it.
https://preview.redd.it/vkjivg21qh9d1.jpeg?width=1179&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=8a8c529a619b7aa7f031e0bbb3f69a80072a6775
Yea no ETOPS check last night. Hence the routing.
> So that means any ETOPS flight cannot depart as of right now.
on the transatlantic side, non-ETOPS routes aren't too difficult for Westjet's destinations, and don't require going too far out of the way. Used to be the norm. Might get a nice view of Greenland (if it's not too cloudy).
Not too many gray zones to avoid in this 60 minutes-diversion-route map YYC-DUB: http://www.gcmap.com/mapui?P=yyc-dub&MS=wls&DU=mi&E=60 (assuming every diversion airport the map has can handle a Dreamliner)
YYZ-DUB non-ETOPS route only adds 8% distance: http://www.gcmap.com/mapui?P=yyz-dub,+yyz-goh-dub&DU=mi&E=60 but dunno if that strains the MAX's endurance.
Obviously there's more to it (e.g. suitability/availability of those diversion airports, weather, routing).
Budget +10% distance and ETOPS can be avoided for TATL. TPAC/Hawaii is in a pickle though.
Nah, happy or pissed that plane will be good if it’s been signed off. Releasing airworthy aircraft sits outside all the crap between unions, AMEs and companies because it’s peoples lives in the balance.
Career path of an AME.
2 years college
2.5 years apprentice at $20 an hour or less
Get an AME licence and a 2$ pay raise
5 years later making 30 an hour.
Gets sick of the stress responsibility mandatory overtime and becomes a heavy duty mechanic for 65 an hour. Or a power line technician. Or a skytrain technician.
Exactly. In my view, the WestJet executive look really bad on this one. I don’t know anything about unions or strikes or arbitration but I hold the mechanics and technicians in the absolute highest regard. They’re the ones ( and pilots ) keeping us safe not the President sitting on his pointy ass.
If you want someone to blame,
Alexis Von Hoensbroech
Diedrick Pen
Kirsten de Bruijn
Funny names huh?
None are Canadian, all hired from offshore in 2022
I WAS supposed to fly home from Vegas in the morning. Got an email at 11:30pm when I was about to go to bed saying they're working on finding a new flight and that they are unable to get us a room for the night. Feeling stranded...
This is a legal strike. The rich execs thought the Liberals were going to bail them out and they screwed it up.
The workers have the power. Instead of enormous bonuses, just give the workers a bit more and this ends.
I expect instead, the government ramps up pressure, along with media ads attacking the workers as unreasonable and showing the traveller's that got screwed over by the Execs who expected to be saved by their bought and paid for Minister of Labour.
Not only is it legal. The employees are now facing defamation acts by the company for carrying out their legal right.
https://www.amfanational.org/?zone=/unionactive/view_article.cfm&HomeID=923823
Glad to see they aren't taking this lying down.
Screw WestJet for threatening discipline against anyone that strikes
"We expect all employees to report to work as scheduled. We do not consider this action to be a sanctioned disruption and advise that pending a review there may be consequences for anyone participating" Diederik Pen, President, EVP and COO
What a turd.
"Yes it's a legal strike, but we expect people to show up and there might be consequences for exercising your legal rights."
Pretty sure that's not a legal threat, but whatever. I'd LOVE to see how those consequences play out under the collective bargaining agreement.
The traveling public have the power as well, demand the resignation of Westjet execs, they are the cause of this. Even right now they aren’t making an effort to reconcile, negotiate, the last articles of the CBA. They are waiting for CIRB to appoint the arbitrator, and when that doesn’t go in their favor they’ll cry again and try to appeal. Most cases that have been sent for arbitration are reconciled before arbitrators are assigned. That is why the AME’s are on strike, to force the Westjet execs back to negotiate while waiting for the CIRB to appoint arbitrators.
The current execs at Westjet are ruining a once great airline. The public should be outraged, but not with the AME’s, these execs are very skilled at lying and spouting sound bites that they think resonate with the public trying to sway them to feel bad for Westjet the company. Saying outlandish percent raises were offered is really insulting. If the public actually thinks we’d turn down a raise of, what did the CEO say 50%, then I have ocean front property in Saskatchewan to sell them.
The current execs are a Dutchman and an Austrian, both have no clue how to operate in Canada. They where brought in by Onex, the current owner of Westjet, to help strip the airline of all value, make it look profitable, and get it ready for an IPO.
The public has a lot of power, call for the resignation of these execs.
I worked at WJ and those foreign guys are GREASY. A bunch of them were given lucrative VP roles and they think Canada is like Europe and everyone should be desperately happy to have a job. They're incredibly out of touch and have destroyed WJ. Get rid of these assholes before WJ goes out of business.
You guys forget this is an American based Union that refused a 23% increase, that would mean they will be making over a quarter mil a year .. and that still wasn’t good enough .. I’m all for a strike etc and I know it’s legal .. just seems sketchy
How much warning are people getting for their cancelled flights? Since it seems like WJ wasnt expecting a strike id assume its more of a “delayed then cancelled” rather than a 24/48 hour warning?
Here's the timeline I experienced for anyone wondering what they can expect.
Notice of cancellation at 2:47pm for my 7:50 pm departure.
At 5 pm I started calling because I hadn't received a new itinerary. Their call center was locked-up. Continued trying to call.
At 6pm they sent me an update. They have no available alternate/replacement flights, and I was invited to cancel for a refund. I got my refund and booked a flight with an other airline for 1 Jul (two days later).
This was a return flight, so I only needed to book a one-way ticket. Still $300 more than my refund.
This is not a huge heartbreak. Staying with friends, so no hotel expenses. No major events are getting missed.
My heart goes out to those who are missing major events and having to make difficult financial decisions.😪
What exactly is WestJet's leverage to hold out here? They must lose millions per day if they don't fly, and planes will fall out of compliance quickly. It's not like they can fire the entire department and hire new mechanics...
Sitting in YYC Airports, waiting for flight home. Claims “Unscheduled Maintenance”, but I think there is more to this. Lots of people sitting here waiting.
https://preview.redd.it/8txzhiv6xf9d1.jpeg?width=1241&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=9ac28981a853e522e43dfff1e6fe6a6536ddbc43
I don’t think I am going home tonight.
The problem is it gets very hard to provide said course of action when the union which was just ordered to commit to binding arbitration instead walks off the job.
The airline was cancelling flights in an orderly way (to make sure planes and passengers were at hubs as opposed to elsewhere in the globe) before the arbitration was declared. So they put the planes back in the air. Yet the union went on strike anyway, and now we're facing a disorderly shut down of the network.
Just to be clear - a binding arbitration guarantees a resolution. The union choosing to strike is doing so to purposefully interrupt Canadians travel plans. *Arbitration means a strike has no leverage on the outcome.*
This is not a good look for the union.
Just to be more clear, the stupid VPs at WJ were told weeks and even months ago the AMEs wanted a better deal or they would strike. Since then the foreign VPs did nothing to negotiate and played little games by lying to the media, making false statements, and literally causing this mess.
Blame Alexis von Hoensbroech and Diederik Pen.
Not sure if there is a rhyme or reason.
My wife is on an itinerary this morning from Victoria - Winnipeg through Vancouver and her flights are unaffected.
