AirTran / Southwest

Summary: an agreed destination, but not one integration date

AirTran/Southwest offers an important contrast to mergers in which employees continued bargaining over the creation of a common contract for years. Its flight attendants negotiated a route into an identified Southwest/TWU Local 556 receiving agreement. Successful Special Merger Training ordinarily triggered an AirTran attendant’s move into that agreement, subject to the transition provisions. The arrangement involved Southwest, AirTran, TWU and AirTran’s CWA-AFA representatives; it was not an achievement attributable to one participant alone. ^{[1] [2]}

The transition nevertheless involved separate contracts, a protected AirTran operating partition, a seniority compromise favoring a defined Southwest cohort, and employees who waited to transfer. The signed 2013 AirTran bridge improved several terms for those still waiting. Later Southwest bargaining remained contentious: members rejected a tentative successor in 2015 and ratified another in 2016. Moving employees into an existing agreement and negotiating that agreement’s successor were different processes. ^{[1] [3] [4]}

The most informative comparison is therefore not a ranking of unions by one elapsed-time total. It is an examination of the destination contract, interim gains, trade-offs, enforceable dates, member choices and consequences when negotiations or implementation took longer than expected. A short timetable can have economic limits; a longer operational transition can still include improvements that employees receive before the final training class.

This report distinguishes the published 2011 AirTran book, the signed bridge and Seniority Integration and Transition Agreement (SITA) reproduced in the 2013 publication, the later Southwest successor, and a separately published final-transition letter. The final Southwest receiving agreement and complete applicable amendment set remain an important gap. That limits particular closing-date comparisons, not the documented AirTran provisions or the transition agreement already recovered.

1. Which contracts belong in the comparison?

Southwest closed its acquisition of AirTran on May 2, 2011. AirTran’s first-quarter filing identifies a newly ratified two-year flight-attendant agreement effective May 1, 2011. Southwest had announced ratification of its agreement in May 2009, followed by a November 2010 Boeing 737-800 agreement extending amendability to May 31, 2013. The older AirTran 2005 and Southwest 2004 books are historical layers, not sufficient descriptions of the contracts at closing. ^{[5] [6] [7] [8]}

Sources: company notices and filings; 2011 published book §§2, 18, 29 and implementation letter; 2013 bridge and SITA; 2016 Southwest term, execution and implementation pages. ^{[9] [1] [10]}

The distinction between a published contract, a tentative agreement, a signed instrument and a later compilation matters. A blank execution block does not establish that no agreement existed. Conversely, an announcement of ratification does not authenticate every clause in a different version. The 2011 publication is useful recovered text; its execution/version qualification remains. The bridge and complete SITA are recovered documents, not still-missing instruments.

2. The receiving-contract arrangement and the seniority bargain

The SITA was executed in December 2011, with handwritten dates appearing to span December 22–23. Both memberships ratified the seniority agreement on January 31, 2012, 274 elapsed days after closing. Southwest then described approximately 9,800 Southwest and 2,400 AirTran flight attendants. Those are January 2012 group figures, not the number remaining in a later transfer wave. ^{[1] [5]}

Bidding seniority was not uniform date-of-hire integration

For Southwest attendants on the September 26, 2010 list, the SITA added 2.5 constructive years to classification seniority for bidding. The corresponding AirTran cohort retained its AirTran classification seniority. Later entrants used their flight-attendant entry dates with applicable contractual adjustments; tied adjusted dates placed Southwest attendants ahead. Atlanta intradomicile bidding instead used actual flight-attendant hire dates. The arrangement did not provide for a systemwide displacement rebid of every position. ^[1]

That protected a defined incumbent Southwest advantage. It belongs alongside the benefits obtained by incoming AirTran attendants, not outside the analysis. An employee’s actual rank effect cannot be calculated without the applicable cohort, adjustments and integrated list.

