BAA strike

vermont100

cherryred80 wrote: »

How lovely that vermont100 should feel the need to point out his skills! A great many BAA employees do unskilled work, although I now realise I should have included a disclaimer to the effect that I did not mean all. *sigh* Oh, and I thank you not to make any assumptions about my line of work. Ta.

Public opinion seems to be mostly against the prospective strikers; I feel there would be more sympathy if this was to prevent a pension scheme being closed to existing members.

Striking to attempt prevent something that may or may not happen? Cool. Count me in for the General Strike then, just in case it snows/doesn't snow on Christmas Day.

Oh, and the notices regarding missing ballot papers were not seen by a number of staff in time to vote. The unions made little effort to encourage a decent turnout. There are staff who will be striking who do NOT know they won't be paid, and who do NOT know what a picket line is. I'm not anti-union, but this is a badly-organised shambles that makes both BAA and the unions look stupid, and does nothing for the popularity of either.

A decent management team and a decent union would have sorted this out by now.

wasnt pointing out my skills was just correcting the fact that you had misled people into believing that baa staff were a bunch of unskilled workers getting perks such as free parking no less , wow what a perk........ that they went sick all the time and that their uniform included shoes and bags . your probably right that decent management and union teams would have sorted this by now and i think this will happen. you need to have a serious word with your union rep because you have not been informed very well. its worrying that you dont realise how this will effect your current pension scheme. if all new employees go on a different scheme then as people on our scheme retire it means less and less people put money into the scheme this will make the scheme weaker with deficits possibly getting larger

vermont100

cherryred80 wrote: »

How lovely that vermont100 should feel the need to point out his skills! A great many BAA employees do unskilled work, although I now realise I should have included a disclaimer to the effect that I did not mean all. *sigh* Oh, and I thank you not to make any assumptions about my line of work. Ta.

Public opinion seems to be mostly against the prospective strikers; I feel there would be more sympathy if this was to prevent a pension scheme being closed to existing members.

Striking to attempt prevent something that may or may not happen? Cool. Count me in for the General Strike then, just in case it snows/doesn't snow on Christmas Day.

Oh, and the notices regarding missing ballot papers were not seen by a number of staff in time to vote. The unions made little effort to encourage a decent turnout. There are staff who will be striking who do NOT know they won't be paid, and who do NOT know what a picket line is. I'm not anti-union, but this is a badly-organised shambles that makes both BAA and the unions look stupid, and does nothing for the popularity of either.

A decent management team and a decent union would have sorted this out by now.

regarding staff not receiving ballot papers ..... if ballot closes on 20th and you have not received one by say 15th would you not think it would be a good idea to phone the union like i did and get one delivered the following day. if you are so anti strike you didnt make much effort to vote . what do you do at a general election ? just keep waiting for that ballot paper til the polls close ?

vermont100

chesterfield wrote: »

Sorry - switched the record player back on...

Exactly what is being meddled with for the current employees?

What has been/is being taken away from the existing BAA workers?

Perhpas my stuck record is being played at some frequency inaudible to the human ear, because it certainly appears that the above hasnt been clarified.

The closest we got to an answer was, and Im paraphrasing, "Well this could be the first step to taking it away from existing members".

Im clearly not in denial about the strike action, its happening. Im not angry either - Im not affected. Im certainly not bothered about bargaining - I have no influence over the actions taken by either party. I do accept the strike action is taking place, and clearly there are enough people wishing to strike to demonstrate that there is a widespread view that the action being taken is justified.

I am simply now on a mission to understand exactly what has motivated people to vote for the strike, what is their reasoning, and why they hold these views. I dont wish to change anyones mind, but better understand the different views just for the sake of gaining knowledge on the subject.

The above post is just one of several that have stated the strike is aimed at retaining "what is being taken away" but as far as I am aware, nothing is being taken away from the existing members. Has the union given misleading statements in order to obtain a yes vote, have we the general public not been told the whole truth by BAA - are they tinkering with existing employees arrangements but giving the impression they arent?

chesterfield im amazed you still carnt see my point of view. let me ask you this. if baa were going to leave the present fs scheme untouched why would they offer first a 6yr then a 10yr dispensation where the pension would be guaranteed not to be to touched?

ali1972

januarynightmare wrote: »

Does anyone know how these strikes work, if I change the date to the 15th could I have problems leaving then too?

Yours, troubled passenger

Probably, because if you're flying from a BAA airport and the Jan 14th strike goes ahead then there may be disruption for a few days.

