Prevention rather than cure. Monday, Pierre-Henri Gourgeon, CEO of Air France, met with unions to prepare them for a more austere than expected return. Deemed "constructive" by the company management, the meeting was to "share" a moody vision of the coming months, which will result in a strengthening economy measures probably formalized in October after the committee Strategic Air France-KLM.
In 2010-2011, Air France announced a cost reduction of nearly 600 million euros. This time, no figures were mentioned. But Monday, Pierre-Henri Gourgeon spoke of "the lack of visibility" on the economic and spoke of the "specter of recession."
No to social at first. A voluntary redundancy scheme has indeed completed at Air France. In two years, the company lost 10% of its workforce.It is not clear that new candidates would raise his finger when a window was open initially. "We should make use of unwanted departures. Now we want to respect the social contract of the company, "said one member of management. Yet behind the scenes, some trade unionists believe that a cost reduction plan will not be enough: "If growth is not to go, plan on removing items from 5,000 to 10,000 is to be feared," stated Monday a trade unionist. Air France has 58,000 employees.
"We will target the fixed-term contracts and temporary contracts and make greater use of outsourcing," lists a spokesman. The hiring freeze, eased in recent months again become very strict.But the recruitment of drivers provided as part of the opening of bases from province to Marseille, Nice, Toulouse and Bordeaux should not be affected payday loans.
Air France will ask all departments to review their budget down. Each manager will be responsible for making proposals in this direction, allowing a second step to calculate the new plan to reduce costs. Another source of savings, reduced capacity of the company, that is to say the removal of flights. After the announcement in late July from a reduction in the growth of long-haul traffic during the winter, is now expected to do the same during the summer of 2012.
In ten days of the announcement of his mégacommande of long-haul aircraft, shared with KLM, the management of Air France said that his austerity plan, however, should not affect aircraft deliveries.
The arrival of Alitalia
A new period of turbulence looks while the current management of Air France to start his estate. The prospective dolphins Pierre-Henri Gourgeon shall take the levers when the profitability of the company has won compared to that of its major European competitors such as Lufthansa or IAG (involving British Airways and Iberia). For its part Lufthansa said on Monday it would sell its subsidiary to British Midlands, which allowed him to gain a foothold in London.
Air France-KLM does not transfer. The Franco-Dutch group is preparing for a majority stake in Alitalia.
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