Despite raging COVID-19 numbers, United Airlines will require an “Absence Certificate” for flight attendants who call in sick over the peak Christmas and New Years travel period. While not out of the ordinary, it takes on a new context during the pandemic.
United Will Require Proof Of Illness From Flight Attendants Who Call In Sick
Per §13.C.4 of United’s current flight attendant contact, United may require an “Absence Certificate” when flight attendants call in sick during the peak holiday period:
The Company may also require an Absence Certificate for all sick calls originating during the Fourth of July and Christmas holidays, which include July 1st to July 7th and December 20th to January 4th respectively. If the Company intends to require an Absence Certificate for sick calls occurring during such holiday period, the Company shall first notify the Union and give Flight Attendants adequate notice to be posted for the Fourth of July holiday period not later than June 14th and for Christmas not later than December 1st. Flight Attendants who have had no absences in the prior twelve (12) calendar months shall not be subject to the Absence Certificate requirement imposed during these holiday periods .
United chose to exercise its option, as it has in previous years, and notified flight attendants this week. The Association of Flight Attendants, the union representing United flight attendants, reminded flight attendants that an Absence Certificate is different than a doctor’s note.
An absence certificate is different from an physician’s note…The Absence Certificate contains personal medical information and must be submitted to United Medical, not your supervisor.
Flight attendants have 72 hours from calling in sick to submit the signed Absence Certificate.
Per a memo to flight attendants, the visit must be in-person:
The Absence Certificate must be prepared and signed by the physician after an in-person visit by the flight attendant to the physician’s office.
Unnecessarily Harsh Or A Vital Insurance Policy Against Abuse?
It was a flight attendant who reached out to me to let me know about this policy. She was upset and felt that all bets are off during this year of pandemic and United acted in an “unnecessarily harsh” manner by choosing to enforce this provision during this darkest hour of the pandemic in the United States. The note must be physically signed by a doctor, so Zoom meetings will not be sufficient. She further added that requirements like this encourage flight attendants to come to work sick.
But on the flipside, we need look only at what happened to Delta over Thanksgiving to see why United would want to have such a policy in place, even during a pandemic. Delta’s Thanksgiving problem was not due to flight attendants or pilots calling in sick, but due to insufficient pilot staffing. Imagine, however, if that was compounded by flight attendants or pilots who simply wanted to stay with their families over the holidays and faced no consequences for feigning illness. Even if only a tiny subset of flight attendants or pilots would even consider engaging in such action, one flight cancellation often has a disastrous rolling effect.
CONCLUSION
United will require flight attendants who call in sick over Christmas and New Years to produce a detailed “certificate” from their doctor that explains their illness. This is not a new requirement, but an existing requirement that will still be imposed this year. I have to imagine this policy was negotiated because “sick outs” do tend to rise during holiday periods and therefore requiring proof of illness seems reasonable. That said, I hope no flight attendant feels pressured to come to work when feeling ill.
image: United
When people sign up for a airline job they must agree to work weekends, shifts, be away from home (for days) and holidays. The past few years increasing number of employees have called in sick during peak travel periods. All airlines must have full staff available to avoid cancellations.
Flight attendants: if you are sick or in self-quarantine, stay home. Get the documentation you need and stick it in their face. Then go about your life. Don’t be intimidated by your employer or these ungrateful bastards here who claim to know your contract. They don’t.
Passengers: Mind your own business. If your flight gets cancelled for staffing issues in the middle of the worst pandemic since 1918, look in the mirror. You put yourself in that situation, so assume some responsibility for your decision too.
United Airlines: What a disgusting, heartless display of corporate indifference to your frontline employees who are exposed to Covid-19 like very few other occupations. You’re going to layoff thousands after New Years Day with zero regard for their health. You just want to squeeze one more month out of them. Everybody can see that. Shameful.
As a passenger who continues to fly during this pandemic, not everyone flying is doing it for pleasure. I fly to rural areas around the country working as a pulmonologist and critical care physician. I would prefer not to get my flight cancelled, not for myself, but for my patients who I have chosen to travel around the country to help in understaffed areas.
This is nothing new. It has been a policy for many holidays past. No surprise, considering the size of the workforce.
Old, stale news meant to incite.
> Old, stale news meant to incite.
Tell that to your colleague who sent it to me…
Matthew, thank you for your response. Everyone has a gripe about something. I’m so darn happy to have a decent job.
They do this every year around the Holidays. If you’re sick, stay home and get a absence certificate. If you’re not sick and you call off, you deserve the points.
As a doctor, this is tough. If someone comes to me endorsing illness (which often now overlaps with covid) they’re going to be put on isolation for the full (at least) 10 days per cdc guidelines regardless of a negative test.
And we have really no way of saying “nah, you don’t really have any symptoms.”
There’s really no way of verifying this, unless of course they’re tested and then test positive, which would only help to rule in illness.
It’s k. Dey ain’t human anyway.
My employer, a supermarket chain, for hourly employees, requires a dr note for any sick pay. Even with a dr note, calling in sick the day before, the day of, or the day after a holiday, holiday pay is forfeited.
Ha. I had no idea the fourth was such a big travel holiday. Why isn’t TG on the list?
Thanksgiving is too.
Critical period times are
July 1-July 7
Wednesday before thanksgiving, to the Sunday after thanksgiving and
December 22-January 3
So they agreed to have this in their collectively bargained contract, and don’t want to live by it? Can we strike the other parts of the contract that the Company doesn’t find agreeable?