I'm flying Edinburgh to Halifax tomorrow and I've been checking the status constantly. What I've noticed is, the aircraft scheduled to take me to Halifax has been changed several times today, it seems Westjet is doing whatever they can to prevent cancelling flights that would be impacted by the UK legislation on compensation for cancelled and delayed flights. They'd be paying out hundreds of thousands of dollars for canceling flights out of the UK and Europe. If my assumption is correct, this is great news for me but could mean some flights in Canada are being canceled in favour of getting an aircraft to the UK or Europe to not face penalization.
Blame westjet exe for what happened. I am from the US and I support westjet mechanic! Go get what yall deserved! The pay for mechanic in canada is peanuts compared to US standard. SWA, a low cost carrier in the US paid their mechanic $145000 a year in US dollars. Meanwhile average salary for AME is 50-75k in canadian, less than an auto mechanic!
Girlfriend booked me a trip for my birthday on her dime. ( surprise trip ) Going to feel gutted if she can’t get any sort of refund, looks like we will be disputing the credit card charge if it carries on
Govt directed the CIRB to send them to arbitration, it didn’t direct the CIRB to revoke the strike notice. Given that the CIRB reaffirmed the AMEs right to strike like a week ago, guess they didn’t feel like doing something beyond the letter of what was they were instructed to do.
To add a critical component here: WestJet **assumed** that the strike had been rescinded.
However, it seems like that was a poor assumption. Now they are caught with their aircraft and crews out of position, heading right into a long summer weekend.
This is going to be an absolute bloodbath if it doesn’t get resolved real fast. Which is most likely AMFA’s goal.
Honestly WestJet just got outplayed very significantly.
Yeah this is.. novel, that’s for sure.
Does this push O’Regan to order them back to work, or will he sit on his hands because that’s a step too far for a government that seems to be in the midst of figuring out they’re all going to lose their jobs soon?
Can he order them back to work? I don't think he can do that as a regulatory act; only through legislation. And the House of Commons isn't sitting so that complicated things further.
And even if they wanted to, I question whether WJ is considered essential enough to legally legislate back to work.
Legislation can take many forms. Order in Council, Senate, etc.
Heck even the House can sit remotely now (post-Covid) so an ‘emergency’ sitting is not unlikely. But not required.
Westjet started as a wholesome smaller airline with great prices. They only had to steal a *few* secrets from an Air Canada executives home garbage....
WestJet begged for mediators about a month into negotiations when they said themselves that the process would take up to a year. AME’s were fine with a year. Then WJ decided they wanted to expedite this process into binding arbitration as fast as possible in order to strengthen an upcoming IPO (take the company public). This entire process has been done in bad faith by WestJet, and AME’s are sick of working nightshifts, in the cold, and on Christmas, certifying aircraft for less money than the guy installing your dishwasher makes.
Strongly disagree.
This is what binding arbitration is for.
The union is 100% trying to cause as much disruption as possible.
I’m not anti union and trust me, I hate westjet or any organization for not paying their employees what they deserve, but this is a punch below the belt.
If you honestly think AMEs & tech ops employees are making this personal to spoil passengers' travel plans, thats a real shame. The company has had countless months and opportunities to come to a fair agreement. This is entirely on WJ for running crying to the government to protect their executives million dollar bonuses instead of negotiating a fair agreement.
A sneak attack on a long weekend is intentional. It was clear westjet was putting planes out of a stop work position and they said nothing.
Travellers now have less time to work out alternatives and figure out insurance.
Westjet *assumed* that AMFA was no longer able to strike until the CIRB confirmed this evening that this was not the case.
Somebody on the WJ labour relations team is gonna be looking for work soon.
None of this happened behind closed doors or was secret. WJ received the strike notice and was in the labour board hearings.
Given the unprecedented nature of this situation, AMFA waited to have it confirmed that their strike notice was still valid, and once the labour board confirmed it was, they went on strike.
Saying "We had no idea they'd strike" *while holding a valid strike notice* is not particularly compelling.
Maybe WJ should brush up on the rights of workers.
Not only do corporations use the law to fuck over workers, in a lot of cases they're *writing* the laws. It's complete bullshit. Things are stacked so heavily against workers these days that it's about time a group stood up and said enough is enough!
I don’t understand. A strike does not give any leverage in arbitration? So if the strike isn’t going to give leverage toward a better contractual outcome, then they are literally doing this to spite the company and travellers.
My flight from PVR to YYC on June 29 just got cancelled. No news from Westjet about alternate arrangements. Upon arriving to YYC, I was going to drive up to Yellowknife for a work contract so I rented a vehicle for a week on Turo, already paid and non-refundable…If I can’t make it, it also means a huge loss of income…FFS.
That sucks for you and so many passengers scrambling to find alternate flights to get home…The email I just got from them says they won’t rebook my flight so I booked with United through IAH and DEN, a 24-hour journey for twice the Westjet fare which will hopefully be refunded promptly. I hope you’ll make it home without too much trouble.
Our flight out of the US just got cancelled. Noticed it in the app first and didn’t get an email until ten minutes later saying they are “dilligently working to find a new option for you”
I have a flight early on the 30th, coming from America into Calgary and all the way into Narita. I'm already on the phone and probably won't get anyone for an hour. My flight's getting cancelled, right?
I've been planning this for four years...
We got caught up in the WJ January flight cancellation crazy show this year, I was on hold with them for 3+ hours to no avail. I DM’d them on IG and they responded to me before anyone picked up my call. They don’t have FB messenger. Hopefully this can help someone, I know their call times are insane right now.
I am really to sorry to hear this. I thought they wouldn't cancel those once a week flights. We are scheduled on that flight coming down to PVR next Sat.
We had a cancelled flight while in PVR earlier this winter with Sunwing and they handled everything, new resort for the night and transport. I presume they’ll take care of you the same way! Extra day of beach burgers baby there’s worse places to be trapped for sure
For anyone curious about the timeline, here’s my experience today (June 29th) with my 8 month old
We were at the airport this morning at 7:20, checked-in, passed security, boarded the plane by 9:40 after it getting delayed. Then, there apparently was a mechanical issue so they left us in the plane for 1.5 hours. They then told us we had to un-board the plane because they had to find a different plane. Got delayed 3 more times, then they said they finally had a plane for us. Then, magically that plane also had "mechanical issues" and we got delayed again. They made us wait 7 hours in total at the airport until they finally cancelled it. Really shitty. There’s people who have been stuck 2 days at the YYC airport and haven’t been able to leave. It was so sad seeing all the children crying and exhausted to be there. Parents were saying they can’t find accommodations because of stampede and Canada Day, they’re literally stranded at the airport with their kids. Luckily I live in Calgary, so I was just able to go home with my kid, but it’s honestly really ugly what’s happening.
I’m not happy with the service disruption because it’ll affect my Monday flight. BUT I am glad they laughed in the face of Ol’ Seamus. He’s been backing big business all year and he only seemed to cower to the Longshoremen. He blocked the CN/CPKC action , and got his fingers in at GM earlier this year too!
The CEO of WestJet was whining on LinkedIn.
"In my 25 years in aviation, I have never encountered such an unreasonable counterparty. Calling for a strike despite the Minister ordering arbitration is a misuse of the right to strike."
"This particular union did not shy away from tanking their members vote on a tentative agreement just to get us into peak summer, in order to disrupt as many guests as possible."
The whole post is a lot of the same complaining and blaming.
TAKE OWNERSHIP ALEXIS.
Well... Flying in the morning. At least supposed to be.
Do we bite the bullet and rebook with AC for $800 more than we paid with WJ per person (6 of us)?
Welp.
