American Airlines says it’s overstaffed by 20,000 employees
American Airlines on Thursday told staff it has more than 20,000 employees
it doesn’t need for its reduced fall schedule as the carrier and
its competitors face weak demand for air travel during the
corona pandemic.
The Fort Worth-based carrier and other U.S. airlines
are urging employees to take buyouts or early retirement
options to reduce headcount before turning to involuntary
measures like layoffs.
U.S. carriers are prohibited from laying off or cutting the pay
rates of their staff through Sept. 30 under the terms of
$25 billion in government payroll support aimed at softening
the impact of the virus on their business.
“We currently anticipate having 20 to 30% — or more than 20,000 —
more team members on payroll than we need to operate our schedule
this fall,” CEO Doug Parker and President Robert Isom said in a staff note. “To be clear, this doesn’t mean 20,000 of our team members will be
furloughed in October, it simply means we still have to work to do to
right-size our team for the airline we operate.”