Economic service recognition was a separate bargain. The SITA recognized AirTran company longevity for specified passes, retirement, vesting and profit-sharing purposes, and flight-attendant longevity for pay, vacation and other relevant provisions. Bidding position, pay progression and retirement service therefore did not become one interchangeable date. ^[1]

Source: SITA I.A.5–B and II.C–I. ^[1]

Membership approval and enforcement

Both memberships’ approval of the agreed integrated list was required. Rejection by either would void the SITA and make it inadmissible in the arbitration provided by Section V of the separate Seniority Integration Process Agreement. The SITA is recovered; that separate process instrument remains necessary to establish its complete timetable and authority. ^[1]

TWU’s Summer 2011 leadership account describes choosing to negotiate a member vote and discusses a seniority-arbitration fallback. It is evidence of leadership’s stated reasoning, not independent proof of every legal requirement or the complete process text. The later company announcement establishes that both groups did ratify. ^{[11] [5]}

Enforcement also followed the transition. AirTran-service and not-yet-transitioned employee disputes generally used CWA-AFA and the AirTran grievance procedures; Southwest and post-transition disputes used the Southwest procedures, with express reservations for Section 6 bargaining rights. This was an allocation of responsibility, not an absence of continuing AirTran representation during the transition. ^[1]

3. Pay and credit: what the AirTran bridge changed

Southwest’s September 3, 2013 announcement identified CWA-AFA as the negotiating representative for a bridge covering the remaining AirTran group. Talks had begun in February. More than 400 attendants had transferred and approximately 1,700 remained. The signed bridge supplied intermediate gains as well as a later rate-alignment commitment. These improvements should not be attributed solely to TWU’s receiving-contract role. ^{[12] [1]}

The printed hourly scale

For a fixed 61–72-month service row, the 2013 publication prints $30.16 for May 2011, $31.37 for May 2012, $32.31 for the first bid period after ratification, and $33.28 from January 1, 2014. An individual could move through service steps during those dates; this is not one employee’s uninterrupted pay history. The full printed schedule appears in Appendix A. ^[1]

The agreement also required an adjusted hourly rate comparable to Southwest rates from January 1, 2015. Its table does not print the numerical 2015 scale. A separately published union explanation supplies hourly figures and expressly distinguishes them from the Southwest TFP rates after transition. Rate comparability must not be described as identical pay units, guarantees, premiums and credit rules. ^{[1] [13]}

The bridge specifies three one-time gross amounts for the applicable ratification-date employees: $575, $500 and $500, totaling $1,575. These are not recurring wage increases or proof of each employee’s receipt. ^[1]

Minimum credit can matter independently of the rate

Sources: 2011 §2, physical PDF 6–8; bridge §2, physical PDF 8–16; implementation letter, physical PDF 117. ^{[9] [1]}

Other protections require equally careful reading. Reassignment compares original and actual credit with applicable guarantees and premiums; it is not a license to add every possible premium together. The bridge’s holiday provision supplies 200% straight-time pay for qualifying work, rather than doubling every other premium. Productivity payments depend on specified block-hour thresholds, while perfect-attendance payments have their own eligibility tests. These are meaningful terms, but they cannot be modeled as automatic additions for all attendants. ^[1]

4. Vacation, sick leave, health protections and training

The bridge’s additional senior-service vacation week was an AirTran bridge gain, not merely something available after entering Southwest’s contract. Its December 31, 2013 award table adds 35 days at eighteen or more years to the existing 14-, 21- and 28-day structure. Qualifying active-service months control accrual. Both recovered AirTran editions specify 22 hours for a seven-day vacation week and 3.15 hours per day for shorter periods, with overlap and L-One conditions. ^{[9] [1]}

Sources: 2011 §§7–9; bridge §§7–9; SITA II.E and II.H; published final-transition LOU. ^{[9] [1] [13]}

The training mechanism contained consequences as well as protections. The SITA established notice, bidding and assignment procedures, positive-space travel, single-occupancy hotels, and post-training days off. Unfilled classes could be assigned by inverse seniority under specified conditions. Refusal to transition or failure to complete training was treated as resignation in good standing, with limited discretion for special circumstances. Leave-takers followed separate rules. ^[1]