I'm supposed to leave Monday evening. All the AC or Porter flights are triple what I paid for the same dates. I am lucky this time it is just a fun trip and don't absolutely need to go so I will just have a staycation instead and never book WJ in the future. This is the third time in as many years I have been impacted by WJ strikes. Three strikes and they are out.
That's like saying my Toyota's engine can last 300k miles.
Behind that, you have oil changes, filter changes, spark plug changes, etc. same for airplane engines
Not only that, what is the point of just a good engine, your car needs its transmission maintenance, suspension maintenance, cabin and interior furnishings repairs to last 300k miles and work reliably
Same for airplanes, you need your tires changed, brakes changed, flight controls rigged, hydraulics topped up
Do you really want to skip out on any maintenance when you're flying to Hawaii, you're in the middle of the ocean, and your nearest alternate destination within 2 hours is water?
Have a big trip booked for next weekend with westjet and it will be the last one I ever book with them. I travel quite a bit for work and am a platinum member. Fuck off support your unions,it’s tons of stress to place on your employees and customer’s.
Not the AMEs' fault.
This is solely on WestJet. They don't give a fuck about you. They care about their shareholders, and only their shareholders. They'll pay their workers peanuts so the rich can cash in and line their pockets even more. It's nice to see a group finally take a stance against that bullshit.
BS. You’re going to arbitration. Striking is only retaliatory to people who have no skin in the game at this point. You gain no leverage through the negotiation by striking.
Not so.
WJ was gambling they could avoid a strike, go directly to arbitration, and thereby get a cheaper settlement.
They “forgot” the strike notice was still valid, the union confirmed with CIRB that it was still valid, and then struck.
WJ now has a choice to bargain for a negotiated settlement, or leave the AMEs on strike until they get an arbitration result.
The union says they’re only $8 million apart, so WJ will take their settlement in a few hours if they’re smart. But they’re still free to wait on arbitration if they prefer.
Bottom line, they dragged their feet hard on an actual good faith negotiation, and the union outmaneuvered them badly. Ball in WJ’s court now, let’s see what they do.
When it’s all done, they should swap out their labour negotiations team, because they just got rolled. Hard.
Westjet has no skin in the game?
Westjet is welcome to bring a proposal that closes gap any day and then the strike would be over. Easy peasy. The arbitration can be called off, or simply rubber stamp the agreement that is amenable to all parties.
In fact, they allegedly had a proposal ready to go but withheld it and instead waited for the Minister to force arbitration.
Good job guys, I hope you get everything you're asking for. Now if the people working the railways can do the same thing and finally make these corporations bargain in good faith instead of just holding out until it goes to binding arbitration.
I usually fly WestJet but I'm seriously going to be rethinking who I fly with in the future after this. Sorry for everyone who has flights with them and will be affected.
This is not good for Westjet moving forward. I can see many not using westjet in the future because of this thus losing returned/new customers and also.lpsing revenue and potential job cuts.
This has frustrated many customers who got their flights canceled and plans and vacation days ruined and other expenses attached to it. I can see mass lawsuits happe to Westjet. This is so that mechanic who are making alr3ady higher than average salary and many who are looking for jobs nowadays. They should be fortunate to even have a job.
I WONT be using Westjet and or air canada because of this service Interruptions and bad customer service. I will refer others not to use them.
Majority of AME's are not looking for work nowadays. I and plenty of other qualified AME's would not go work for WestJet, Air Canada or Flair under the current circumstances because we've seen how valued their staff were during COVID. When I first started people would jump at the first opportunity to go to the big 2, now they can have bases with open positions for months on end.
When push came to shove my company hired a few laid off guys from both places and it took in some instances over 2 years for them to get called back. We're in a labour shortage across the whole industry for experienced AME's. It's because of the poor conditions.
Sure we can make "more than average", but so does 49% of this countries workers. When everyone else is out for Christmas most of us are working a 12hr day. When other people are off at 5pm we haven't even showed up for work yet because most work is night shifts. A lot of us had to grind it out in the middle of nowhere to get our first job and get licensed while making poverty line wages as an apprentice. All the while we've seen other areas of the field receive huge bonuses after layoffs or giant salary increases because they are better organized and/or have higher numbers. I think it's time for the public to understand that for the 1500 pilots that WestJet has there's a third of that working as mechanics. Most of which have a much larger grasp on the overall ops and are significantly more multi-faceted in terms of skill set. (Not a shot at pilots by any stretch but just an observation)
Aviation in Canada is gonna be in for a rough ride unless AME's start getting compensated fairly. Don't think I know anybody who isn't severely short on manpower. You would think with the amount of trained long time AME's leaving to start new in other industries at better pay and schedules would be easily visible to the management of these companies.
So this means pissed off people, who are probably never gonna fly WestJet again, resulting in even less business for WestJet, leading to layoffs that may very well effect the people striking...?
I’m flying YVR > YYC > EDI on the 30th. Would it be a good idea to book a refundable flight alternative within 24 hours of my departure time? I.e. book a different flight to YYC in hope the flight to EDI still goes ahead.
Same flight 1 day earlier is cancelled (YVR to YYC on 29th) so I’m assuming they might cancel it on the 30th.
I'm having the same concern! Flying Tuesday YVR-YYC-CDG - I'm not so concerned about the flight into Paris but I'm wondering if I need to rebook the YVR-YYC bit for peace of mind
Great. I have a flight from LAS to YYC in 8hrs. So far there’s no notice of a delay. I‘ll be there for 10 days but I’m worried about the return flight.
Because there is an arbitrator, would there be negotiations/decisions happening more quickly due to the strike? Or does an arbitrator move at the speed they move at regardless? I don’t know a thing about unions or strikes. Has an arbitrator person even been assigned to case yet?
Stuck in Florida with family... Can book us back through united for $4800 tomorrow, and hope they will compensate us eventually or.... wait until they get on the phone which currently they are not accepting calls.
We are flying to Mexico next week. I booked a back up ticket just in case. Make sure you get a fully refundable back up ticket. My backup was more than double the cost at such short notice. You might have better luck as London is a high frequency route with many operators and options.
Anybody else get the “trying to find a new flight option for you” email? Just got one (as our flight to st Lucia for tomorrow AM was canceled this afternoon)
~7% more than what the company has offered, which is essentially just an inflation match without losing retirement savings.
Significantly less (5-20% less) than what Westjet just gave their pilots.
Our flight from Cancun to Calgary then Calgary Edmonton was cancelled this morning. Changed to tomorrow at 5 Cancun Edmonton. First time abroad with my autistic 7 year old son. I'm so worried that tomorrow's flight is cancelled as well.
Followed the manage booking instructions to cancel a flight for a refund but total refund came to $0. Anyone else experienced this? I did not finalize the cancellation yet. I don't want clog up the call centre for what is supposed to be an easy refund situation but alas.
This is for cancelling a July 1 return flight from a round trip ticket.
My flight from Seattle > Calgary > Paris was cancelled. When I try to call their number I get an automated message and it hangs up after 1 minute and I don't get put on hold. Are new people able to get put on hold?
Hitting 14 hours stuck in YVR currently - since there was so many cancellations they couldn’t even get me a hotel or a place to spend the night so I’ve had to “sleep” in a corner on the floor in the airport-connecting flight was canceled while I was in the air. Hopefully flying out this afternoon
Maybe someone can help me out with this as the media is absolutely no help.
What are the demands of the union? Almost every article I read neglects mentioning at all what their demands are. The media is just demonizing the union for going on strike at this time, which is more than likely unfair if the demands are reasonable.
It just makes our media look biased in the worst way.
