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Firing Flight Attendants Who Watched an iPad May Cost United $1.5 Million
Despite having more than seventy years of combined experience working for United Airlines, flight attendants Ruben Lee and Jeanne Stroup were fired by the carrier for watching a video on an iPad for approximately fifteen minutes and failing to wear aprons during one flight in September 2013. But while folks at the company may have thought they'd save money by sacking two veteran employees, they were wrong. A jury has awarded Lee and Stroup $800,000 in damages, and attorney David Lane, who… (www.westword.com) More...
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The folks in the United PR department must be exhausted
That job must be worse than the White House Press Secretary!
This was a no brainer except for the gang that cannot shoot straight.United is lucky they only had to deal with the two flight attendants. It could have been one of the federal alphabet agencies.
First of all, this firing happened before the use of handhelds by F/A was common. Be that as it may, the action was completely out of proportion to the alleged offense. Most likely someone wanted these people out for another reason (union activism?), and the court quite properly said no.
Most likely they were fired for trivial reasons because they were senior employees and likely at the top tier of their compensation. Honestly, if the "offenses" had been serious, I doubt that they would have waited so long to terminate them.
I've never been in a union and I don't see how that helped these employees. At any rate, without unions, most companies provide at-will employment, i.e. they can fire you for anything they want and, if you feel you were unfairly treated, your only recourse is to sue them for wrongful termination.
It's happened to me. My last job was with an engine test equipment company, as their sole representative in the US and Canada for their gas turbine product line, handling all OEM and MRO accounts. I was hired because the previous rep refused to travel, which didn't work for long term capital equipment sales cycles. I spend about 50% of my time traveling for the first 2 years to re-establish relationships and around 15-25% ongoing to maintain them and for projects.
I was terminated by a new GM for the US-based operation, in my opinion, because all of my cost was borne by the local office while 90% of the revenue I generated went to corporate. I got no severance package and had to sue them just to get what would have been reasonable at most companies.
I've never been in a union and I don't see how that helped these employees. At any rate, without unions, most companies provide at-will employment, i.e. they can fire you for anything they want and, if you feel you were unfairly treated, your only recourse is to sue them for wrongful termination.
It's happened to me. My last job was with an engine test equipment company, as their sole representative in the US and Canada for their gas turbine product line, handling all OEM and MRO accounts. I was hired because the previous rep refused to travel, which didn't work for long term capital equipment sales cycles. I spend about 50% of my time traveling for the first 2 years to re-establish relationships and around 15-25% ongoing to maintain them and for projects.
I was terminated by a new GM for the US-based operation, in my opinion, because all of my cost was borne by the local office while 90% of the revenue I generated went to corporate. I got no severance package and had to sue them just to get what would have been reasonable at most companies.
One would think that by now companies would realize and know that they can't do this kind of thing to employees. But then, United seems to be having more problems than they can handle lately.I avoid flying United like the plague and have since the 1980's. But for those that do use United, I just hope that the idiocy and incompetence does not extend to those on the flight deck. With all these issues past and present, one has to wonder.
