Lufthansa and the pilots' union Vereinigung Cockpit (VC) were able to agree on further cost-cutting measures to cope with the corona crisis. These should apply to the pilots of Lufthansa, Lufthansa Cargo, Lufthansa Aviation Training and parts of the Germanwings pilots, as they say.  

Cost reduction by the end of the year 

The agreement includes measures to reduce costs, which are to apply until the end of 2020. From September onwards, among other things, the increase in short-time working allowance and employer contributions to fund retirement benefits will be reduced. Tariff increases agreed for 2020 will be postponed to January 2021.

Compulsory layoffs in the second quarter of 2021 at the earliest

In return, the cockpit personnel will receive protection against dismissal until March 31, 2021. The significant overcapacity of the pilots will, however, last considerably longer than until March 2021. The number of redundancies for operational reasons can therefore only be limited by concluding a long-term crisis agreement. In a long-term crisis package, the costs of excess staff could be compensated for by reducing working hours and wages for the period of the crisis, for example. 

At the same time, Lufthansa announced that it would refrain from hiring new pilots from outside the Group in all German flight operations as long as there were surplus staff. This also applies to tourist flight operations. 

“We clearly reject the threat from Lufthansa to issue redundancies for operational reasons. In our opinion, a social partnership must show how resilient it is, especially in bad times. The pilots are ready to make a noticeable contribution to keeping the entire cockpit staff on board. The preservation of jobs continues to have top priority. VC stands behind Lufthansa in these difficult times. Conversely, we expect the Group Management Board to also stand behind all employees, ”said Markus Wahl, President of VC. 

The package of measures has already been accepted by the Executive Board of Deutsche Lufthansa AG, the Air Transport Employers' Association and the VC committees and is effective immediately.