Aer Lingus has warned that flights could face further disruption due to industrial action by cabin crew in a dispute over rosters.
The airline says that cabin crew have escalated a work-to-rule in protest at new rosters after they rejected proposals, which had been brokered by the Labour Relations Commission.
The airline says that it is seeking to implement cost-saving proposals in line with its 'greenfield' restructuring programme, which have already been accepted by all other grades at the airline.
It claimed that as of today, the union has escalated its nine-week work-to-rule by refusing to do 'coupling' of flights and by instructing senior cabin crew to refuse to act up as cabin managers on transatlantic flights.
Aer Lingus believes this will lead to additional disruption to that caused by the adverse weather conditions.
A spokesperson for the cabin crew union IMPACT denied that there had been any escalation of the work-to-rule. He said that the two sides had been close to agreement at the LRC.
The spokesperson also denied that there had been any disruption from the cabin crew work-to-rule, saying any problems with the schedule were due to the weather.
He pointed out that there had been no disruption to services during the previous nine weeks.
Aer Lingus said it deplored what it called the cynical actions of IMPACT in escalating its industrial action days before Christmas.
The airline said it 'beggared belief' that cabin crew would decide to impose further hardship on customers.
It said it was taking the IMPACT action extremely seriously, but the priority remains the welfare of customers, particularly over Christmas.
