Professional engineers at Qantas have voted to ban overtime and out of hours call-outs, saying the airline has brought nothing to the table during wage negotiations.
Members of the Association of Professional Engineers, Scientists and Managers, Australia (APESMA) in Sydney, Brisbane and Melbourne voted in favour of the bans on Friday.
The bans will commence in all three cities on Friday of next week.
Qantas said the union was asking for a 30 per cent pay rise over three years, which it described as "unreasonable".
But APESMA director Catherine Bolger said the airline seemed in no hurry to resolve the dispute quickly.
"It's interesting that they've had our claim for over five months, and they haven't costed it until this week when we're voting on industrial action," Ms Bolger told AAP.
"Qantas haven't yet come to the table in seven months of negotiations.
"We've had over 15 meetings and they've still not been able to respond to which parts of our claim they'd be able to agree to and which parts they think need more work."
Ms Bolger said the engineers had no intention of inconveniencing Qantas passengers.
"Our members don't want to take action. It's a last resort," she said.
"It just shows their depth of frustration."
However, Ms Bolger said she was encouraged by a letter sent by Qantas CEO Alan Joyce saying he was committed to resolving the standoff.
She said the dispute was more about fatigue management and professional development than pay increases.
"Our members are required to do work out of hours, and they may be called two or three times a night," she said.
"It may well be that those members may only have four to five hours sleep before they start work the next day."
One-third of work done by professional engineers, including checking planes for airworthiness, happened outside their normal working hours, she said.
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9 Comments
I think the engineers have to realise management, and most of their advisers have never donr there kind of work and dont respect what they do. They are usually lawers accountant types, they run the company as though they are the car driver not not mechanic that maintains the car. They only want the ...
I dont think air travel in it's current form will continue too far into the future. Particularly with the added burden of security and ever increasing running costs. Unless these costs can be carried by the consumer, which is unlikely given the declining value of most currencies, the profit ...
If the workers are over worked then why not add to staff numbers for a safer and more reasonable work place? Getting a raise for an over utilized staff does not solve the problem if they continue to be over worked. Maybe the union wants to maintain short staff numbers to to raise pay levels? 30% ove ...
I really believe (and have, for some time,) that QANTAS should be broken up, or sold to another global carrier, perhaps SIA, Emirates, or Qatar Air, Gulf Air, etc. Quaint Ar$e have had a long, sordid reputation for being totally ignorant about Customer Satisfaction, militant and just plain bellig ...
Qantas Airlines (without jetstar and FF) only made 4 million dollars profit for the year - i dont think this is a time for asking for more money. They should thank Qantas for keeping their jobs in Australia when they are already being paid 5 times more than what overseas engineers would cost - Gre ...
Watch Out! Qantas could go on the same flight plan as Ansett and then where will we be??? -- with foreign owned airlines???.
they agreed to work for so much a year and now they want more... ???
If Qantas can pay a 3 million dollar super liability for the ex-CEO, which he should have paid, and also pay him over $500,000 per day, then they can afford to pay their staff who keeps the aircraft in the air. Remember there are no cutbacks where the CEO's are concerned and they don&# ...
you guys lucky that you still have job.