Frustration with the Seniority Preferential Bidding System
Dear WestJet Members,
The Union shares your continued frustration with the current seniority preferential bidding system. Despite what you may hear from the Employer, the Union’s position is that this system does not reflect the intent of what was presented and agreed to in bargaining.
Seniority preferential bidding systems are about seniority - not points, not a limit of sixteen bid lines and not a global solver.
With each passing month, the number of individual scheduling grievances is growing. The Union will maintain pressure on the Employer. The three policy grievances filed by the Union in May 2022 remain active – Failure to Implement (-002), Failure to Train SRC (-003) and Failure to Resolve Monthly Awards (-004) - our asks remain firm:
Implement a seniority bidding system that respects seniority, as was the bargained intent, to be jointly evaluated and selected by the representatives from the Union and Employer.
The system must allow the Scheduling Review Committee and our Members to clearly understand why they received the schedule they did, and why a day off violation was deemed valid.
Identification and implementation of improvements to the current system in the interim
What can you do? Dispute! Dispute! Dispute!
What can be disputed? Unawarded requested day off (RDO) and/or pairing.
How? Using the form found at this link; please ensure you use separate forms for RDOs vs pairings. You don’t need to create separate disputes within each category - list all your disputed RDOs in one form and all your disputed pairings in the other form.
When? Before the form closes on 24th of each month or 72 hours after the release of the schedule as per the CA.
Prerequisite: You had to have bid for that day off and/or pairing and not received it and your bid cannot conflict with preassigned activity such as vacation or training.
We have hundreds of grievances in queue. We are urging the Employer to reach a settlement that respects seniority; we have yet to receive a reasonable or respectable offer.
All scheduling disputes from the last few months have been escalated to individual grievances. The Union is prepared to attend, present and pursue the full grievance process for every single scheduling grievance that has been filed.
This issue is the most pressing concern for our members, and we are committed to dedicating all necessary resources to defend and uphold our Collective Agreement.
Please continue to dispute your unawarded Requested Days Off and pairings using the form before the deadline.
The Union has been reasonable, patient and willing to participate in discussions beyond what is called for. For months, the Union’s outspoken desire to collaborate and share information in order to make the transition to seniority scheduling as successful as possible has been endless, yet here we are.
The Employer had 14 months from ratification to get this right. We are now seeing the release of October 2022 schedules with no resolve. We cannot get that time back. The Union’s tolerance for this system has expired. There seems to be a lack of concern from the Employer over how this system has and will continue to impact the membership. This is simply, another failed WestJet rollout.
Only WestJet can fix it.
In Solidarity,
Your CUPE 4070 Executive Team
CUPE 4070 President, Crystal Hill
CUPE 4070 Vice-President, Alia Hussain
CUPE 4070 Secretary-Treasurer, Alex Grigoriev
CUPE 4070 Recording Secretary, Marco Di Virgilio
WestJet YVR Base VP, Chris Brewer
WestJet YYC Base VP, Brigitte Benoit
WestJet YYZ Base VP, Bryan Hansraj
WestJet Encore YYC Base VP, Colleen Tracey
WestJet Encore YYZ Base VP, Mauricio Mejia
Swoop Base VP, Allan Ramsarran