Cabin union UFO has called for around 19,000 flight attendants at Lufthansa and Lufthansa CityLine to strike on Tuesday and Wednesday. All departures from Frankfurt on Tuesday between 4am and 11pm will be on strike and all departures from Munich on Wednesday, UFO announced on Saturday evening.
Flight attendants at the parent company and regional subsidiary Lufthansa Cityline previously voted by more than 96 percent in separate ballots to strike.
Last week, ground staff organized by Verdi grounded most of Lufthansa's passenger traffic, now in their fifth wave of warning strikes. The final effects of the strike, which lasted for more than two days, were felt even on Saturday morning with some flight cancellations and delays.
Ufo stressed that the group announced a record result on Thursday with a net profit of almost 1.7 billion euros – the third best in the group's history. “The cabin must now also participate in this success, and the concessions made during the corona crisis must be adequately compensated,” said Joachim Vázquez Burger, chairman of the UFO board.
For about 18,000 cabin crew at Lufthansa and nearly 1,000 at Cityline, UFO is seeking 15 percent more money with an 18-month contract period. The union wants to achieve an inflation compensation bonus of 3,000 euros and higher payments. In separate collective bargaining negotiations, the union rejected the respective offers as insufficient.
Founded in 1992, the Independent Flight Attendants Organization (UFO) is a sectoral union representing flight attendants exclusively, primarily at the Condor and Lufthansa Group. In private flight operations, it competes closely with the DGB union Verdi, which wants to organize flying staff. Co-operation between two antagonistic unions is not possible.
In the post-corona year of 2022, UFO is the only union in the Lufthansa Group to abstain from industrial action. In the collective bargaining agreement, particularly low-wage groups received raises, while inflation compensation bonuses were postponed until the current round of collective bargaining.
