Aer Lingus cancels 76 more flights from July 8th amid pilot action

Aer Lingus has announced that it will cancel 76 additional flights from July 8th to 10th as a result of its pilots work to rule with the move coming just hours ahead of a Labour Court hearing aimed at resolving the dispute.

As on most other days since the dispute began, the bulk of the cancellations are on short-haul business routes to airports in cities including London, Manchester, Amsterdam, Paris, Brussels and Frankfurt with one flight to the US impacted each day.

All told close to 500 flights have now been cancelled since the work-to-rule began a week ago with 120 flights cancelled last Saturday as a result of an all out strike by pilots that lasted for eight hours.

[ What are my rights if industrial action at Aer Lingus affects my holiday plans? ]

[ Aer Lingus turbulence more complex than pilots’ claim for a ‘few million euro’ ]

The cancellations are as a result of industrial action from the Irish Air Line Pilots’ Association (Ialpa) in a dispute over pay.

Ialpa lodged a lay claim of close to 24 per cent which, it said, would cover inflation over a five year period between 2019 and 2024 while management offered increases of around half that and said any further wage increases would have to be linked to enhanced flexibility and productivit.

Both parties are due to resume talks at the Labour Court this afternoon.

“In order to continue to protect as many services as possible from the continuing and highly disruptive impact of IALPA’s continuing industrial action, Aer Lingus has had to take the step of cancelling 76 additional flights over the course of Monday 8th July to Wednesday 10th July (inclusive),” the company said in a statement.

“Implementing these cancellations is to enable us to protect as many services as possible for as many of our customers as possible. These cancellations will be implemented today, and details will be communicated to impacted customers.”

Customers who are impacted by the fresh wave ofcancellations will be given the option to change their flights for free.

They will also be able to claim a refund or voucher.

“Aer Lingus fully understands the anxiety being experienced by customers given the uncertainty caused by IALPA’s industrial action and is giving impacted customers as many options as possible,” the company’s statement concluded.

Both sides to the dispute held over nine hours of talks on Monday after which it was confirmed that the Labour Court would use powers under industrial relations law to intervene.

Capt Mark Tighe, president of the Irish Airline Pilots’ Association (Ialpa), part of trade union Fórsa, said its work to rule at Aer Lingus would continue in the meantime.

Meanwhile, Aer Lingus confirmed it had hired aircraft and crew from other operators, a practice known as “wet leasing”, to fly some services while pilots continued industrial action.

The company hired one Boeing 777 to fly from Dublin to Chicago, while it brought in two Airbus A320s to serve European destinations including Greek islands and Malaga, popular with Irish sunseekers, along with the Czech capital Prague.

Sign up for push alerts and have the best news, analysis and comment delivered directly to your phone