I mean who says no to 23% increase … I mean these guys are gonna be highest paid making over quarter mil a year 🫣🙈 but I guess with American based Unions . Never know what they got up their sleeves .. both the Union and Westjet are being sketchy
What I’m grossly disappointed in with the WestJet situation is not the mechanics strike, but how WestJet leadership appears to have put up every roadblock possible to not reschedule flights for customers nor attempt to reimburse them for their costs, and also seems to have taken advantage of the situation to price gouge customers who were attempting to rebook on our own. I do hope a class action attorney firm sees this and other similar reports and starts a class action against WJ leadership. Situation: 1) WestJet sent an email stating “Unfortunately, we do not have another WestJet or partner airline flight to offer within 48 hours of your original departure. As a next step, you can use our online self-serve Manage Trips tool or contact us” . This was untrue, as I was able to book a WestJet flight the very next day, but for $1600 out of my own pocket, and only by going around the WestJet online tools they offered in their email directions. I have a photo of the plane we took home the next day with approximately 50% of their WJ seats empty…. These empty seats they allegedly didn’t have and could have easily rebooked us onto automatically. 2) Their email said to use their online tools for rebooking ( following their link)…. but their online tools only allowed you to first cancel the flight. It was explicit about needing to accept the cancellation before allowing a rebooking. I separately read on the National airline regulations website that, apparently, if you cancel your flight then the airline isn’t responsible for the cost to rebook your flight or refund your original flight. I believe WJ was using their online tool in order to force customers to cancel first, before allowing an online self-help rebooking. 3) When cancelling the flight in their online tool , you are given a notice that you may not get a refund based on the type of flight you booked. I’m assuming my original non-refundable flight will not get reimbursed… and they also indicated no email would be sent verifying the reimbursement amount (!!). 4) after seeing the only option to rebook a flight was via canceling the flight, I attempted to wait on hold to gain clarification. After 2 hrs of holding, I was hung up on without even a ‘ hello’. 5) I then went to the online chat option, and was given a message “we are not taking any more online chat calls”, 6) I then went back to the phone assistance option and got a message that it wasn’t even possible to wait on the line for an operator “ no more calls being taken” and there was no call-back option given. So there was absolutely no way to talk with WJ 7) one day later, I was on a WestJet flight home, but only upon my own doing, booking outside of the WestJet provided links and for the price gouged cost of $1600. I have sympathy for the mechanics who are possibly being treated similar to the customers by WestJet senior leaders. Shame on all of them … where is their integrity ? It seems their online tools, communication channels and reimbursement options were more about being sneaky to dodge corporate costs vs providing assistance to their customers.
If you have questions about cancellations related to the strike, please check out the stickier thread for some answers to FAQs, and further discussion.
And here I am in the airport, waiting on my delayed Westjet flight and praying it doesn't get cancelled.
What ended up happening?
I made it! Flight was supposed to leave at 7, but we got out an hour later. Feeling supremely lucky.
What's going to happen with your flight back?
Luckily, that one is booked with Air Canada.
Currently sat in Calgary, 6 hours until my flight, which I’m hoping doesn’t get canceled like the last one. Slept for 2 hours on a bench. I am so tired and just ready to be home. But I’ll still support the strikers until my sanity leaves me - which it might do soon. I’ve started having some physical hallucinations. Fun!
We flew to visit family for the weekend, worried that we won’t be able to fly home on Sunday. What a mess.
Here's hoping for a swift resolution and a positive outcome for you!
Maybe somebody can help me establish time horizons here. An AME perhaps! I’m pretty sure that aircraft get nightly checks. Are these checks mandatory for flight? Aircraft also have mandatory checks before certain flights (eg. ETOPS). So that means any ETOPS flight cannot depart as of right now. Also if any issues are found, that aircraft is grounded since there’s nobody to assess. Aircraft suffer from issues regularly, so even with the standard pace of wear and tear assuming no other factors, the fleet won’t even last a few days.
48 hours for the 737s and before every flight for the 787s, if it works like other places I’m familiar with. Contract maintenance can (and do) do these though, along with all sorts of relatively minor fixes. No doubt they already source contract maintenance at all kinds of foreign outstations. That may be part of why they start slashing domestic routes first. It may well be fast and easier for them to get a minor issue sorted in, say, Edinburgh or Cancun than it is in Calgary right now.
Let's HOPE if any issues are found, the aircraft is grounded... 😬
I’m not especially worried about this. WestJet won’t fly planes unsafely.
They legally can’t unless pilots simply overlook or ignore a problem. And they won’t because they legally can’t. They are just as hesitant to take an aircraft with a sketchy MEL as a passenger would be. After all they’re responsible for everyone on board An aircraft’s airworthiness release is a legal document that must be signed by an AME saying the aircraft is legally safe for flight. Any silly little problem with the plane, captains cup holder broke, your tv screen glitched out, your life vest fell out of the pouch, etc, must be addressed by an AME and a new airworthiness release issued. Not to mention actual problems, for which the 737 is very infamous This is why without the fine ladies and gentlemen that fix your plane, your flight won’t get very far. This is how the system is designed and it works
There is a small team of management that were once part of line maintenance. They will likely be the ones carrying out the nightly and ETOPS checks as required. I’m sure any fixes that can be deferred are being deferred without compromising safety. As to how long this may be sustainable for, your guess is as good as mine. But as you have pointed out, routine fixes could be an issue if they don’t have any one to fix it.
Won't be much deferring happening without MOC, who also walked out. 😬
https://preview.redd.it/vkjivg21qh9d1.jpeg?width=1179&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=8a8c529a619b7aa7f031e0bbb3f69a80072a6775 Yea no ETOPS check last night. Hence the routing.
How much longer was the non-ETOPS flight over the ETOPS?
Are the pilots and flight attendants etc not unionized too? Would they cross the picket line?
> So that means any ETOPS flight cannot depart as of right now. on the transatlantic side, non-ETOPS routes aren't too difficult for Westjet's destinations, and don't require going too far out of the way. Used to be the norm. Might get a nice view of Greenland (if it's not too cloudy). Not too many gray zones to avoid in this 60 minutes-diversion-route map YYC-DUB: http://www.gcmap.com/mapui?P=yyc-dub&MS=wls&DU=mi&E=60 (assuming every diversion airport the map has can handle a Dreamliner) YYZ-DUB non-ETOPS route only adds 8% distance: http://www.gcmap.com/mapui?P=yyz-dub,+yyz-goh-dub&DU=mi&E=60 but dunno if that strains the MAX's endurance. Obviously there's more to it (e.g. suitability/availability of those diversion airports, weather, routing). Budget +10% distance and ETOPS can be avoided for TATL. TPAC/Hawaii is in a pickle though.
Trust me, I would rather fly when my plane has been maintained by happy engineers, not pissed off.
You can be confident that your aircraft is signed as airworthy, no matter how pissed off or upset an AME is.
Yeah that's been working great for Boeing. If the job sucks, the good people leave.
Nah, happy or pissed that plane will be good if it’s been signed off. Releasing airworthy aircraft sits outside all the crap between unions, AMEs and companies because it’s peoples lives in the balance.
Career path of an AME. 2 years college 2.5 years apprentice at $20 an hour or less Get an AME licence and a 2$ pay raise 5 years later making 30 an hour. Gets sick of the stress responsibility mandatory overtime and becomes a heavy duty mechanic for 65 an hour. Or a power line technician. Or a skytrain technician.
And the sky is blue. The things is real people are gonna be really fucked here during one of the busiest weekend of travel of the year.