The SITA’s merger-training provision references the earlier AirTran training rule and specifies 3.5 hours per day. The referenced rule includes lost-trip comparisons in relevant circumstances. A later union publication lists prospective total credit for January training cohorts. Neither the isolated 3.5-hour figure nor the later generic training rule should be applied universally without resolving those cross-references. ^{[9] [1] [13]}

5. Retirement: improvements before transfer and protection of prior service

The flight-attendant provisions examined here are principally defined-contribution retirement arrangements. AirTran’s published 2011 book describes a 401(k) savings plan; Southwest’s receiving framework includes matched savings and profit sharing. This is not the same documented pension-termination-versus-continuing-accrual question examined in Continental/United. The plans of pilots or technical-operations employees must not be substituted for flight-attendant provisions. ^{[9] [14] [1]}

The matching formulas

Under the 2011 AirTran publication, participation begins after six months, employee contributions are immediately vested, and employer contributions vest after three company years. The employer matches a fraction of the employee’s contribution, subject to the first 15% contributed. The signed bridge retains that schedule through December 31, 2014 and supplies dollar-for-dollar matching up to 9.3% from January 1, 2015. Its new paragraph does not independently repeat every eligibility and vesting rule. ^{[9] [1]}

*Calculated from the specified formulas, assuming eligibility, sufficient employee contributions, a common eligible-pay denominator and no other binding limit. The earlier service thresholds are strictly more than, and the tier rates replace rather than add to one another. These ceilings are not individual contribution records or lifetime values. ^{[9] [1]}

Profit sharing had an earlier date

The SITA expressly made AirTran flight attendants eligible for Southwest profit sharing from January 1, 2012, with the specified AirTran longevity recognition for vesting. Southwest’s 2012 Form 10-K independently reports AirTran employees’ eligibility from that date. This improvement did not wait for every attendant’s individual training date. ^{[1] [15]}

A contemporaneous CWA-AFA notice dated April 8, 2013 reported that the contribution for 2012 had been deposited on April 3, allocated by 2012 service and income. This is an attributed implementation report, not an audit of every account. Eligibility in 2012 and the reported deposit in 2013 are different events. ^[16]

Account retention did not mean a service-credit reset

The original SITA kept existing AirTran 401(k) accounts in place and counted subsequent Southwest service toward their vesting. Southwest deferrals defaulted to 3% upon the specified employment transition, subject to employee change or cancellation. Matching eligibility followed Article 30 from the first Southwest employment day, with AirTran company longevity counted for Southwest vesting. The default contribution was not the maximum match. ^[1]

The later final-cohort LOU separated administrative Southwest employment from training completion. Its interaction with plan-entry language must be acknowledged rather than replaced with one assumed universal account-transfer date. Preserved balances, matching eligibility, vesting service and the date of an administrative asset transfer answer different questions. ^[13]

6. Integration: what each milestone actually measures

The chronology distinguishes contractual rights, company expectations, reported implementation and formal representation. The time to a seniority vote is not the time to common scheduling; the final AirTran flight is not the final training roster.

Sources: company releases and filings; SITA/bridge; published final-transition material; Spring 2015 TWU newsletter; NMB decisions. Day totals are calculated from the cited dates. ^{[5] [17] [1] [18] [13] [19] [2] [20] [4]}

Southwest’s 2014 filing broadly described conversion of AirTran employees to Southwest employees while its labor table still listed 350 AirTran flight attendants under interim terms pending training. The published final-transition LOU helps explain why administrative employment and training could be separated, but does not prove compliance for every employee. ^{[18] [13]}

TWU’s Spring 2015 report identifies the final January wave and class 306. An adjacent acquisition-announcement date in that newsletter is erroneous; the training statement remains attributed rather than conferring reliability on every nearby sentence. The NMB later identified four inactive, on-leave AirTran attendants who had not transitioned. Those exceptions do not establish that ordinary active classes continued until 2016. The first actual mixed-crew assignment and first fully common bidding cycle remain separately unestablished. ^{[19] [2]}

