Workers at an Air Transat call center accuse the airline of taking advantage of the health crisis to lower their wages and slash their pension funds, which the Quebec aircraft manufacturer denies.
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“I’m afraid I will have to start from scratch. We could lose $ 5 an hour. We don’t know if we are going to keep our pension plan, ”said Journal an Air Transat call center worker, who requested anonymity for fear of reprisals from his employer.
In mid-May, more than 160 employees at the airport’s Air Transat call center learned that they were going to lose their jobs in the fall due to COVID-19. Two months later, some were told they could go to work at another non-unionized call center in the city center.
For Stéphane Lacroix, spokesperson for the Teamsters, Air Transat has abolished these positions to create others at a discount, which he denounces with grievances. “We want to make money on their back by leaving the union,” he lamented.
Joined by The newspaper, Air Transat confirmed the closure of its airport call center, but assured that all of its employees, unionized or not, do have “group insurance and pension contributions”.
“The closure of the Information and Seat Selection Center [CISS] and grouping of our calls within a single call center [sont] a business decision, which has nothing to do with the fact that this group is unionized. It is the pandemic which, unfortunately, is making jobs disappear, ”said its vice-president of public affairs, Christophe Hennebelle.
More than 5,000 people worked for Transat before the pandemic, including 3,000 at Air Transat and 2,000 non-unionized in its other companies. Its airport call center has 160 employees and the downtown call center has 400.
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