Agreement still has to be ratified by pilots union
The tentative agreement between Air Transat and its pilots announced earlier this week has resulted in major sighs of relief from travel agents who were facing the possibility of major disruptions to client vacation plans.
The airline announced the agreement by stating that it “lifts the risk of a strike and now allows its customers to travel with peace of mind.”
The announced agreement will be submitted for ratification by the union members.
“My first reaction to the agreement is one of complete relief,” Ethel Hansen Davey of Uniglobe Enterprise in Toronto told Travel Courier. “I don’t think that airlines understand the profound stress and anxiety these labour disputes have on travel advisors. We get no information to pass on to our clients, who are understandably stressed and anxious as well. There needs to be some compensation to advisors for the unpaid hours we put in on their behalf. And don’t say ‘service fees.’ Adding financial stress on top of the stressful situation for the clients is not in my wheelhouse.”
Compounding Hansen Davey’s frustrations are rumblings of labor strife at Porter Airlines, where flight dispatchers are unhappy with their current situation and have just voted in favor of strike action.
Paul Nielsen of Toronto’s Paragon Travel praised the travel agency community for the way it dealt with a labor dispute that saw Air Transat cancel some flights ahead of a possible walkout.
“As with every time there is a travel challenge we need to keep a level of sanity and composure in the face of our clients,” he said. “We travel consultants are right in the middle and if we go all panicky it makes things just that much worse. I believe we did well.”
But Nielsen said he feels Air Transat handled the situation better than has been the case during some previous airline labour disputes.
“Thankfully Air Transat has learned lessons from industry travails of the past and communicated reasonably well,” he continued. “Not perfect, but better than others in the past and hopefully they will take a few moments to note their best practices for the next time. And as an industry I hope we all learn for the next time and make sure our clients are informed and prepared for when ‘shit happens.'”
Delores Frederiksen of CAA Atlantic in Saint John also was quick to state the agreement was good news for her agency.
“I do not have anyone who has been impacted, but our office has a client in destination who potentially could have been impacted,” she said. “When speaking with Air Transat, they advised that they keep our clients updated directly and ensure that they were taken care of. Coming in this morning, it is so great to hear the strike was diverted!”
Meanwhile, Annick Guérard, president of Air Transat parent Transat, said in a statement: “We are pleased to have finally reached a tentative agreement with the union representing our pilots, marking a complete overhaul of their collective agreement. We would have greatly preferred to avoid the threat of a strike, which forced us to modify our operations.
“We are aware that this period has created significant uncertainty, and we extend our sincerest apologies to our customers whose flights were disrupted in recent days.”