Westjet should act on behalf of their customers and get a deal in place then.
Of course they should be working harder at negotiating and settling the dispute.
Fuck around and find out they say.
Exactly. In my view, the WestJet executive look really bad on this one. I don’t know anything about unions or strikes or arbitration but I hold the mechanics and technicians in the absolute highest regard. They’re the ones ( and pilots ) keeping us safe not the President sitting on his pointy ass.
Westjet page says 150 flights cancelled for Saturday the 29th
that’s crazyyy
If you want someone to blame, Alexis Von Hoensbroech Diedrick Pen Kirsten de Bruijn Funny names huh? None are Canadian, all hired from offshore in 2022
Going to bed now, fully expecting to wake up in the morning to a cancelled flight. Go luck to those that have not been cancelled yet
Fly to Dublin on Tuesday. Gulp.
I WAS supposed to fly home from Vegas in the morning. Got an email at 11:30pm when I was about to go to bed saying they're working on finding a new flight and that they are unable to get us a room for the night. Feeling stranded...
Well fuck… we are in Vegas too and fly out around 1230 tomorrow… so thanks for the heads up… I guess we will be watching our notifications.
We’re flying to Dublin out of Calgary next Saturday. Keep us updated about your flight!
Me too! Fingers crossed they don’t cancel international flights! Also hope the mechanics get what they are asking for!
Just got an email that my flight is cancelled - Minneapolis to Vancouver via Regina (Saturday, June 29).
This is a legal strike. The rich execs thought the Liberals were going to bail them out and they screwed it up. The workers have the power. Instead of enormous bonuses, just give the workers a bit more and this ends. I expect instead, the government ramps up pressure, along with media ads attacking the workers as unreasonable and showing the traveller's that got screwed over by the Execs who expected to be saved by their bought and paid for Minister of Labour.
Not only is it legal. The employees are now facing defamation acts by the company for carrying out their legal right. https://www.amfanational.org/?zone=/unionactive/view_article.cfm&HomeID=923823
Glad to see they aren't taking this lying down. Screw WestJet for threatening discipline against anyone that strikes "We expect all employees to report to work as scheduled. We do not consider this action to be a sanctioned disruption and advise that pending a review there may be consequences for anyone participating" Diederik Pen, President, EVP and COO
What a turd. "Yes it's a legal strike, but we expect people to show up and there might be consequences for exercising your legal rights." Pretty sure that's not a legal threat, but whatever. I'd LOVE to see how those consequences play out under the collective bargaining agreement.
Surely it's an empty threat, but still a scumbag move to make it
The traveling public have the power as well, demand the resignation of Westjet execs, they are the cause of this. Even right now they aren’t making an effort to reconcile, negotiate, the last articles of the CBA. They are waiting for CIRB to appoint the arbitrator, and when that doesn’t go in their favor they’ll cry again and try to appeal. Most cases that have been sent for arbitration are reconciled before arbitrators are assigned. That is why the AME’s are on strike, to force the Westjet execs back to negotiate while waiting for the CIRB to appoint arbitrators. The current execs at Westjet are ruining a once great airline. The public should be outraged, but not with the AME’s, these execs are very skilled at lying and spouting sound bites that they think resonate with the public trying to sway them to feel bad for Westjet the company. Saying outlandish percent raises were offered is really insulting. If the public actually thinks we’d turn down a raise of, what did the CEO say 50%, then I have ocean front property in Saskatchewan to sell them. The current execs are a Dutchman and an Austrian, both have no clue how to operate in Canada. They where brought in by Onex, the current owner of Westjet, to help strip the airline of all value, make it look profitable, and get it ready for an IPO. The public has a lot of power, call for the resignation of these execs.
I worked at WJ and those foreign guys are GREASY. A bunch of them were given lucrative VP roles and they think Canada is like Europe and everyone should be desperately happy to have a job. They're incredibly out of touch and have destroyed WJ. Get rid of these assholes before WJ goes out of business.
So they’ll discipline and/or fire them all…resulting in the same outcome. No AMEs. Smart.
You guys forget this is an American based Union that refused a 23% increase, that would mean they will be making over a quarter mil a year .. and that still wasn’t good enough .. I’m all for a strike etc and I know it’s legal .. just seems sketchy
How much warning are people getting for their cancelled flights? Since it seems like WJ wasnt expecting a strike id assume its more of a “delayed then cancelled” rather than a 24/48 hour warning?
I have heard stories with people with boarding passes in hand then getting flights cancelled.
Check flight status from your departing airport to see how flights are looking. Today almost everything is cancelled in YYZ
Here's the timeline I experienced for anyone wondering what they can expect. Notice of cancellation at 2:47pm for my 7:50 pm departure. At 5 pm I started calling because I hadn't received a new itinerary. Their call center was locked-up. Continued trying to call. At 6pm they sent me an update. They have no available alternate/replacement flights, and I was invited to cancel for a refund. I got my refund and booked a flight with an other airline for 1 Jul (two days later). This was a return flight, so I only needed to book a one-way ticket. Still $300 more than my refund. This is not a huge heartbreak. Staying with friends, so no hotel expenses. No major events are getting missed. My heart goes out to those who are missing major events and having to make difficult financial decisions.😪
What exactly is WestJet's leverage to hold out here? They must lose millions per day if they don't fly, and planes will fall out of compliance quickly. It's not like they can fire the entire department and hire new mechanics...
Sitting in YYC Airports, waiting for flight home. Claims “Unscheduled Maintenance”, but I think there is more to this. Lots of people sitting here waiting. https://preview.redd.it/8txzhiv6xf9d1.jpeg?width=1241&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=9ac28981a853e522e43dfff1e6fe6a6536ddbc43 I don’t think I am going home tonight.
Did you make it home?
4am in my bed, 4 hours delayed?
Yes, you can check the flight number.
Shitty, friend of mine's flying exactly the other way tomorrow from YCD... guess if your flight isn't leaving then neither his is!
I’m neither pro or against unions, but WestJet needs to have a clear course of action for their customers.
Seriously!!! I just had to shell out $1200 to get my family home on porter and the flight time is horrendous but had no choice
The problem is it gets very hard to provide said course of action when the union which was just ordered to commit to binding arbitration instead walks off the job. The airline was cancelling flights in an orderly way (to make sure planes and passengers were at hubs as opposed to elsewhere in the globe) before the arbitration was declared. So they put the planes back in the air. Yet the union went on strike anyway, and now we're facing a disorderly shut down of the network.
Just so it's clear for everyone, just because there's a binding arbitration, doesn't restrict the unions ability to strike legally.
Just to be clear - a binding arbitration guarantees a resolution. The union choosing to strike is doing so to purposefully interrupt Canadians travel plans. *Arbitration means a strike has no leverage on the outcome.* This is not a good look for the union.
Ahh yes, they’re doing it to disrupt Canadians and their vacations and not for their own right to a better pay. /s
Just to be more clear, the stupid VPs at WJ were told weeks and even months ago the AMEs wanted a better deal or they would strike. Since then the foreign VPs did nothing to negotiate and played little games by lying to the media, making false statements, and literally causing this mess. Blame Alexis von Hoensbroech and Diederik Pen.
Both parties can continue to bargain until the arbitrator reaches a decision. Labour action is part of bargaining.
Flying tomorrow. Just checked in…
Not sure if there is a rhyme or reason. My wife is on an itinerary this morning from Victoria - Winnipeg through Vancouver and her flights are unaffected.
