BA pays staff $500 sweetener as bonuses shrink

British Airways will hand staff 400 pounds ($496) and a free return flight to help make up for missed bonus payments. The payout, detailed in a letter to workers seen by Bloomberg and confirmed by BA, will be made to all UK employees. Staff were due to receive only a fraction of their standard bonus because earnings fell short of a GBP1.5b threshold and the carrier missed customer service and punctuality goals. “The 2016 all-colleague bonus scheme has triggered at a much lower level than in previous years,” the London-based unit of IAG SA said in the staff letter. “However, the British Airways board has decided that all eligible colleagues in the UK will receive a bonus with their March pay.” Alex Cruz, who took over as head of BA last April, needs the support of staff after embarking on a four-year program to boost margins. Measures include cutting almost 700 back-office jobs, as well as some maintenance posts, switching to paid-for food on short-haul flights and adding extra seats across the fleet to bring seat density into line with rivals. Employees will still receive a small part of their usual bonus for meeting on-time performance targets in one quarter. For much of the year the carrier struggled to integrate a new check-in system, delaying flights and weighing on customer ratings, while air traffic control strikes also disrupted schedules. No profit-related bonus will be paid after BA’s earnings were held back by a slowdown in business travel ahead of the June 23 referendum on Britain’s membership of the EU, together with an over-supply of short-haul seats as a string of terrorist attacks crimped demand. Confirming the one-time payments and additional free flights, British Airways said that it was “proud of how hard our colleagues work to support our customers.” <br/>