WHY CAN’T THE TRUTH BE TOLD?

Several weeks ago, a 5-year Continental Flight Attendant was recruited by the Association of Flight
Attendants (AFA-CWA) to share his testimonial about the life of a Continental Reserve, in order to sway
opinion in favor AFA over the International Association of Machinists & Aerospace Workers (IAMAW) at
the new United Airlines. Unfortunately, the AFA has been distributing this testimonial as fact. However,
most Continental Airlines Flight Attendants know full well that this testimonial is filled with inaccuracies
and misleading information. In order to highlight these fallacies and respond with the truth and with
verifiable facts, we present to you a side-by-side comparison in response:

“Life on Reserve at Continental” Rebuttal

by Maxwell Fisher, 5-Year CAL FA by James Thrombley,
1999-hire CAL FA
The merger of Continental and United gives
us an opportunity to address the issues we all The statement to the left is simply false.
face as flight attendants from both legacy In the recently ratified CAL/IAM contract
carriers and an opportunity to improve the lower pay scale for new hires was
technology and get what we all deserve. My eliminated.
name is Maxwell Fisher, and I am just
beginning my 6th year at Continental Airlines. Back in 2006, the CAL/IAM flight
I just want to take this opportunity to express attendants negotiated a concessionary
my experience with you. agreement with $72 million in annual
savings to the company. One of the
concessions was a 3-year “B-scale” for
The IAM got a new contract ratified after
flight attendants not yet hired. That scale
Flight Attendants voted down the previous
reduced pay rates for years 1 through 3
one on February 1, 2006. The IAM touted the
to $18.00, $20.00, and $22.50,
agreement “The membership mandated no
respectively.
hourly base rate reduction and job protection.
These goals were achieved.” However, it was
Those who were hired during the life of
not true. New hire flight attendants who
the agreement – including this Reserve –
started training after the ratification of this
knew full well what the starting pay was
agreement was to be put on a lower pay scale,
when they accepted employment with
which started at my class. They gave a pay
CAL.
cut to new flight attendants who are trying to
make ends meet. We all know your first 5
years are the most difficult at any airline, the
IAM made it even more difficult

Our priorities as Flight Attendants are not
their number one concern. After having the
IAM at CAL for more than 2 decades, the
welcome to the IAM video in my training still
never had one single flight attendant in the
video.
What this 5-year Reserve does not tell you
in his letter is that a flight attendant
showed the video during the IAM
contractually allotted 2-hour presentation
at his Flight Attendant initial training
class.

