Frontier Airlines’ pilots union has reached a tentative agreement on a new labor contract with the company after more than a year and a half of negotiations.
The four-year agreement freezes pay for a year for most of Frontier’s approximately 650 pilots, according to Frontier Airline Pilots Association president Jeff Thomas.
It includes future cost-of-living pay increases and future pay-scale reductions, making it essentially “cost-neutral,” he said.
“We adjusted the overall rates, but nobody will be taking any pay reductions as a result of it,” Thomas said. “… It certainly doesn’t look at all like one of the contracts that came out of the bankruptcy filings.”
The pilots union agreement adds a defined-contribution retirement plan and includes some changes in work rules and productivity improvements, Thomas said.
Frontier has “industry-leading pilot productivity” and one of the most competitive crew- operating costs in the industry, Thomas said.
The agreement also allows Frontier to use non-Frontier Airlines Pilots Association pilots for its Q400 turboprop operation.
But Thomas said the contract limits flying by other pilots relative to the size of its main Airbus operation, which is flown by the unionized pilots.
“The intent is that this flying should promote growth” of the mainline operation, Thomas said.
The leadership of the pilots union plans to put the tentative agreement up for an electronic vote by its members in mid-January.
Results are expected in mid-February, and the agreement would become effective around March 1.
Before accepting 11 percent pay cuts after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, Frontier pilots had negotiated pay increases in 2001 that brought their base annual pay to a range from $33,000 to $125,500.
Staff writer Kelly Yamanouchi can be reached at 303-954-1488 or kyamanouchi@denverpost.com.
