BA loses legal action to Unite

BA loses court battle to Unite

Unite yesterday successfully overturned the decision stopping them from implementing the first of three five day strikes starting next Monday the 24th May. The other strike dates are on 30th May and 5th June with a day pause between each date. This is designed to have maximum impact over the bank holiday and the run up to the world cup.

This latest strike is over the removal of travel perks for those members of staff who previously went on strike and nothing to do with the original strike over the number of crew working on an airline and the acceptance of a pay freeze for two years.

BA share price fell steeply on this news with the company already anticipated to announce a loss for this year of around £500m. BA claim the strikes earlier in the year cost them £40 million and the ash cloud disruption a further £100m

The impact of the strike will be less than previous strikes with BA saying it expects that most of the staff will report for work allowing them to operate about 70% of their normal flights.

The problem for the customer is will their flight be included in the 30% not flying that will make fewer people book with them in the first place. Flying empty planes is no benefit to BA.