SWA Pilots to Vote on Contract

After three years of negotiating, Southwest Airlines and the Southwest Airlines Pilot’s Association have come to a tentative agreement on a new contract. The next step is for the contract to be voted on by the pilots. If passed, the contract will run until September 1st of 2011.

Gary Kelly, the President, CEO and Chairman of Southwest Airlines, is happy that the two sides could come to an agreement during these difficult economic times.

Said Kelly: “I applaud the negotiation teams and the SWAPA Board for recognizing the importance of this new tentative agreement. Although this new proposal was negotiated during a very different and consistently challenging economic period than the previous tentative agreement, we are proud that we could still offer our hard working Pilots a proposal that is responsible, yet reflects the current uncertain economic outlook.”

The contract became amendable in September of 2006 and negotiations were started during that month. In total, this new contract is going to a vote that consists of nearly 6,000 Southwest Airlines pilots. In total, Southwest Airlines has almost 35,000 workers.

SWA Pilots (Image: Flickr)