The much-quoted January 2015 completion deadline in Southwest’s 2013 employee table belongs to the AirTran pilot row. The flight-attendant row addresses interim coverage until transition. A separately worded company expectation of end-2014 flight-attendant movement is relevant, but is not that pilot provision. Flight-attendant contractual dates must instead be identified in the appropriate SITA, bridge and final-transition material. ^[21]

7. The last cohort: employment, insurance and a remedy for waiting

The July 18, 2014 union publication reproduces a Final Transition Letter of Understanding and then gives separate explanations of hourly rates and planned training pay. The signed LOU counterpart remains unauthenticated. Its reported provisions are not automatically proof of actual completion or payment. ^[13]

For remaining active AirTran attendants, the published LOU required administrative processes by December 31, 2014 and Southwest employment no later than January 1, 2015. Those who had not completed training remained under the AirTran agreement and amended integration provisions. Southwest insurance commenced January 1 for the specified untrained group, with enrollment conditions and preceding AirTran coverage. A vacation cash-out option likewise supplied payment rather than time off. ^[13]

A separate provision addressed leave returnees after operational integration. A qualifying employee had to be offered a class beginning within two weeks of active return. Otherwise, compensation by reference to AirTran §2.E.1 ran from day 15 until training began. That reference is to the monthly-guarantee provision, not a generic daily training rate. The record does not supply a universal daily-proration formula or establish every affected employee’s payment. ^{[13] [1]}

The analytical significance is substantial: a negotiated arrangement can attach an economic consequence to a particular implementation delay without pretending that the remedy itself completes the operational work. This is one way to assess protection for employees still waiting, alongside the final integration date.

8. Successor bargaining remained contentious

The receiving-contract model did not eliminate disagreement over Southwest’s next agreement. In July 2015, Southwest reported that flight attendants rejected a tentative successor by 87% of ballots cast, with nearly 89% turnout, attributing the figures to TWU. It said employees would continue under the existing agreement, amendable since May 31, 2013. The 2015 Form 10-K corroborates the rejection and continuing negotiations. ^{[3] [22]}

On October 31, 2016, Southwest reported approval of another agreement by 53.86%, with 89.21% participation, again identifying the results as union-reported. These figures concern the whole Southwest voting group, not a separately identified former-AirTran electorate. The complete rejected TA, negotiating-change comparison and original vote audit remain narrower research questions. ^[4]

The later final book was signed in January 2017 and includes phased implementation. Its retroeffective term does not establish that all its clauses governed earlier AirTran transfers. A rejected successor did not, on the examined record, reverse completed transfers; a successful transfer did not mean employees endorsed every later bargaining proposal. ^[10]

TWU’s role should therefore be evaluated on two connected records: the transition framework and its trade-offs, and the terms it later recommended to members. Praise for one does not justify omitting friction in the other.

9. Bargaining deadlines and the cost of delay

A date matters when it changes an employee’s rights or what happens after disagreement. Seniority arbitration, new-contract interest arbitration, grievance enforcement and benefit-effective dates address different problems. They should not be combined into one score for “merger completion.”

Sources: SITA III.E and bridge §28.C; American NPA; retained United protocol/proposal; published final-transition LOU. ^{[1] [23] [24] [25] [13]}

American/US Airways: a binding result after rejection

American, US Airways, APFA and CWA-AFA committed to a process with more than a target date. The NPA required commencement within 60 days after the specified membership ratification, an extendable 150-day negotiating period and mediation. Failure to agree or ratify triggered binding interest arbitration. Hearings were to start within 90 days of submission, with an award within 30 days of the first hearing day. Different triggers and conditions mean these intervals cannot be added into an unconditional total-completion promise. The economic safeguards concerned aggregate value for each predecessor group, not improvement of every clause or individual outcome. ^[23]

The actual award records a later procedural choice: on November 7, 2014, the parties moved the prospective November 11 hearing to December 3, at APFA’s request. The supplied stipulation does not establish why that request was made or an avoidable income loss from it. After the tentative agreement’s rejection by sixteen votes, the December 13 award adopted the TA except its compensation table and provided different wage and implementation dates. The earlier NPA’s seniority-conditioned effectiveness and the award’s express December 13 date remain distinct; the incomplete intervening record is not repaired by inventing a seniority-list completion date. ^[26]