In any of the mailings ever sent to my home
over the course of several years, they never
once focused on our profession or what they
were doing to make our lives or professions
better.
He also does not tell you that he, himself,
was pictured in an IAM brochure promoting
the IAM National Pension Plan in 2007.
That brochure was sent to every CAL flight
attendant's home.
 While flight attendants throughout the rest of
industry started benefiting from reciprocal
cabin seat agreements with other airlines, we
had none.
Besides the United one that AFA pushed for,
we still have none in effect with no timeline for
implementation.
Our reserve quality of life does not exist here.
If a lineholder sees that a reserve has been
assigned a trip, they can take the trip away
from the reserve even if the lineholder is from
another base within certain timelines. This is
called “Bumping.” This happens more often
2 lineholder can “bump” a Reserve from a trip
than not.
Flight Attendants at UAL have enjoyed
reciprocal cabin agreements for several
years now. However, those agreements are
not contractual. UAL achieved those
agreements, in large part, due to the
grassroots activism of Flight Attendants
who commuted on Jet Blue after the
closure of the MIA base. The recently
ratified CAL/IAM contract includes the
following clause:
Re: Reciprocal Cabin Seat Privileges:
This letter will confirm our recent
discussions in which the Company agreed
to implement off-line reciprocal cabin seat
privileges with other airlines as soon as
possible following ratification of the
collective bargaining agreement. We
expect that such agreements will
commence no later than sixty (60) days
following that ratification.
We all recognize the hardships Reserves endure
and most of us agree that improving reserve
needs to be a priority in the joint agreement.
However, it needs to be clarified that a CAL
when the Reserve picks the trip up from open
flying (following days off, personal drops, 24-
hour breaks or vacation). The time limit for
“bumping” a Reserve is 12 hours before check-
in, and the Reserve can only be “bumped” from
trips that depart after 11 am the following day.
Trips that Reserves pick up before 11 am are
considered “golden” and the Reserve cannot be
“bumped.”
United Reserves do not have the ability to pick
up trips from open flying -- unless it is their day
off and the company has no other Reserves
available to assign.
Although "bumping" may sound like an injustice
to a Reserve, it can work to the benefit of a
Reserve when "bumped" from a less desirable
trip assigned to them by scheduling. "Bumping"
also helps keep scheduling from hiding trips
that should otherwise be available to
lineholders to pick up or trade.
In addition, even when you think you have
your trip and you have checked in for it, it
doesn’t mean you are going to keep it. There
is a clause that says “reserves are always
subject to reassignment.”
Just last week, I was given a trip. I went to
the airport and checked in at the duty desk
for my trip. I get a phone call after I checked
in but about 30 minutes before my
scheduled show time to say my assignment
has changed and to check with the duty
desk. When I went downstairs again to talk
to inflight, I was told they had to given my
trip away to a lineholder and I’ve been
“reassigned” to sit 4 hours on Airport Alert.
There was nothing that I could do.
I immediately went to look for someone at
the union. They were not there. They do not
have anyone scheduled to be down there, no
one scheduled to be on call ever, no one
available to assist when I needed them.
Here are some common clarifications
about our current reserve system…
• Reserves at CAL are only given a small
window to pick up a trip coming only from
a day off. Between 4-7pm EST, only for
trips that check in before 11am. Only if
those trips are all picked up, then other
trips fall into the reserve pickup window
but you’re subject to being bumped.
• The call out lines-- where you have a
specified period of time where they can
call you on reserve; the day before they
can convert you to 24 hour ready reserve
instead of your call out line or they can
simply assign you a trip at any time during
the day, regardless of your “call out”
times.
The situation that this Reserve has
described is a gross misrepresentation.
This Reserve was not "bumped" by a
lineholder. A lineholder cannot "bump" a
reserve this close to check-in. It sounds
like the lineholder may have missed their
check-in (possibly under the commuter
"Oops" policy) and would have been sent
home without pay (and without points!).
Due to the severe short-staffing situation
at CAL, scheduling likely reassigned this
Reserve to Airport Alert so that they could
use the lineholder as well.
While no Reserve likes getting reassigned,
the fact is that all Reserves at both
airlines are subject to reassignment at any
time. Just ask the Reserves in HNL who
have been on rotating reserve for 30 years!
Mr. Fisher also fails to mention that on
this particular case he refers to, Newark
Local Lodge officer Shaun McNulty was in
the office that day and personally took on
his case as a trained grievance officer.
Although the specifics of the case cannot
be discussed, the fact that the case WAS
actually handled by the union is a major
omission and misrepresentation on the
part of this reserve.
As stated before, United Reserves do not
have the ability to pick-up trips so this
provision would be considered by many to
be a huge improvement.
The window Continental Reserves have to
schedule themselves lasts for three hours
each day, during which personal drops are
granted and other trips are added for
operational reasons.
During this time the Reserve actually has
an advantage as they can pick up trips via
the computer while a lineholder must call
scheduling to trade or pick-up for the next
day.
This sounds a lot like UAL Call-in Reserves
being converted to Ready-Reserve.
This is something UAL Reserves live with
every month. In the CAL/IAM contract,
Reserves can only be converted from call-
out to ready a maximum of 3 times per bid
period.
• Our lines (lineholders and reserves) are
posted for April 2011 in EWR on March
22nd. Then you can’t touch your line until
the 29th – that’s when the Flight