I don’t think that is the issue at all. I think the issue, if there is one, is that COVID-19 was totally unexpected and 2020 is not a conventional year.
I understand the weirdness that the pandemic has created, and we’re dealing with it a union environment at my office as well. Just always seems that it paints the company in bad light for using the contract
I don’t understand the no zoom sentiment. Doesn’t a faxed signature work? I don’t think they need it notarized.
Agree. Seems it would be reasonable to accept completed certificates this year from virtual visits given how many doctor’s offices don’t want to see patients in-person to ensure the sanitation of the office. I’d also argue it puts undue financial obligations on the employee to pay for an in-person visit just to complete paperwork the employer wants, but that’s the corporate reality we work in.
I hope you sensed my pain in trying to balancing the two considerations. Technically, United is acting totally fairly and should not be condemned, especially because this year (in particular) there would likely be more workers who get “sick” over Christmas. But at the same time, the requirement that FAs have an in-person visit strikes me as not helpful at all and potentially dangerous in this environment.
Mr Klint…thank you! Keep up the good work.
I was terminated with 22 years of service earlier this year for being under the care of my doctors for over 8 weeks and I was in management so I feel the FA pain. United sick policy is unfair,& inhuman you should not be HARASSED from management or HR (even on weekends) your focus should be on getting well.
I was receiving calls on the weekends on when I think I would be back and my manager even calling my doctor’s office posing as HR inquiring about my absence. Added note.. I was still eligible for FMLA that my dr placed me earlier in the year on…as I close you should not be in fear of your job for being sick or dealing with a illness you have no control over. Luckly the FA’s have a union to fight there case…. my appeal was decide by another manager so I had no win!!!
Those that are still operating flights at UA have no reason whatsoever to be complaining about this policy. Earlier this year their union agreed to a side-letter to their contract, selling out their most junior 5,500 “flying partners,” and promptly turned around to call their colleagues who were understandably upset by being side-blinded “intitled”.
Play by the rules that were always unevenly applicable to your “intitled” colleagues.
This is not news. Junior flight attendants get upset because they can’t hold the holiday off. So they call in sick. Or they use their convenient FMLA status. Coverage is already slim. It should not be a surprise to any flight attendant that the company would activate this policy again. They’re already paying 1.5x overtime pay at certain crew bases due to shortages.
In other news, the Titanic sunk. In other words this is old news and happens every year. Its going To be worse this year because they laid off so many people, too many, people who would normally get it off won’t be able to get it off.
United has literally been doing this for years. Its nothing new.
Unfortunately when someone call sick the coworkers need to work more
I am sure the got more money in the contract in exchange for this policy
This is nothing new and really shouldn’t be news. Flight crews know what they signed up for and have been around long enough to know. Others aren’t as lucky and happy to take their place. This is an unprecedented time and if zoom appt can work for others, it should be sufficient but…
For Anonymous:
Covid-19 is very big news as well as being a new virus. Furthermore, there’s not a flight crew anywhere in the universe that signed up to get infected by it. That’s a silly comment. Did they sign up to get stabbed to death on 9/11 too? Nevermind, someone took their place.
MEMO to United Airlines management: 14 million Covid cases in US now, nearly 275,000 dead in just 9 months. You are losing millions. Can you use a little discretion here?
Stop punishing your employees. It’s not their fault. How many have tested positive? Do you have any clue? How many have died from Covid? Don’t want to admit it? Not the kind of news you want folks discussing, eh? We get it.
How about you clean your airplanes and screen your customers. Stop worrying about sick calls. Pretty soon you’re going to lay off these same flight attendants anyway. Right?
Keeping it real,
Jimmy Mack
Not terribly surprising. I had to supply an absence certificate a few years ago, after a stomach bug took down my family and myself for 4 days.
Old news!! I started flying in 1989, and I remember EVERY year getting threatened with this! Doesn’t usually affect the pilots, they don’t get the same treatment, but it really should, can’t go without them either!!!
Blah.. blah.. blah…this is nothing new. This policy has been in place for years,… I’m sure you’ll post another article like this one next December 2021.
Good! As a furloughed flight attendant of United I have seen so many post on FB company groups that these senior working flight attendants with a full time paying job and health insurance are upset about the crappy work pairings and just call out or use FMLA so they don’t have to work a long crappy trip. Going forward I think this should be implemented at all times until the furloughed are called back, I have sympathy for the real sick calls but not wanting to work because you layover in a Indianapolis Airport hotel for the holidays is selfish behavior when so many of us want to go back to the job we love and have full health benefits during a global pandemic. piss poor behavior from some of the sour cranky flight attendants who kept there job and didn’t choose other options that weren’t given to the involuntary furloughed flight attendants.
It’s the same policy it’s always been. The difficulty has always been that most urgent care centers and many doctor’s offices are not staffed by doctors, especially around the holidays. They are staffed with nurse practitioners and physician’s assistants. UAL requires a note from an M.D. or D.O. Those can be difficult to get in the best of times. There was a followup memo to this year’s requirement that a telemedicine visit counts…it doesn’t need to be in person, but it still does need to me an M.D.
https://www.reuters.com/article/health-coronavirus-airlines-workers-focu/united-airlines-flight-attendants-raise-alarm-on-crew-quarantine-protocols-idUSKBN28L1HE