The award denied proposed future profit-sharing and health-insurance parity options. Union-side dissent annotations appear on its execution page. Binding resolution therefore carried a price as well as finality: it was not unanimous agreement, every requested protection, or another membership veto. The parties’ $112 million annual incremental employer-cost valuation above a modeled baseline was an arbitration valuation—not a cash fund for employees or a measured cost of bargaining delay. ^[26]

Further decisions improved wages after the award. American’s December 18 disclosure confirms agreement to use the TA’s higher wage scales, effective January 1, 2015. A later filing separately identifies an additional 4% increase announced December 23. Those later decisions were not wage gains awarded by the arbitrators. ^{[27] [28]}

For the full sequence, see US Airways/American: the JCBA vote, arbitration and implementation.

Why the parties selected these mechanisms

APFA explained its backstop in October 2013 as a response to prolonged negotiations and a way of obtaining improvements sooner. It invoked other mergers as warnings. That is evidence of APFA’s stated rationale, not a neutral finding about every decision elsewhere. CWA-AFA’s January 2014 explanation emphasized participation, consideration of both predecessor books and group-level economic safeguards. CWA-AFA was a participant in American’s binding process, not uniformly opposed to all binding arbitration. ^{[29] [30]}

For AirTran/Southwest, TWU’s account of the membership-vote decision and seniority fallback provides a different documented choice. It should be read beside the signed SITA and subsequent approval, not converted into an unverified whole-JCBA deadline. ^{[11] [1]}

United: a recommendation was not the same guarantee

The separate Continental/United research identifies a June 25, 2014 protocol with a best-efforts target of July 23, 2015, review procedures and retained party rights. Missing the target did not automatically impose a contract award. The August 2015 proposal contemplated a recommended package still subject to acceptance and ratification. Its rejection can be assessed critically, but cannot accurately be called rejection of the same binding economic endpoint used at American. ^{[24] [25]}

These documents do not establish what accepting the United proposal would have produced, or that an equivalent binding employer commitment was available and rejected in every earlier merger. See Continental/United: bargaining choices and arbitration and agreement versus operational implementation. The prior transaction’s source qualifications remain intact.

10. What can responsibly be calculated about waiting?

Three types of cost should remain separate: prospective improvements postponed while negotiations continue; noncompliance after an entitlement takes effect; and provisions deferred between contract adoption and operational implementation. The same elapsed month can affect lineholders, reserves, senior employees and leave returnees differently.

These are arithmetic illustrations of the recovered provisions with stated assumptions. They are not individualized benefits advice or historical loss estimates. ^{[9] [1]}

A credible delay analysis must account for intervening raises, minimum-credit changes, eligibility, service progression, one-time amounts, retirement contributions, implementation conditions and any retroactive adjustment. Multiplying a later rate across every preceding year would not do that. Equally, uncertainty about a hypothetical earlier settlement should not obscure an actual fixed-date improvement or a documented failure to meet an enforceable obligation.

The useful conclusion is specific: process design can limit unresolved bargaining, advance particular entitlements and allocate some consequences of implementation delay. Its value depends on the terms, constraints, cohorts and actual use—not speed alone.

11. What the comparison says about TWU, CWA-AFA, APFA and management

Sources: SITA and bridge, contemporaneous party explanations, company statements, American protocol/award and retained United process documents. ^{[1] [11] [12] [23] [26] [24] [25]}

The America West/US Airways comparator is relevant because later parties explicitly invoked its prolonged separate-contract history when explaining their own choices. That contemporary comparison is evidence of the later parties’ reasoning; it is not proof that an identical binding proposal had been available and rejected in the earlier transaction. ^[29]

Common representation, a corporate merger and a contract signature do not each resolve every integration problem. Conversely, separate agreements during a transition do not prove inactivity if the parties negotiated intermediate gains and a usable route into common terms. The AirTran record supports examining both achievements and compromises: the seniority adjustment, economic service recognition, bridge improvements, member votes, training consequences and enforcement arrangements.

