The German union representing Lufthansa cabin personnel says it will brief its members late Friday on a potential strike call before the year's end. Airline management says it is interested in further arbitration. UFO said it would announce stoppage details on its YouTube channel late afternoon Friday local time. A UFO spokesman said that strike action — withheld over Christmas — was intended before the year's close. A strike in November led to cancellation of 1,500 flights of Lufthansa's core fleet, affecting some 200,000 passengers. Walkouts in the months long row has previously involved the group's smaller subsidiary airlines. Thursday a Lufthansa management spokesman said: "We are still interested in a major arbitration. Strikes from our point of view are no solution." <br/>
star
Fed up with the uncertainty over their own future tagged with the fate of Air India, airline employees are in the process to deciding to either take the National Company Law Tribunal (NCLT) route to recover their dues or declare a general strike to put pressure on the govt from privatising the carrier. The two options were arrived after all the recognised AI unions and other employee bodies met in Mumbai. However, a final course of action will be decided after further discussion and is expected soon. If the strike option is chosen, then it will be initiated from Jan 8, 2020. The decision to consider either the NCLT route or the strike comes days after the airline’s pilots and engineers demanded immediate payment of their dues. <br/>
In what appears to be a first, debt-ridden Air India has refused to issue tickets for official travel of officials from govt agencies that owe the airline more than US$14,000. The airline has drawn up a list of defaulters that still owe dues to the airline. Govt agencies that have made it to the list include the CBI, IB, Enforcement Directorate, Indian Audit Board, Controller of Defence Accounts, Border Security Force, Central Labour Institute and Customs commissioners. Last month, Air India's finance department started gathering data on govt dues. The agencies have been put on 'cash and carry' in the past few weeks. "They are issued tickets only if they pay upfront," said an official. The airline has, however, made some exceptions including the Airports Authority of India, the Ministry of Civil Aviation and the Lok Sabha. <br/>