Pilots and cabin crew working for the Lufthansa subsidiary airline Discover have begun four days of strike action, affecting flights out of Frankfurt and Munich.

Discover flights from Frankfurt and Munich hit by strikes

Starting on August 27, pilots and cabin crew working for Discover Airlines, a subsidiary of Lufthansa, will begin industrial action scheduled to last until Friday, August 30.

Discover Airlines operates flights from airports in Frankfurt and Munich and during these four days, Discover flights departing from the two German airports will be severely disrupted or cancelled.

Passengers who are planning to travel out of one of the two cities on one of Discover’s 27 aircraft have been advised to regularly check the status of their flight.

UFO bypasses existing pay deal between ver.di and Lufthansa

The cabin crew and pilots planning to strike from Tuesday are represented by the trade unions Unabhängige Flugbegleiter Organisation (UFO) and Vereinigung Cockpit (VC). At UFO, almost 92 percent of members voted in favour of industrial action and at VC, 81 percent of members elected to strike.

The call for industrial action made by VC and UFO comes after ver.di, Germany’s largest trade union which VC and UFO see as their competition, already struck a deal with Lufthansa at the beginning of August.

VC and UFO representatives claim the ver.di deal is insufficient. Among other updates ver.di secured a 5 percent rise in pay for employees, compared to the 8,5 percent rise that UFO is demanding.

Marcel Gröls, responsible for collective bargaining policy at VC, added that the ongoing dispute begged a larger question, “Who decides who represents employees at Lufthansa’s Discover airline?” 

According to ZDF, management at Lufthansa has attempted to shut down union action, prompting UFO representative Harry Jäger to push another point, “[Lufthansa’s] attempt to make a union powerful out of nothing by giving gifts turns everything upside down that has been taken for granted in 150 years of trade union history: the union is responsible for the power of the union, not the employer”. 

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