A flight attendants' union says it is disappointed by Air New Zealand's moves to lease an overseas plane, rather than rehiring some former staff.
The airline today said it was in talks over a "wet lease" - where it pays for the plane, crew and other costs - to provide backup if its staff shortages continue over summer. It will make the call in the next few weeks.
It will also cancel and reschedule about 1.5 per cent of its flights during the next six months, in what it says is a proactive move to avoid cancelling services closer to the time that passengers have booked to travel.
This amounts to about 10 of 500 domestic services and 1 in 65 international flights a day or around 100,000 passengers from about 11 million carried in a year. Affected customers are now being contacted.
''I do feel for the customers," said chief executive Greg Foran. "But I think it's much better to be out in front rather than deal with cancelling someone's flight 24 hours before they are due to go."
Flight Attendants Association of NZ president Craig Featherby said: "We're disappointed they've chosen to go down this path. All unions were consulted a couple of days ago about the possibility of a foreign carrier coming into New Zealand. But we were not told that it was due to current sickness. We were told it was due to an overall lack of staff."
He said long-haul cabin crew his union represents started on the minimum wage - something that is now being reviewed in negotiations with the airline.
"Air New Zealand's on this huge recruitment drive at the moment to get more and more and more staff but unfortunately, it's also common knowledge that Air New Zealand do pay a lower salary for these safety roles - flight attendants."
Some staff were being lured to other airlines which paid more.
Pay increases to retain staff would be a "smidgen" of the costs of a wet lease, which could run into tens of millions of dollars for the summer period. Competition from other airlines short of capacity will push up lease costs.
In 2017-18 Air New Zealand, then suffering problems with Dreamliner engines, contracted Portuguese operator Hi Fly to operate some of its international routes, getting mixed passenger reviews.
"If you're a shareholder of Air New Zealand right now, you'd be saying why are you spending a lot of money on a foreign airline to come in when you should pay your people you've got right now more? We can solve this problem with the unions collectively together."
The airline is 51 per cent owned by the taxpayer and got more than $2 billion of government support during the pandemic.
Featherby said Hi Fly was great at what it did, but when passengers booked on Air New Zealand they expected to fly on that airline, not on a foreign carrier.
He said there was a pool of laid-off staff who could be rehired and would require minimal training, just a refresher course. Some who contacted the Herald last month said they had exemplary records and were hurt and baffled at why they weren't welcome back.
While the airline says some former staff remain off the books after their previous performance was carefully assessed, Featherby said now was the time to tap into that pool.
"We understand they can pick and choose who they bring back. But if the company is desperate and wants to get the planes in the air, bring them back, put them on a temporary contract for three months and see how they go."
New Zealand Airline Pilots Association president Andrew Ridling said his organisation had sought assurances from Air New Zealand about the capacity cuts and the wet lease possibility.
"We have spoken to the chief executive [Foran] about this decision and have been assured that New Zealand pilots will still be trained to fly during this period. However, we will continue to keep a close watching brief on this situation especially in the run-up to Christmas season."
E tū head of aviation, Savage, said the airline informed his union late on Tuesday about the ongoing staffing problems and the possibility of wet leasing an aircraft due to the shortage of trained cabin crew over the summer period.
"The airline's decision to decrease flights to cope with the domestic situation makes sense," he said. "It is the front-line workers who deal with flight disruptions when they occur, so a realistic assessment of the airline's capacity now will decrease the level of traveller disruption in the future."
But right now the announcement is adding to the pressure on contact centre staff who field enquiries from passengers. ''The contact centre is also understaffed so it is not just cabin crew and airport workers that are needed."
The details of the possible wet lease are not yet known.
"Crew leaders are open to working with the company to avoid any outsourcing, including temporary changes to terms and conditions in return for longer term improvements," said Savage.
That tradeoff would be seen as a win-win if it avoided the brand damage that so often comes when passengers realise they paid to fly with an airline only to get onboard and find overseas crew on a leased aircraft.
