Southwest Airlines suing Colorado over state labor policies
A woman who punched a flight attendant on a May Southwest Airlines flight from Sacramento to San Diego pleaded guilty to interfering with a flight attendant
COLORADO (KRDO) -- Southwest Airlines is suing the state of Colorado claiming the state's sick leave policies don't allow the airline to monitor and prevent abuse of the system the way they want to.
Southwest argues that Colorado's law will ultimately lead to flight delays, cancellations, and eventually higher prices. Additionally, they already provide generous paid sick leave and benefits to their employees.
The state law in question is known as "The Colorado Healthy Families and Work Place Act" and allows employees to all in sick without providing a doctor's note if they're out for less than four days. It also requires businesses, like Southwest, to give their employees up to 48 hours of sick leave a year.
Southwest claims their own policies help them to monitor absences and ensure the sick leave is not abused but said that can't happen if they have to follow the state's law.
At the Colorado Springs Airport, April saw 46% of all their outgoing flights being operated by Southwest Airlines.
Thursday, Southwest Airlines provided KRDO with the following statement:
"For more than five decades, Southwest Airlines has provided its Employees some of the most generous benefit packages in the airline industry including paid sick leave, vacation time, paid holidays, and enormous flexibility for its People. This week, the airline filed two lawsuits against the State of Colorado regarding the state’s efforts to apply its Healthy Families and Workplaces Act (HFWA) to Southwest, including a penalty of over $1.3 million against the airline, despite the law including exemptions for companies, like Southwest, whose employees are covered by collective bargaining agreements (CBA) that provide paid leave. For reference, 85% of Southwest’s Employees are covered by these agreements.
The lawsuits contend the Colorado Department of Labor and Employment (CDLE) is wrongly enforcing its own interpretation of the law, which ignores the statutory exemption and would require Southwest to rewrite its CBAs despite the generous benefits they provide its Employees. Southwest believes the CDLE wants to alter the collectively-bargained benefits for its workgroups in Colorado, even though the CDLE has not identified any Southwest Employee who was prevented from taking leave or who was not paid for a qualifying leave.
As one of the nation’s largest airlines, it’s important for Southwest to continue providing industry-leading benefits to all of its Employees so it can continue serving its Customers and connecting them to the people and places important in their lives."
Southwest Airlines