Attendant to Flight Attendant trade
window opens. Open time trades can only
be done in a short window on the 30th
between 6-8am EST until it opens again
that night at 10pm EST.
Move-up lines for reserves are not even to
begin to be built until the first day of the
bid month which would be April 3rd. They
have 5 days to build them; no standards
set by the IAM but open to interpretation
by scheduling so needless to say, it’s not
consistent.
I should know; I missed a move-up line by
1 for March. I was given 3 excuses by
scheduling. First I was told the computer
went down…Didn’t get to the person in
front of me (but they did)…and they simply
met their quota and needed more reserves.
One month they may only do 75 but I have
seen them give as many as 160!
4
Oh yes, on Reserve, you cannot pick up
trips on your days off or days that touch
your days off. We have certain days off that
can be rolled (or moved), and lately this is a
very common occurrence. So, you never
really have control of your time off.
• We are guaranteed 83 hours of pay for the
month, that’s provided you only have 10
days off. We are sometimes given 11-12-13-
14 day off lines. If you hold a 14 day off
reserve line, you lose 4 hours per day. 14
Day off lines would be a line guarantee of
67 hours.
This is not very different than what
happens at United with Reserve Move-up --
except by the time a United Reserve finally
gets their move-up line the trade
allotments are usually closed.
Under the CAL/IAM Agreement a Reserve
has the ability to build their own move-up
line from available trips, rather than just
having the line randomly built by
scheduling. At CAL, move-ups lines are
built during the first 5 days of the bid
period. The more quickly CAL Reserves call
scheduling back to tell them which trips
they would like, the more quickly they call
the next Flight Attendant on the list.
In EWR domestic, upwards of 100 move-up
lines are typically built. In IAH domestic,
at least 140 move-up lines are built and
sometimes as many as 200 are built. It
really depends on how quickly lineholders
get back to scheduling with the trips that
they would like for their line.
The rolling of days off is definitely
something that needs improvement or
elimination in the joint contract. It does
bear clarification though that CAL
Reserves have the ability to trade their
days off with open time in a reserve pool
and they can break up their sets of days
into additional sets of days off –
something United Reserves cannot do.
If a CAL Reserve chooses to do so, they can
schedule themselves on one day, off the
next, on the next, off the next, etc. This
flexibility sometimes results in scheduling
finding it necessary to fly Reserves into a
day off. The day off is restored at the
soonest opportunity on the Reserve's line.
This would be an improvement to the
United Reserve system.
With an 11-day off line the Reserve would
be guaranteed 79 hours instead of 75. On
a 12-day off line the Reserve would be
guaranteed 75 hours.
When a reserve is involuntarily awarded a
line with more than 10 days off, per the
contract they are able to contact
scheduling and have those reserve duty
days restored and their pay guarantee
restored correspondingly.
What has the IAM done for the last 2
decades to address reserves? Another
flight attendant can take your trip away….
you can sit 6 hours of airport alert …..we
have no trip or duty rigs. I had a friend
who worked EWR-BOS layover then back to
EWR the next morning. She was paid 3
hours of pay for a 2 day trip.
5 significant increase in hourly pay rates,
It’s not all about the hourly rate. You can’t
just look at our hourly rate and say this is
how much we get paid. Duty rigs, trip rigs,
minimum day pay, reserve override are all
things we don’t have in the IAM contracts.
This amounts to being a significant impact
in our pay. We are always told fly now,
grieve later. They won’t even make an
effort. I had to file a grievance back in
2009 about shorting us 15 minutes debrief
time for customs clearance in YVR. No one
would fix it, and we had a 9 hour layover. I
won the grievance, but I received no
compensation for winning.
Much is made of the lack of trip rigs at
CAL. Most of these low time trips have
been split off of published IDs and are
then picked up by lineholders and
“piggybacked” onto domestic or
international trips in order to increase
flight hours. They are rarely assigned to a
Reserve. In the event that they are, the
Reserve still gets the 83-hour line
guarantee.
As far as this Reserve's question: "What
has the IAM done for reserves?" In the
years just before this Reserve started
flying at CAL, many improvements were
made to the reserve system. Most notably
Reserve Preferencing. For each day that a
reserve is on duty they can select
MAXIMUM FLY, MINIMUM FLY, NO
PREFERENCE, or AIRPORT ALERT.
More importantly, reserves at CAL have
protection from being furloughed.
AFA-CWA likes to point out that the No
Furlough clause in the CAL/IAM contract
contains the following force majeure: "...a
decrease in available fuel supply".
Although fuel prices are currently rising,
we are not experiencing a decrease in the
availability of fuel. Under the newly-
ratified contract Reserves gained a
retro pay dated back to January 1, 2010,
and job protection with the No Furlough
Clause.
More important than duty rig, trip rig, or
reserve override is a sufficiently high line
guarantee that allows a Reserve to afford
the necessities of life and pay their bills.
With the 83 hour minimum, a CAL reserve
is paid 8 additional hours each month.
All of us (except this Reserve) understand
that “fly now, grieve later” is a factor of
the Railway Labor Act, which governs our
collective bargaining and grievance
procedures and is a fact of life regardless
of which union represents us.
The question remains, who has the best
track record for protecting flight
attendants? Recognizing that if your
Domestic, International, Reserve,
Lineholder, it doesn’t matter. We are ALL
flight attendants. We need to unite
together instead of trying to put us
against each other.
We all know the old Unimatic system will
not be the combined system. The
restrictions of the past will be gone with
technology improvements once we all