"Part of the overall problem across the board at Air New Zealand are the rates of pay which were too low prior to the pandemic when the company was doing well and which are now too low to attract enough staff in the current job market,'' said Savage.
There have been some an additional problems with the airline's re-hire processes.
"Some staff made redundant because of the pandemic are being refused re-employment based on past performance. In some cases, however, the company employment records are wrong and there are many former staff at airports and cabin crew who still don't have a clear indication of what exactly the performance issue was."
Savage said this has been a hot topic in talks with the company.
"We are pleased to see them improving the rehire process to allow more staff to return.
Now is the time to take back those experienced crew who are ready and willing to join and who would need minimal training."
Foran said the airline started working on its capacity cut plan at the end of the July school holidays, when flight delays and cancellations had disrupted the travel plans of up to 60,000 passengers. He said staff sickness and bad weather were largely to blame.
"We said to ourselves, we don't really want to stretch to a point where customers lose surety that we're going to get them from A to B, particularly going into Christmas, and we want to make sure that we look after our wonderful Air New Zealand staff."
He said the schedule changes gave the airline breathing space.
"We can't guarantee that we're not going to get other issues that are going to come our way, but this at least gives a little bit of breathing space, which we think is the right thing to do."
The airline would now have more crew on standby to cover for staff sickness or other disruption.
When the pandemic hit, Air New Zealand's staff numbers fell by a third from 12,500. He said the airline had rehired 2000 staff and last month said it had another 1100 vacancies, including cabin crew.
Foran said the airline had kept in close contact with about 800 former cabin crew on a register, 75 per cent were rehired, 8 per cent didn't want to come back and the remainder wanted to return but had not been re-employed.
"Those people have the opportunity to reapply, but based on an assessment that we did of performance, they have not come back in the first instance. And I think that is exactly the right decision as we strive to restart better than ever."
He said the airline had not made any decision on a wet lease provider, but had documentation from using Hi Fly four years ago.
"We have the feedback on what the customer experience was and in the discussion that we've been having with the unions we think it is prudent for us to explore creating a little bit more insurance, particularly from November onwards, and getting a wet lease makes sense."
Air New Zealand is bringing its 777-300s out of storage although its eight-strong 777-200 fleet isn't coming back.
Foran said the airline had done extensive forecasting of demand for its equity and debt raise earlier this year, but had since been surprised by the strength of the aviation recovery.
"I wish I was better at forecasting, but we gave it our best shot and it has come back quicker than what we thought and we're pleased about that," he said.
Scores of staff were being put through training every week, but it only took a Covid case among trainers to disrupt that.
"Retrospectively, everyone can say, 'we could have done this and could have done that'."
He said he was proud of progress made on pay, but would not discuss specifics.
"There's 34 collective employment agreements, of which I think we've completed 12 of them. But I'm very comfortable that Air New Zealand is adopting the right approach with our staff."
Foran said he didn't believe the capacity cut was likely to impact fares.
"You're talking 100,000 out of 11 million. You can go out and still buy lots of seats."
What should I do if my flight changes because of these schedule changes?
• If your domestic flight has changed and you have not been given a flight on the same day, then you will be able to request a change online under Manage my Booking, opt in to credit or request a refund.
• If your international flight has changed and you have not been given a flight on the same day or on a day either side of your original booking, then you will be able to request a change online under Manage my Booking, opt in to credit or request a refund.
• If you have booked through a travel agent, you will need to contact them if changes are needed, or to request a refund if eligible.
When can you get a refund?
• For other controllable events like staff sickness, engineering or operational requirements, a refund may also be available when Air New Zealand is unable to provide an alternative flight within the timeframes stated above.
• For disruptions outside of the airline's control (e.g. weather), where the alternative flight offered is not suitable, customers can opt in to credit or if they purchased a refundable ticket, they will be eligible for a refund or where a refund is required by applicable legislation.
Air NZ engine problems mean just over half of flights are departing on time.