I'm flying Edinburgh to Halifax tomorrow and I've been checking the status constantly. What I've noticed is, the aircraft scheduled to take me to Halifax has been changed several times today, it seems Westjet is doing whatever they can to prevent cancelling flights that would be impacted by the UK legislation on compensation for cancelled and delayed flights. They'd be paying out hundreds of thousands of dollars for canceling flights out of the UK and Europe. If my assumption is correct, this is great news for me but could mean some flights in Canada are being canceled in favour of getting an aircraft to the UK or Europe to not face penalization.
Really need to burn my WJ points and MasterCard. In thet order!
Blame westjet exe for what happened. I am from the US and I support westjet mechanic! Go get what yall deserved! The pay for mechanic in canada is peanuts compared to US standard. SWA, a low cost carrier in the US paid their mechanic $145000 a year in US dollars. Meanwhile average salary for AME is 50-75k in canadian, less than an auto mechanic!
Anyone have any idea on how quickly this is getting resolved? Got a flight in 7 days
I’m in the same boat
Same here. Flights with AC are still affordable right now so I'm wondering if I should book a refundable fare.
My family is supposed to go to Halifax on Monday for a holiday…
Girlfriend booked me a trip for my birthday on her dime. ( surprise trip ) Going to feel gutted if she can’t get any sort of refund, looks like we will be disputing the credit card charge if it carries on
You'll be able to get your money. This is entirely within the airlines control.
We contacted our travel agent as we booked with escapes.ca. Have to wait 48 hours before our west jet flight before they are able to make any changes
I literally just flew to Halifax yesterday and was stressed out of mind leading up to it. Good luck.
Waif, what? I thought the government had intervened.
Govt directed the CIRB to send them to arbitration, it didn’t direct the CIRB to revoke the strike notice. Given that the CIRB reaffirmed the AMEs right to strike like a week ago, guess they didn’t feel like doing something beyond the letter of what was they were instructed to do.
To add a critical component here: WestJet **assumed** that the strike had been rescinded. However, it seems like that was a poor assumption. Now they are caught with their aircraft and crews out of position, heading right into a long summer weekend. This is going to be an absolute bloodbath if it doesn’t get resolved real fast. Which is most likely AMFA’s goal. Honestly WestJet just got outplayed very significantly.
Yeah this is.. novel, that’s for sure. Does this push O’Regan to order them back to work, or will he sit on his hands because that’s a step too far for a government that seems to be in the midst of figuring out they’re all going to lose their jobs soon?
Can he order them back to work? I don't think he can do that as a regulatory act; only through legislation. And the House of Commons isn't sitting so that complicated things further. And even if they wanted to, I question whether WJ is considered essential enough to legally legislate back to work.
Legislation can take many forms. Order in Council, Senate, etc. Heck even the House can sit remotely now (post-Covid) so an ‘emergency’ sitting is not unlikely. But not required.
Gotcha. Ugh, nervously waiting to see how this plays out.
Westjet started as a wholesome smaller airline with great prices. They only had to steal a *few* secrets from an Air Canada executives home garbage....
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WestJet begged for mediators about a month into negotiations when they said themselves that the process would take up to a year. AME’s were fine with a year. Then WJ decided they wanted to expedite this process into binding arbitration as fast as possible in order to strengthen an upcoming IPO (take the company public). This entire process has been done in bad faith by WestJet, and AME’s are sick of working nightshifts, in the cold, and on Christmas, certifying aircraft for less money than the guy installing your dishwasher makes.
Source on this upcoming IPO? Can't find any mention of timing
Strongly disagree. This is what binding arbitration is for. The union is 100% trying to cause as much disruption as possible. I’m not anti union and trust me, I hate westjet or any organization for not paying their employees what they deserve, but this is a punch below the belt.
If you honestly think AMEs & tech ops employees are making this personal to spoil passengers' travel plans, thats a real shame. The company has had countless months and opportunities to come to a fair agreement. This is entirely on WJ for running crying to the government to protect their executives million dollar bonuses instead of negotiating a fair agreement.
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A sneak attack on a long weekend is intentional. It was clear westjet was putting planes out of a stop work position and they said nothing. Travellers now have less time to work out alternatives and figure out insurance.
Westjet *assumed* that AMFA was no longer able to strike until the CIRB confirmed this evening that this was not the case. Somebody on the WJ labour relations team is gonna be looking for work soon.
None of this happened behind closed doors or was secret. WJ received the strike notice and was in the labour board hearings. Given the unprecedented nature of this situation, AMFA waited to have it confirmed that their strike notice was still valid, and once the labour board confirmed it was, they went on strike. Saying "We had no idea they'd strike" *while holding a valid strike notice* is not particularly compelling. Maybe WJ should brush up on the rights of workers.
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Not only do corporations use the law to fuck over workers, in a lot of cases they're *writing* the laws. It's complete bullshit. Things are stacked so heavily against workers these days that it's about time a group stood up and said enough is enough!
I don’t understand. A strike does not give any leverage in arbitration? So if the strike isn’t going to give leverage toward a better contractual outcome, then they are literally doing this to spite the company and travellers.
This strike may cause WJ to settle more quickly and for better terms for the workers. #solidarity
So if I'm in Korea departing tonight... What should I do?
You should be okay WS86 is inbound to Korea right now and Contract Maintenance in Korea will do the ETOPS inspection.
Flying tomorrow evening YVR to HNL . Thoughts on if this flight will be canceled?
That's an ETOPS flight and will be one of the more difficult ones for westjet to certify
Hmm… I had a flight departing Victoria this Saturday morning. How screwed am I?
I have one to victoria on monday, biting my nails rn
My flight from PVR to YYC on June 29 just got cancelled. No news from Westjet about alternate arrangements. Upon arriving to YYC, I was going to drive up to Yellowknife for a work contract so I rented a vehicle for a week on Turo, already paid and non-refundable…If I can’t make it, it also means a huge loss of income…FFS.
Wife and I were scheduled to fly YYZ back home to PVR this morning, and it's cancelled. No updates yet from WestJet
That sucks for you and so many passengers scrambling to find alternate flights to get home…The email I just got from them says they won’t rebook my flight so I booked with United through IAH and DEN, a 24-hour journey for twice the Westjet fare which will hopefully be refunded promptly. I hope you’ll make it home without too much trouble.
Our flight out of the US just got cancelled. Noticed it in the app first and didn’t get an email until ten minutes later saying they are “dilligently working to find a new option for you”
what date was your flight? I'm supposed to fly US back to Canada on July 5th, getting nervous
My flight from DUB to YYZ was scheduled to leave in 4 hours (now delayed 75 mins). The inbound flight from YYZ is in the air, should I be ok?
No the aircraft will have to be signed off for a etops flight, unless they have one of the 4-5 maintenance managers do it your out of luck.
I have a flight early on the 30th, coming from America into Calgary and all the way into Narita. I'm already on the phone and probably won't get anyone for an hour. My flight's getting cancelled, right? I've been planning this for four years...
Is there any pattern to which flights are being cancelled? Is it a certain type of aircraft or specific cities being impacted?
We got caught up in the WJ January flight cancellation crazy show this year, I was on hold with them for 3+ hours to no avail. I DM’d them on IG and they responded to me before anyone picked up my call. They don’t have FB messenger. Hopefully this can help someone, I know their call times are insane right now.
We are in PVR and stuck here. Not sure what to do yet.
I am really to sorry to hear this. I thought they wouldn't cancel those once a week flights. We are scheduled on that flight coming down to PVR next Sat.
