{"id":10970,"date":"2017-01-10T12:50:23","date_gmt":"2017-01-10T12:50:23","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/unitelive.org\/?p=10970"},"modified":"2017-01-10T12:50:23","modified_gmt":"2017-01-10T12:50:23","slug":"worst-job-ever","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/?p=10970","title":{"rendered":"\u00e2\u20ac\u015bWorst job ever\u00e2\u20ac\u0165"},"content":{"rendered":"
<\/div>\n

As British Airways Mixed Fleet cabin crew take 48-hour strike action over poverty pay commencing today (January 10), UNITElive speaks to former crew members who tell the real story of the conditions they toiled under behind the scenes.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Five years ago, Tom* decided he needed a career change \u00e2\u20ac\u201c he wanted a bit of adventure and so applied to join British Airways Mixed Fleet cabin crew.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Little did he know then that he would be starting a job that he says is by far the worst experience in employment he\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s ever had.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\u00e2\u20ac\u015bI knew from the beginning the pay would be low, but I didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t realise then just how difficult it would be to get by on such a low wage; I definitely had to change my spending priorities,\u00e2\u20ac\u0165 he explained.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\u00e2\u20ac\u015bI couldn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t afford to be sick so I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122d fly even when I was ill. I didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t live in London so that was really the only way I managed to get by financially \u00e2\u20ac\u201c and even then just barely.\u00e2\u20ac\u0165<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\u00e2\u20ac\u015bOf those colleagues I knew who did live in London, they were all either living with parents or family, or they were crammed in flat shares living with five other people.\u00e2\u20ac\u0165<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

While Tom may have been prepared for the low pay \u00e2\u20ac\u201c he started on just \u00c2\u014112,000 \u00e2\u20ac\u201c he wasn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t prepared for how utterly undervalued he and his colleagues were in every imaginable way.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\u00e2\u20ac\u015bPassengers only see the surface of our responsibilities,\u00e2\u20ac\u0165 he explained. \u00e2\u20ac\u015bIt\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s so much more than serving food and drink. The training and knowledge that you must have in order to ensure that each flight is safe and secure is significant.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\u00e2\u20ac\u0098Every last drop\u00e2\u20ac\u2122<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

\u00e2\u20ac\u015bYou\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re constantly working unsocial hours too \u00e2\u20ac\u201c management tries to squeeze every last drop out of you.\u00e2\u20ac\u0165<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Despite the fact that regulations on rest breaks for cabin crew do exist, management often forces Mixed Fleet crew to work the very maximum hours, Tom notes. He adds this is also a failure of the regulations themselves, which he believes should be stronger and better enforced.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

It wasn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t unusual to find yourself in a position of having a seven day block of work, working more than 60 hours,\u00e2\u20ac\u0165 he said.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Tom recounted having to fly, for example, to Tokyo with only a two-day rest break in between before having to fly back \u00e2\u20ac\u201d this entailed crossing 8 time zones one way and then crossing eight time zones on the way back.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\u00e2\u20ac\u015bYour body clock is totally out of sync and during this whole time you aren\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t feeding yourself properly \u00e2\u20ac\u201c places like Tokyo aren\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t cheap,\u00e2\u20ac\u0165 he explained.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Utter exhaustion <\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

Ultimately Tom said he quit from total and utter exhaustion.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

The massive disparity between how he and his colleagues were treated and the importance of the role they played in maintaining passenger safety made the exhaustion even tougher to bear.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\u00e2\u20ac\u015bCabin crew are absolutely essential to British Airways\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 operation,\u00e2\u20ac\u0165 he said. \u00e2\u20ac\u015bWhen you\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re on a plane and you\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re miles from anywhere, if anything happens, cabin crew are the ones who\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ll be there for you in an emergency. The training required to do this is of massive importance but it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s totally undervalued.\u00e2\u20ac\u0165<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Most galling of all, Tom explains, is that he and many of his colleagues were on such low pay that they were eligible for working tax credits, which in effect means taxpayers are subsidising British Airways for paying their workers so little.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\u00e2\u20ac\u015bThat a blue chip, hugely profitable company is getting away with this is downright criminal,\u00e2\u20ac\u0165 he said.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Tom highlights that this week\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s British Airways strike, he believes, has garnered much public support.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\u00e2\u20ac\u015bI\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m very proud of Mixed Fleet cabin crew for taking a stand to right this injustice and I wish them the very best.\u00e2\u20ac\u0165<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

*Named changed to protect privacy<\/em><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Pic of January 10 protest by Mark Thomas<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

As British Airways Mixed Fleet cabin crew take 48-hour strike action over poverty pay commencing today (January 10), UNITElive speaks to former crew members who tell the real story of the conditions they toiled under behind the scenes.   Five years ago, Tom* decided he needed a career change \u00e2\u20ac\u201c he wanted a bit of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":10973,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[17],"tags":[390,96,215],"wps_subtitle":"\u00e2\u20ac\u0098Squeezed-out\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 ex-crew quit from exhaustion","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10970"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=10970"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10970\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10972,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10970\/revisions\/10972"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/10973"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=10970"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=10970"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=10970"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}