Hi everyone, this is Patti and today is Wednesday, February 26. I didn’t record my FLT-LINE from Seattle yesterday as planned because the busy schedule of the transformation meetings kept me on the move.

If you’ve had an opportunity to attend one of these meetings, you’ll know that in addition to the development of a low cost product, the other crucial element of the transformation plan is cost reduction. It’s very simple. We need to get our costs down and our revenues up. Costs in virtually every form including salary and productivity are clearly one of the fundamental industry issues, and some airlines frankly are managing them better than others. Airlines with lower costs and more flexible work rules have already established a base from which to compete in this very tough marketplace. It may seem harsh, but those without that solid cost and productivity advantage cannot ultimately succeed.

In the Onboard Service Division, we continually look for ways to reduce our costs. We’ve made very significant reductions between December and January and now need to look at creative ways to change in things like catering or onboard product and you know best what those can be. So we continue to encourage what can we do with DIS 123 feedback and the new I Team—that does virtual on-line feedback with flight attendants participating.

I need to tell you that on every flight I take and in my domicile visits, I’m really encouraged because flight attendants are asking me “What can we do to help?” “What else can we do?” and I very much appreciate this outreach and want to be careful about approaching a sensitive subject.

One way every employee can contribute to our financial recovery is simply by coming to work.  Sick leave and its associated costs represent the Onboard Division’s most costly expense. Last year alone, Onboard spent close to $65 million on sick leave. On average, that means we have 1600 flight attendants on sick leave each month. And I realize this is a difficult subject but have to say that we have faced our toughest financial times ever right now and in order for United to have a fair chance for survival, we’ve got to get these costs down in order to make our DIP financial targets. Don’t misunderstand, when you are sick, your sick leave is there like an insurance policy for you to use. But when you’re not, you should use the other avenues of schedule flexibility that are available to you. I need to say here that I appreciate very much those flight attendants who maintain perfect dependability and demonstrate their commitment.

We are committed to providing many options for schedule flexibility and continue to increase allocations for trip trades, daily and walk-up ANP and GWOP allocations. The irony is that when more reserves are needed to cover sick calls, fewer reserves are available to cover trips vacated through daily and walk-up ANP awards. In other words, as the use of sick leave increases, the opportunities for schedule flexibility decrease.

Let’s work hard on this together because it will truly make a difference in our ability to return to profitability. That’s all for today, I’ve had some great flights and enjoyed some wonderful service. I’ll be speaking to you again on Friday. Until then, take good care of each other and of our customers.