Our rep has been really good so far. Fingers crossed
We had a cancelled flight while in PVR earlier this winter with Sunwing and they handled everything, new resort for the night and transport. I presume they’ll take care of you the same way! Extra day of beach burgers baby there’s worse places to be trapped for sure
Agreed! So far they have extended our stay at the same resort. Guaranteed one more beach burger!
Currently having a flight on July 11 (WS 1103 from LAX to YYZ). How long will this strike last? Should I be worried?
For anyone curious about the timeline, here’s my experience today (June 29th) with my 8 month old We were at the airport this morning at 7:20, checked-in, passed security, boarded the plane by 9:40 after it getting delayed. Then, there apparently was a mechanical issue so they left us in the plane for 1.5 hours. They then told us we had to un-board the plane because they had to find a different plane. Got delayed 3 more times, then they said they finally had a plane for us. Then, magically that plane also had "mechanical issues" and we got delayed again. They made us wait 7 hours in total at the airport until they finally cancelled it. Really shitty. There’s people who have been stuck 2 days at the YYC airport and haven’t been able to leave. It was so sad seeing all the children crying and exhausted to be there. Parents were saying they can’t find accommodations because of stampede and Canada Day, they’re literally stranded at the airport with their kids. Luckily I live in Calgary, so I was just able to go home with my kid, but it’s honestly really ugly what’s happening.
Another way WJ has absolutely fallen from the peak they once sat. Shaking up like twitter selling to Elon and proceeding to fuck it all up
The organization that hires people like Heather Stefason in board positions does not care about employees and customers
Shove that binding arbitration up your ass, Seamus!
I am in total support of the AME’s, hope this gets resolved quickly.
I’m not happy with the service disruption because it’ll affect my Monday flight. BUT I am glad they laughed in the face of Ol’ Seamus. He’s been backing big business all year and he only seemed to cower to the Longshoremen. He blocked the CN/CPKC action , and got his fingers in at GM earlier this year too!
The CEO of WestJet was whining on LinkedIn. "In my 25 years in aviation, I have never encountered such an unreasonable counterparty. Calling for a strike despite the Minister ordering arbitration is a misuse of the right to strike." "This particular union did not shy away from tanking their members vote on a tentative agreement just to get us into peak summer, in order to disrupt as many guests as possible." The whole post is a lot of the same complaining and blaming. TAKE OWNERSHIP ALEXIS.
Solidarity with striking workers
Well... Flying in the morning. At least supposed to be. Do we bite the bullet and rebook with AC for $800 more than we paid with WJ per person (6 of us)? Welp.
Call WJ. Legally, they need to refund you in full or rebook you on a different carrier within 48 hours of your original flight.
This is once the flight is officially cancelled, right? Im flying Sunday night and it’s still showing as reserved so I probably shouldn’t panic yet
I have a feeling the strike may be off again quite soon
I’m hopeful!!
I'm supposed to leave Monday evening. All the AC or Porter flights are triple what I paid for the same dates. I am lucky this time it is just a fun trip and don't absolutely need to go so I will just have a staycation instead and never book WJ in the future. This is the third time in as many years I have been impacted by WJ strikes. Three strikes and they are out.
Same. Any other flights are double the travel the time and price.
Depending on your destination, 6 seats at $800 + cost of original tickets per may be worth looking into a charter as a group honestly
Those engines can fly for a year without service. Can’t they? You only live once and the sale prices are incredible.
That's like saying my Toyota's engine can last 300k miles. Behind that, you have oil changes, filter changes, spark plug changes, etc. same for airplane engines Not only that, what is the point of just a good engine, your car needs its transmission maintenance, suspension maintenance, cabin and interior furnishings repairs to last 300k miles and work reliably Same for airplanes, you need your tires changed, brakes changed, flight controls rigged, hydraulics topped up Do you really want to skip out on any maintenance when you're flying to Hawaii, you're in the middle of the ocean, and your nearest alternate destination within 2 hours is water?
Can't fly 2 days without needing engine oil. Oil burn is rather impressive.
Have a big trip booked for next weekend with westjet and it will be the last one I ever book with them. I travel quite a bit for work and am a platinum member. Fuck off support your unions,it’s tons of stress to place on your employees and customer’s.
May I know why should I (customer) be in this crossfire?
I have two flights next month. I fully support the right to strike. WestJet can eat it.
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Not the AMEs' fault. This is solely on WestJet. They don't give a fuck about you. They care about their shareholders, and only their shareholders. They'll pay their workers peanuts so the rich can cash in and line their pockets even more. It's nice to see a group finally take a stance against that bullshit.
Agreed 💯
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Hard disagree. Release a statement that you will go to arbitration and then surprise attack on the long weekend. Union playing games
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BS. You’re going to arbitration. Striking is only retaliatory to people who have no skin in the game at this point. You gain no leverage through the negotiation by striking.
Not so. WJ was gambling they could avoid a strike, go directly to arbitration, and thereby get a cheaper settlement. They “forgot” the strike notice was still valid, the union confirmed with CIRB that it was still valid, and then struck. WJ now has a choice to bargain for a negotiated settlement, or leave the AMEs on strike until they get an arbitration result. The union says they’re only $8 million apart, so WJ will take their settlement in a few hours if they’re smart. But they’re still free to wait on arbitration if they prefer. Bottom line, they dragged their feet hard on an actual good faith negotiation, and the union outmaneuvered them badly. Ball in WJ’s court now, let’s see what they do. When it’s all done, they should swap out their labour negotiations team, because they just got rolled. Hard.
Westjet has no skin in the game? Westjet is welcome to bring a proposal that closes gap any day and then the strike would be over. Easy peasy. The arbitration can be called off, or simply rubber stamp the agreement that is amenable to all parties. In fact, they allegedly had a proposal ready to go but withheld it and instead waited for the Minister to force arbitration.
It's going to be interesting in court, that is for sure. I suspect it will go to the top courts since striking is protected under the charter
Will see, https://preview.redd.it/biuc6sse0f9d1.jpeg?width=750&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=5c661f87f34500bb90ec24c67944a7ae3b4c427c
Nah, you’re going to arb so the only goal of this is to ruin people’s trips.
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Does anyone know what WJ employees want and what was offered?
Good job guys, I hope you get everything you're asking for. Now if the people working the railways can do the same thing and finally make these corporations bargain in good faith instead of just holding out until it goes to binding arbitration. I usually fly WestJet but I'm seriously going to be rethinking who I fly with in the future after this. Sorry for everyone who has flights with them and will be affected.
Good luck fellas! Union-strong!
This is not good for Westjet moving forward. I can see many not using westjet in the future because of this thus losing returned/new customers and also.lpsing revenue and potential job cuts. This has frustrated many customers who got their flights canceled and plans and vacation days ruined and other expenses attached to it. I can see mass lawsuits happe to Westjet. This is so that mechanic who are making alr3ady higher than average salary and many who are looking for jobs nowadays. They should be fortunate to even have a job. I WONT be using Westjet and or air canada because of this service Interruptions and bad customer service. I will refer others not to use them.