We're on a shorter trip but have the same dilemma about making back up plans. We have looked at booking some additional no frills fares from non BAA airports, but this either involves driving considerable distances at this end (London to Scotland if we want to fly to our original destination) or travelling half a day on a train at the other end if we have to fly to an alternative city. So basically it costs us even more money to make back up plans, but we lose our holiday if we don't and BA then cancels our flights rather than re-routes them.

ali1972

MiserlyMartin wrote: »

In france they wouldn't put up with poor pay, worthless pensions and working conditions.

Don't they have a problem with high unemployment in France?

chesterfield

vermont100 wrote: »

chesterfield im amazed you still carnt see my point of view. let me ask you this. if baa were going to leave the present fs scheme untouched why would they offer first a 6yr then a 10yr dispensation where the pension would be guaranteed not to be to touched?

I can see your point, but why strike about something that may not happen, now? Why not strike when and indeed IF, it happens?

What guarantees have you that the company will not be sold, with mass redundancies taking place before the 6 years that BAA have promised. What guarantees are there that keeping the FS scheme in place now and giving "guarantees" that it will never be touched will result in a viable scheme for many years to come - it could go belly up like many other schemes have and will.

Perhaps they are offering a dispensation that it will not be touched for 10 years, as they can only "guarantee" the financial security of the scheme ofr that long. How long can you "guarantee" you will be able to afford the rent/mortgage etc?

Unfortunately there are no "guarantees" in life, nobody knows what tomorrow will bring, and the best we can do is try and forecast as best we can with the figures we have in front of us today. For BAA to offer 10 years security on a FS pension scheme, would appear on the face of it quite generous. I would be surprised to see such commitments from any other company in todays financial climate.

Keek62

I will spend the next couple of weeks in a state of some anxiety over this issue. I've not had a holiday in 20 years nor do I have any pension ... so I'm afraid I don't have sympathy with BAA staff at all, they have a lot more than I do.

My problem - not being a seasoned traveller obviously - is that I have a once in a lifetime chance of a trip to stay with friends in Japan.. they have gone to considerable effort and expense to help me organise this. I must fly from Edinburgh to Schiphol to get a connecting flight on the 15th. I no longer know what to do and I daren't miss my flight in Schiphol.. I would be devastated as I will lose my money and never be able to afford it again. If I knew for certain that the Edinburgh flight will not happen then I could at least try and figure out some way of walking across the North Sea some days in advance in order to be there in time. I just need enough information and time to try and raise the cash to get to Schiphol via another route. I just don't know what route to take.. ferry? Any advice would be appreciated.

chesterfield

If this really is a once in a lifetime chance, I would be planning a contingency now. Be that a bus ride and a few trains to get you to Europe if needs be. Or a trian to Manchester and a flight from there.

poppyolivia

so what are the chances of it happening? Is it almost most likely rather than not or is it 50/50?...is there a ray of hope?..are the 3 strike dates defo the dates or can they change ie we are flying on the 13th can that be changed instead of the 14th?

qwerty123456

Keek62 wrote: »

I will spend the next couple of weeks in a state of some anxiety over this issue. I've not had a holiday in 20 years nor do I have any pension ... so I'm afraid I don't have sympathy with BAA staff at all, they have a lot more than I do.

My problem - not being a seasoned traveller obviously - is that I have a once in a lifetime chance of a trip to stay with friends in Japan.. they have gone to considerable effort and expense to help me organise this. I must fly from Edinburgh to Schiphol to get a connecting flight on the 15th. I no longer know what to do and I daren't miss my flight in Schiphol.. I would be devastated as I will lose my money and never be able to afford it again. If I knew for certain that the Edinburgh flight will not happen then I could at least try and figure out some way of walking across the North Sea some days in advance in order to be there in time. I just need enough information and time to try and raise the cash to get to Schiphol via another route. I just don't know what route to take.. ferry? Any advice would be appreciated.

If you have a through ticket Edinburgh-Amsterdam-Tokyo the you will certainly not just be able to turn up at Amsterdam and expect them to take you on the flight. That is called using tickets out of sequence and airlines do not allow it. You see if you had bought a ticket Amsterdam-Tokyo instead of Edinburgh-Amsterdam-Tokyo then it would have cost an awful lot more. You get a discount for the inconvenience of having to connect at Amsterdam.

Here's a contingency for you....When the strike is fully confirmed and KLM put a policy into place for rebooking passengers that are affected by the BAA strikes, rebook your Edinburgh-Amsterdam sector for before the strike dates and stay in Amsterdam until your next fligh takes off. Alternatively you could rebook the entire EDI-AMS-NRT for after the strike. Remember you will only be able to do this when the airlines are sure that a strike will go ahead and they will do it for you free of charge.