have the same system. AFA works with
many other flight attendants at several
different airlines. The Flight Attendant
union knows what works for some might
not be priorities at others. They don’t do
just one survey for contracts, they do
several.
They present all of AFA’s proposals and
give you updates on what management is
proposing. We don’t have that under the
IAM –instead we have zero transparency.
Every vote we take is different. Different
procedures every time, only thing
consistent is inconsistency.
6
Reserve is difficult. AFA provides override
pay. IAM gives pay cuts to the new flight
attendants and gives them nothing extra.
They have had time after time to improve
reserve life, and they have never once
addressed the issues. They have had their
chance, and they failed in 2006…failed two
rounds of negotiations to address the
issues that matter to us.
We have no cabin seat agreements
currently in effect without any definite
timeline to implement. We are the only
major airline without a program in effect.
This affects our quality of life – and if you
are a commuter, it affects your pay.
Well if we are talking track record, let's
talk about a 10-year contract at UAL
that most claim they did not vote for.
Let's talk about a point-based
Disciplinary System, which was
negotiated by AFA, which United Flight
Attendants did not vote on.
Let's talk about the most recent survey
sent out by AFA, the results of which
have STILL not been released.
Let’s talk about a lack of snap-backs in
their current UAL contract, or even
consideration of a protective
Transitional Agreement that IAM had
the foresight to negotiate and ratify for
their membership!
Let's talk about 6 years of negotiations
at US Airways for a joint contract, and
AFA-CWA never filed for federal
mediation (and could have TWO YEARS
AGO!).
Although this Reserve may not know
this, since he was not yet hired, the
2006 negotiations were concessionary
bargaining, much like the current AFA
Bankruptcy Agreement. And still
reserves gained flexibility and
scheduling improvements.
CAL Flight Attendants absorbed $72
million in yearly concessions without
taking a cut in hourly rates of pay.
Therefore, the bar for negotiations for a
combined contract will start at $52.53
this September.
Not true.
See page 2.
 Flight Attendants at CAL were taken out
of profit sharing in 2010. No one was
informed about this until we received a
letter from management stating we
should’ve voted for the TA we voted down.
The IAM announced a new TA shortly
after, with a vote scheduled before profit
sharing day, and then, just to be sure we’d
get the message they moved it back
another week to make sure we were voting
as every other group at the new United got
their share of profit sharing.
Management gave us cupcakes with $ signs
on them on profit sharing day. Did the IAM
object to this? No, they encouraged it –
they worked with management. How would
that make you feel?
There were no additional gains except for
temporary monetary gains, even though
the gains were less than the previous TA.
With the IAM, our union dues went up this
year again to just under $56 a month, and
it keeps climbing with a provision that
allows it to continue to go up every year.
The VP for the IAM is a former ramper for
TWA.
Do you think you can call him up about a
flight attendant issue and think he would
be able to understand you?
Every other unionized workgroup had a
ratified contract that stipulated
inclusion in the new profit-sharing plan.
To their credit, the IAM was able to
negotiate a payment equal to profit-
sharing, even though the flight
attendants did not have a ratified
agreement by the end of 2010. There was
a time at CAL when the pilot group did
not receive profit-sharing because it was
not included in their contract.
I feel a whole lot better having the choice
to take my profit-sharing in cash instead
of having it deposited into a 401(k).
Weren’t UAL Flight Attendants told
everyone had to have the same method of
distribution – either cash or 401(k) – per
IRS regulations?
Then why are CAL Flight Attendants
given a choice?
It costs money for quality union
representation. AFA-CWA has a little-
known automatic dues increase clause in
its Merger Agreement with CWA. The dues
are supposed to increase yearly based on
the average of all dues paid by other CWA
members. That average is $48 today.
In order to circumvent a required dues
increase, and to balance their budget, the
AFA leadership voted to take a $1.7
million Line of Credit against its
Emergency Reserve Fund. While it may be
true that they have not drawn on the LOC
yet, check back at the end of the fiscal
year in June. And be prepared for a $6
increase as soon as this election is over.
And remember that the new $49 dues will
still not include access to a strike fund.
I have met and spoken personally with
Robert Roach. He has a far better grasp of
the issues we are facing and what we
have been through in the airline industry
over the last 30 years than a 5-year CAL
Reserve – that is for absolute certainty!
This upcoming vote is about picking a
union who will have our interests as their
top concern.
We need a union who understands our
issues and presses for those issues to be
addressed – not just a union that peppers
us with glossies because they want
15,000 more people paying $56 dollars a
month.
This upcoming vote is about choosing a
union that has the financial resources
and clout to get us a contract with the
best pay and work rules in the industry.
It is about having a union structure that
supports democracy, transparency and
accountability at all levels of the union.
IAM UNITED!

With our profession, we need someone

who understands our job is 24 hours a
day, 7 days a week. We need someone
who already understands the issues we James Thrombley
face every day. Continental Flight Attendant
1999 hire
We will never work under the current CAL
or UAL contract as a combined group. We
have good things we want from both sides
and we can achieve our goals when we
combine. “AFA brings us together to
organize on issues that matters to us as
Flight Attendants. AFA is about you and
me. No other union can represent us the
way AFA can.

Maxwell Fisher
Continental Flight Attendant
2006 hire