12. The later contract and retirement-administration endpoint

The final 2016 Southwest successor provides a dated later endpoint, not a substitute for the missing complete 2009/2010 receiving set. Its text includes scope and successorship provisions, a separate pay-longevity structure, senior-service vacation entitlement, and profit-sharing/matched-savings provisions. Its retirement article reproduces the 9.3% match with an earlier stated effective date; that does not establish that every AirTran employee became eligible on that earlier date. ^[10]

The following is a dated text comparison, not a claim that the 2016 terms were the terms applicable at every 2012–2015 transfer:

Sources: recovered AirTran books and SITA; final 2016 Southwest Articles 11, 14, 16, 21 and 30. ^{[9] [1] [10]}

For administration, the 2025-plan-year Form 11-K, filed June 26, 2026, describes the May 31, 2024 merger of ProfitSharing Plan assets into the 401(k) plan and the renaming to the Southwest Airlines Co. Retirement Savings Plan. It continues to report profit-sharing contributions. Administrative consolidation did not itself abolish profit sharing. ^[31]

The filing distinguishes Southwest’s sponsorship, the Retirement Savings Plan Committee’s administration, Empower Trust Company, LLC’s trustee role, and Empower Retirement’s recordkeeping role. The May 2024 restated plan preserves conditional AirTran vesting-service and transferred-loan provisions. Different stated vesting schedules do not by themselves prove a reset of prior service. The separate technical-operations plan merger described in the plan is not a flight-attendant transfer date. ^{[31] [32]}

These statements are bounded to the inspected instruments. The complete final current CBA and applicable amendments, current summary plan description/material modifications and full latest Form 5500 remain distinct review items. An annotated tentative agreement should not be presented as the authenticated final contract. Readers determining an individual entitlement should consult the governing plan and agreement, rather than treating this historical comparison as an account statement.

For the contrasting retirement problem—terminated, frozen and continuing defined-benefit legacies—see Continental/United’s retirement comparison and the US Airways/American report. The AirTran/Southwest materials examined here do not establish the same flight-attendant pension-termination history.

Conclusion: evaluate the promise, the consequence and the employee’s result

AirTran/Southwest combined a negotiated receiving agreement, a seniority settlement with real trade-offs, interim improvements for those still waiting, and particular protections against implementation delay. American/US Airways used a different mechanism capable of compelling a new-contract result after failed bargaining or ratification. United’s examined process retained greater dependence on later party approval. These are consequential distinctions, not interchangeable references to arbitration. ^{[1] [23] [26] [24] [25]}

The comparison can recognize TWU’s role without erasing CWA-AFA’s bridge gains, scrutinize rejected successor proposals without treating them as reversal of earlier transfers, and explain the benefit of finality without overlooking an award’s economic limits. The question is not merely how soon a document was signed, but when a particular employee could use a better term, what had to be surrendered, and what remedy existed if the promised step did not occur.

Appendix A. AirTran’s printed hourly schedules

The following reproduces the factual service rows and printed cents from §2.A of the recovered 2013 publication. Amounts are US dollars per credited hour, not Southwest TFP rates. The first two columns preserve the earlier May 2011/2012 schedules. The first post-ratification bid-period column and January 2014 column are distinct triggers. The 2011 book’s blank-execution qualification remains; graduation/probation and longevity rules affect placement. ^{[1] [9]}

The signed book supplies a January 1, 2015 comparability obligation rather than a printed 2015 numerical column. The later union explanation is therefore not silently appended as another executed-contract column. It provides an explanation of AirTran hourly rates, not a universal conversion to Southwest TFP. ^{[1] [13]}

Appendix B. Source boundaries and remaining questions

This phase incorporates the recovered signed bridge and complete signed SITA. It does not reinstate them as missing. Remaining questions are specific: the published 2011 book’s execution/version status; the final Southwest receiving agreement and amendments; the separate seniority process agreement; the signed final-transition LOU counterpart; full successor-proposal and original ballot material; and particular last-training, mixed-crew, common-bidding and account-transfer facts. The broader early ValuJet/AirTran contract lineage is not claimed complete.