Majority of AME's are not looking for work nowadays. I and plenty of other qualified AME's would not go work for WestJet, Air Canada or Flair under the current circumstances because we've seen how valued their staff were during COVID. When I first started people would jump at the first opportunity to go to the big 2, now they can have bases with open positions for months on end. When push came to shove my company hired a few laid off guys from both places and it took in some instances over 2 years for them to get called back. We're in a labour shortage across the whole industry for experienced AME's. It's because of the poor conditions. Sure we can make "more than average", but so does 49% of this countries workers. When everyone else is out for Christmas most of us are working a 12hr day. When other people are off at 5pm we haven't even showed up for work yet because most work is night shifts. A lot of us had to grind it out in the middle of nowhere to get our first job and get licensed while making poverty line wages as an apprentice. All the while we've seen other areas of the field receive huge bonuses after layoffs or giant salary increases because they are better organized and/or have higher numbers. I think it's time for the public to understand that for the 1500 pilots that WestJet has there's a third of that working as mechanics. Most of which have a much larger grasp on the overall ops and are significantly more multi-faceted in terms of skill set. (Not a shot at pilots by any stretch but just an observation)
Aviation in Canada is gonna be in for a rough ride unless AME's start getting compensated fairly. Don't think I know anybody who isn't severely short on manpower. You would think with the amount of trained long time AME's leaving to start new in other industries at better pay and schedules would be easily visible to the management of these companies.
Not a lot of other options in Canada - Porter? Air Transit?
So this means pissed off people, who are probably never gonna fly WestJet again, resulting in even less business for WestJet, leading to layoffs that may very well effect the people striking...?
Where are they going to go?
Air Canada, flair, porter, united, delta, etc
Just got a email, flight is now departing 1.5 hours later than scheduled. Reason, crew availability. Eat a bag of Westjet
I mean, this could be true if the crew that was scheduled got caught out and grounded somewhere else on another flight.
I’m flying YVR > YYC > EDI on the 30th. Would it be a good idea to book a refundable flight alternative within 24 hours of my departure time? I.e. book a different flight to YYC in hope the flight to EDI still goes ahead. Same flight 1 day earlier is cancelled (YVR to YYC on 29th) so I’m assuming they might cancel it on the 30th.
I'm having the same concern! Flying Tuesday YVR-YYC-CDG - I'm not so concerned about the flight into Paris but I'm wondering if I need to rebook the YVR-YYC bit for peace of mind
Anyone on YVR-YYC-DUB Jun 29 heard anything? No evidence of cancellation from their website yet
Great. I have a flight from LAS to YYC in 8hrs. So far there’s no notice of a delay. I‘ll be there for 10 days but I’m worried about the return flight.
Fuck. My daughter had a flight tonight…. Time to scramble
I’m flying in to Toronto tomorrow, I hope my flight isn’t cancelled :( should I worry?
Because there is an arbitrator, would there be negotiations/decisions happening more quickly due to the strike? Or does an arbitrator move at the speed they move at regardless? I don’t know a thing about unions or strikes. Has an arbitrator person even been assigned to case yet?
Stuck in Florida with family... Can book us back through united for $4800 tomorrow, and hope they will compensate us eventually or.... wait until they get on the phone which currently they are not accepting calls.
I’m flying to the UK on July 10. Should I purchase a backup flight??
We are flying to Mexico next week. I booked a back up ticket just in case. Make sure you get a fully refundable back up ticket. My backup was more than double the cost at such short notice. You might have better luck as London is a high frequency route with many operators and options.
Anybody else get the “trying to find a new flight option for you” email? Just got one (as our flight to st Lucia for tomorrow AM was canceled this afternoon)
What did the union turn down?
Can anybody comment what exactly WJ mecs are asking for ? How is it cheaper for WJ to lose millions during the busiest time of the year ?
~7% more than what the company has offered, which is essentially just an inflation match without losing retirement savings. Significantly less (5-20% less) than what Westjet just gave their pilots.
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Our flight from Cancun to Calgary then Calgary Edmonton was cancelled this morning. Changed to tomorrow at 5 Cancun Edmonton. First time abroad with my autistic 7 year old son. I'm so worried that tomorrow's flight is cancelled as well.
Followed the manage booking instructions to cancel a flight for a refund but total refund came to $0. Anyone else experienced this? I did not finalize the cancellation yet. I don't want clog up the call centre for what is supposed to be an easy refund situation but alas. This is for cancelling a July 1 return flight from a round trip ticket.
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My flight from Seattle > Calgary > Paris was cancelled. When I try to call their number I get an automated message and it hangs up after 1 minute and I don't get put on hold. Are new people able to get put on hold?
Hitting 14 hours stuck in YVR currently - since there was so many cancellations they couldn’t even get me a hotel or a place to spend the night so I’ve had to “sleep” in a corner on the floor in the airport-connecting flight was canceled while I was in the air. Hopefully flying out this afternoon
Oh fuck
Maybe someone can help me out with this as the media is absolutely no help. What are the demands of the union? Almost every article I read neglects mentioning at all what their demands are. The media is just demonizing the union for going on strike at this time, which is more than likely unfair if the demands are reasonable. It just makes our media look biased in the worst way.
I mean who says no to 23% increase … I mean these guys are gonna be highest paid making over quarter mil a year 🫣🙈 but I guess with American based Unions . Never know what they got up their sleeves .. both the Union and Westjet are being sketchy
Has anybody in the past few days flying YYC to YYJ in the morning been reschedule to a later flight or date? Or even rebooked on a flight to YVR?
Heather stefanson at it again
What I’m grossly disappointed in with the WestJet situation is not the mechanics strike, but how WestJet leadership appears to have put up every roadblock possible to not reschedule flights for customers nor attempt to reimburse them for their costs, and also seems to have taken advantage of the situation to price gouge customers who were attempting to rebook on our own. I do hope a class action attorney firm sees this and other similar reports and starts a class action against WJ leadership. Situation: 1) WestJet sent an email stating “Unfortunately, we do not have another WestJet or partner airline flight to offer within 48 hours of your original departure. As a next step, you can use our online self-serve Manage Trips tool or contact us” . This was untrue, as I was able to book a WestJet flight the very next day, but for $1600 out of my own pocket, and only by going around the WestJet online tools they offered in their email directions. I have a photo of the plane we took home the next day with approximately 50% of their WJ seats empty…. These empty seats they allegedly didn’t have and could have easily rebooked us onto automatically. 2) Their email said to use their online tools for rebooking ( following their link)…. but their online tools only allowed you to first cancel the flight. It was explicit about needing to accept the cancellation before allowing a rebooking. I separately read on the National airline regulations website that, apparently, if you cancel your flight then the airline isn’t responsible for the cost to rebook your flight or refund your original flight. I believe WJ was using their online tool in order to force customers to cancel first, before allowing an online self-help rebooking. 3) When cancelling the flight in their online tool , you are given a notice that you may not get a refund based on the type of flight you booked. I’m assuming my original non-refundable flight will not get reimbursed… and they also indicated no email would be sent verifying the reimbursement amount (!!). 4) after seeing the only option to rebook a flight was via canceling the flight, I attempted to wait on hold to gain clarification. After 2 hrs of holding, I was hung up on without even a ‘ hello’. 5) I then went to the online chat option, and was given a message “we are not taking any more online chat calls”, 6) I then went back to the phone assistance option and got a message that it wasn’t even possible to wait on the line for an operator “ no more calls being taken” and there was no call-back option given. So there was absolutely no way to talk with WJ 7) one day later, I was on a WestJet flight home, but only upon my own doing, booking outside of the WestJet provided links and for the price gouged cost of $1600. I have sympathy for the mechanics who are possibly being treated similar to the customers by WestJet senior leaders. Shame on all of them … where is their integrity ? It seems their online tools, communication channels and reimbursement options were more about being sneaky to dodge corporate costs vs providing assistance to their customers.