Delta seeking volunteers to help out in loyalty lounges amid staffing shortage

[chipwich]

Your undermining of civil society amounts to Bolshevik sabotage. You are a traitor and are damned.

[DGuller]

Seems reasonable to me.  Not every person in the world thinks of their relationship with their employer in adversarial terms.

It can be adversarial if you want to make it that way, such as by not volunteering your time off work for the company, but it doesn't have to be this way. 

[chipwich]

Seems reasonable to me.  Not every person in the world thinks of their relationship with their employer in adversarial terms.

It can be adversarial if you want to make it that way, such as by not volunteering your time off work for the company, but it doesn't have to be this way. 

In Minnesota it's illegal for an employer to even suggest off the clock work.

[Grey Fox]

I'll be nicer to Yi and simply call it investor mentality. That the mere existence of the company is a good thing for people.

It's not.

[Monoriu]

We civil servants "volunteer" all the time.  It takes a few years to expand the number of staff.  In the meantime, if there is anything, they call up people to "volunteer" on Sundays, evenings or whatever.  Happens all the time. 

[DGuller]

Why the scare quotes?

[grumbler]

Why the scare quotes?

Because they are not actually volunteers.  They are staff being required to do uncompensated work.  Happens all the time in authoritarian regimes.

[Oexmelin]

Happens frequently in democratic ones too.

[Syt]

Happens frequently in democratic ones too.

A lot of (most?) office jobs here have "all in" contracts, meaning that any "necessary" overtime is paid for in the monthly salary (though special rules apply if extra time is on a Sunday or public holiday). When I worked in accounting that e.g. there would be crunch time around year end where I would work 50-60 hour weeks for 6-8 weeks without additional recompense.

Studies indicate that employees on such contracts often feel additional pressure to work overtime (even if not necessary) and that the avg. pay per hour is lower than for people who get paid overtime.

[Jacob]

I think there's distinction for regular overtime for salaried employees and this Delta thing, however. It's one thing to say "the project you're on requires more effort to complete on time than anticipated, please work extra within your actual job description" and quite another to say "yeah, I know you're an accountant but we'd like  you to wipe some tables and restock the napkin dispensers at our business class lounge."

[Syt]

I think there's distinction for regular overtime for salaried employees and this Delta thing, however. It's one thing to say "the project you're on requires more effort to complete on time than anticipated, please work extra within your actual job description" and quite another to say "yeah, I know you're an accountant but we'd like  you to wipe some tables and restock the napkin dispensers at our business class lounge."

What if the extra work happens every month? I was not always affected, but I've had coworkers who worked lots of overtime middle of the month and end of the month because of corporate deadlines. Some of them often had 2-300 hours overtime at the end of the year (not to mention a lot of untaken vacation days).

But I see your point. You're thinking more of if the company calls you on the day the office is closed because you move to a new location, only you get a phone call at 8 am if you would be able to help because as it turns out hiring the cheapest possible moving company was not such a great idea, and then you spend your day from 9 am till 3 am hauling furniture with a few other "volunteers" and need to be back in the office next day 8 am for a team meeting? Purely hypothetical.

(And to clarify: Austria had at the time laws that prohibited workdays over 10 hours plus breaks - since raised to 12 - but of course people go over all the time and just move around the hours on their time sheets, if they record the hours at all - because since they don't get paid for them, why should they? And the employer can claim ignorance if it comes to inspections).

[garbon]

From a search it looks like Delta asks for volunteers any time that it is short staffed at a particular location. To my mind that seems to devalue the work that employees do if it wants people to offer unpaid time when Delta management has mishandled staffing.

On the subject of the company being good to employees, I guess it hasn't fired them, but it also isn't paying them.

https://employeebenefits.co.uk/delta-saves-voluntary-leave-schemes/#:~:text=Delta%20Air%20Lines%20has%20saved,%2D19%20(Coronavirus)%20pandemic.

Delta Air Lines has saved 24% in salary and benefits costs after more than 45,000 employees choose to take voluntary unpaid leave.

The airline introduced the option for employees to take voluntary unpaid leave in June 2020 to help it deal with the financial ramifications of the Covid-19 (Coronavirus) pandemic.

https://www.cnbc.com/2020/12/09/delta-ceo-asks-employees-to-take-more-unpaid-leave-in-2021-d.html

Delta CEO asks employees to take more unpaid leave in 2021 as industry continues to struggle

Delta Air Lines CEO on Wednesday asked employees to sign up for more unpaid leave with a slump in travel to continue into 2021.

"Our voluntary unpaid leave program will continue to be essential to positioning Delta for the recovery, and we will need participants for the foreseeable future," Ed Bastian said in a note to staff. "I ask everyone to consider whether a voluntary leave makes sense for you and your family."

...

More than 40,000 Delta employees have opted for unpaid leaves of absence at the company's urging. Roughly 18,000 accepted buyouts and early retirement packages, cutting Delta's pre-pandemic head count by about 20%.

[Zanza]

You have to wonder why the usual contractor could not find sufficient personnel. Maybe they should offer more. Georgia has 250.000 unemployed persons.

[Syt]

You have to wonder why the usual contractor could not find sufficient personnel. Maybe they should offer more. Georgia has 250.000 unemployed persons.

That seems to be a common theme for low paying jobs at the moment that people don't want to take them (and the increased unemployment money doesn't help). Now, if those jobs were paying a living wage the matter might be different, but that seems unlikely to happen.

[garbon]

Do we have evidence that Delta is actually hiring or was there first step (while swathes of their employees are still on furlough) to ask for volunteers?