The bridge also contains a duration/renewal formulation using October 1 alongside a May 1 notice reference. The general agreement’s calendar-month trigger and implementation letter’s bid-period trigger are distinct. These textual features are preserved rather than silently repaired. The outstanding-grievance clock runs after the last AirTran attendant becomes a Southwest employee, which cannot automatically be equated with the active-cohort January 2015 deadline while inactive exceptions remain. ^{[1] [2]}

Primary company and agency records establish corporate events and representation. Signed contractual text establishes promises, subject to its scope and conditions. Union communications identify positions and reported implementation; they are attributed rather than treated as neutral verdicts. Company praise is likewise not independent proof of bargaining value. Other CrewSignal articles supply extended explanations and cross-references, not independent corroboration of their own conclusions.

Terms used in this report

CBA / JCBA: collective bargaining agreement / joint collective bargaining agreement. SITA: Seniority Integration and Transition Agreement. SMT: Special Merger Training. TFP: trips for pay, a contractual credit unit. Interest arbitration: resolution of disputed terms for a new agreement. Rights or grievance arbitration: resolution of disputes under existing obligations. NMB: National Mediation Board. Amendable date: a bargaining milestone, not a promise that all contractual obligations simply disappear on that date. In this report, post-2004 narration uses CWA-AFA; original document titles retain their wording.

Sources and cited provisions

1. [1] AirTran/CWA-AFA 2013 agreement, implementation letter and four-party SITA

   151 physical PDF pages. Pay/credit 8–16; leave 46–54; retirement 83; duration/execution/implementation 115–118; complete SITA 135–144.

   Source type and review qualification

   Recovered signed contract and transition text. Bridge/implementation executed September 30, 2013. SITA signature dates appear December 22–23, 2011; dual-member ratification/effectiveness is separate. Complete original recovered and retained in the R3 research. This integration uses the supplied original crops and the subsequently reviewed full-context clause guide; the complete parent PDF was not independently re-downloaded in this phase.

2. [2] Southwest/AirTran, 43 NMB 120: single-system determination

   May 17, 2016; printed 122–123 (cohorts/SITA) and 126 (determination).

   Source type and review qualification

   Agency decision. Four inactive/on-leave cases are a separate cohort; this finding is not the later certification or a first-common-bidding date.

3. [3] Southwest Flight Attendants Reject Tentative Agreement

   July 24, 2015; result and existing-agreement paragraphs.

   Source type and review qualification

   Company announcement. Company publication of union-reported results: whole Southwest electorate, not former AirTran alone; not an original ballot audit.

4. [4] Southwest Airlines Flight Attendants Approve Tentative Agreement

   October 31, 2016; opening and bargaining/amendability paragraphs.

   Source type and review qualification

   Company announcement. 53.86% approval and 89.21% participation are attributed union figures published by the company.

5. [5] Southwest and AirTran flight attendants ratify seniority integration agreement

   January 31, 2012; ratification, workforce sizes and May 2, 2011 closing.

   Source type and review qualification

   Company announcement. Workforce figures describe this announcement, not subsequent remaining partitions.

6. [6] AirTran Holdings, first-quarter 2011 Form 10-Q

   Recent Accomplishments and 2011 Outlook, printed 26–27.

   Source type and review qualification

   Company SEC filing. Establishes the newly ratified agreement effective May 1, 2011; does not supply the complete signed clause set.

7. [7] TWU 556 ratifies Southwest flight-attendant agreement

   May 18, 2009; opening.

   Source type and review qualification

   Company announcement. Ratification evidence, not authentication of every clause in the separately circulating tentative master.

8. [8] Southwest flight-attendant union ratifies Boeing 737-800 agreement

   November 18, 2010; opening two paragraphs.

   Source type and review qualification

   Company announcement. Announcement date retained separately from differing later retrospective dates; executed side-letter stack remains a hold.

9. [9] AirTran/CWA-AFA published 2011 agreement

   108 physical PDF pages, with two printed pages on many sheets. §§2, 7–9, 18, 29; implementation letter.

