After reaching new contract terms with key labour groups, the senior leadership team of ultra-low-cost carrier (ULCC) Spirit Airlines has agreed to take a pay cut “not less” than the reduction agreed to by its pilots’ union.
Spirit disclosed on 7 November that, amid financial restructuring through Chapter 11 bankruptcy, it had reached tentative agreements with unions representing its pilots and flight attendants. Spirit’s pilots are represented by the Air Line Pilots Association, International and its flight attendants organise through the Association of Flight Attendants.
But the Florida-based ULLC says that both agreements are still subject to union ratification, court approval and “additional progress in the company’s ongoing Chapter 11 restructuring to position Spirit for the future”.
”Spirit’s senior leadership has committed to taking a salary reduction at a percentage not less than the pilot group’s reduction upon ratification of a tentative agreement with pilots,” the airline says.
Notably, former chief executive Ted Christie came under scrutiny for accepting a bonus of nearly $4 million shortly before Spirit filed for its first round of Chapter 11 resturcturing in November 2024.
The ULCC does not specify how big of a pay cut its managers and rank-and-file employees will take as part of the tentative agreements.
Savings from the wage reductions are expected to achieve “the target necessary for the company’s next draw under its debtor-in-possession financing”, it says.
Long-struggling Spirit has been undertaking drastic capacity cuts, furloughing pilots, rejecting leases of dozens of Airbus aircraft and exploring a merger or possible sale of the company to another airline as it works through its second Chapter 11 process in less than a year.
