Lufthansa has agreed to a new pay deal for around 20,000 ground staff, just days after a significant strike resulting in the airline cancelling over 1,000 flights, costing it around $36m.
After a third round of negotiations, Lufthansa and the trade union ver.di eventually agreed on a new collective pay agreement for Lufthansa ground staff.
“We are pleased that we have succeeded in finding a good solution for our employees with the social partner,” said Michael Niggemann, Lufthansa’s head of HR.
“We have agreed on large salary increases. It was especially important to us to give disproportionately higher consideration to the lower and middle income groups. With this, we are living up to our social responsibility for our employees and ensuring our attractiveness as employer. In view of the continuing high burdens caused by the pandemic and the uncertain economic situation, we have spread the increase in compensation over several stages and created longer-term planning certainty through an 18-month term.”
The agreement is still subject to the approval of the boards and a ver.di membership survey.
With regard to the upcoming negotiations with the cockpit and the cabin, Niggemann reaffirmed the Lufthansa management’s willingness to reach an agreement and expressed confidence that good solutions can also be achieved here.
Last week, Lufthansa recorded its first quarterly profit since the start of the Covid crisis and said it expects to return to full-year operating profit this year on the back of continued strong demand for its short-haul European routes.
The German airline posted a €259m net profit for the three months to the end of June – the second quarter of its financial year – and noted a 164% year-on-year revenue increase to €8.5bn.
Lufthansa – which counts Swiss, Eurowings and Brussels Airlines amongst its many subsidiaries – said it expects ticket demand to remain high for the rest of this year. The group reported a load factor – which measures how full its planes are – of 80% for the second quarter.
The airline said bookings up to the end of this year are currently around 83% of pre-pandemic levels.
Lufthansa’s flight capacity in its third quarter is likely to be around 80% of pre-Covid levels – less than planned and largely resulting from travel chaos at European airports brought about by staff shortages and surging passenger demand.
Lufthansa has already cancelled more than 2,000 flights since the start of the summer.