   Source type and review qualification

   Published contract; execution/version qualification. Complete published text recovered; main and implementation signature blocks are blank. Ratification/effectiveness corroboration does not authenticate every executed clause. Complete original recovered and retained in the R3 research. This integration uses the supplied original crops and the subsequently reviewed full-context clause guide; the complete parent PDF was not independently re-downloaded in this phase.

10. [10] Southwest/TWU final 2016 successor agreement

    Articles 3, 11, 14, 16, 21, 30, 35; printed 227, 229 and implementation appendix 235–239.

    Source type and review qualification

    Signed later contract endpoint. Ratification October 31, 2016; signing January 10, 2017; stated term retroeffective to June 2013. Later provisions are not automatically proof of earlier receiving terms. Prior source review retained; no new full original download claimed here.

11. [11] Unity, Summer 2011: leadership account of member approval and seniority process

    President’s message, printed/PDF 4.

    Source type and review qualification

    Union commentary. Attributed party rationale and reported seniority timetable; not the separate executed process agreement or a whole-JCBA arbitration commitment.

12. [12] Southwest and AirTran flight attendants reach tentative bridge agreement

    September 3, 2013; bridge, February bargaining commencement and staffing paragraphs.

    Source type and review qualification

    Company announcement. TA announcement; identify CWA-AFA bargaining for the remaining AirTran group. Signed text supplies exact terms.

13. [13] Final Transition publication, July 18, 2014

    Published LOU body; separate AirTran 2015 Hourly Rates explanation; separate planned January SMT-pay explanation.

    Source type and review qualification

    Union-published LOU reproduction and attributed explanation. Retained archived publication. Signed LOU counterpart not authenticated. Adjacent union explanations are not automatically executed amendments; plans are not completed-training evidence.

14. [14] AirTran Holdings, 2010 Form 10-K

    Note 12, Employee Benefit Plans, printed 100.

    Source type and review qualification

    Company SEC filing. Separate pilots/mechanics arrangements must not be imported into flight-attendant terms.

15. [15] Southwest Airlines, 2012 Form 10-K

    Note 15, Employee Retirement Plans, printed 113–114.

    Source type and review qualification

    Company SEC filing. January 1, 2012 employee eligibility corroborates the flight-attendant-specific SITA rule; company-wide accounting amounts are not individual allocations.

16. [16] CWA-AFA April 8, 2013 profit-sharing notice

    April 8 notice describing April 3 deposit and 2012 service/income allocation.

    Source type and review qualification

    Union implementation report. Original reported retained and read by Dots; archive access was not independently regained by this reviewing runtime. Attributed notice, not account audit.

17. [17] Southwest Airlines, third-quarter 2011 Form 10-Q

    Integration discussion, flight-attendant process-agreement sentences.

    Source type and review qualification

    Company SEC filing. Documents the company’s reported September process agreement, not its complete text.

18. [18] Southwest Airlines, 2014 Form 10-K

    Printed 8–9, integration narrative; printed 23, 350 AirTran flight attendants in employee table.

    Source type and review qualification

    Company SEC filing. Broad conversion and training-pending row must be read together.

19. [19] Unity, Spring 2015: President’s Message

    Printed 3 / physical PDF 5; first June 2012 class and final January 2015 wave/class 306.

    Source type and review qualification

    Union implementation report. Contemporaneous union retrospective; adjacent announcement-date error retained as a limitation. Not a company roster or exact final graduation date.

20. [20] Southwest, 43 NMB 146: certification without an election

    June 28, 2016; printed 146–149.

    Source type and review qualification

    Agency decision. CWA-AFA did not object to TWU certification. Do not describe this as a contested election.

21. [21] Southwest Airlines, 2013 Form 10-K

    Strategic Initiatives; Employees table, printed 23–24, and following fence paragraph.

    Source type and review qualification

    Company SEC filing. January 2015 deadline in the employee table is in the pilot row. Separate FA expectation is not an enforceable completion guarantee.

22. [22] Southwest Airlines, 2015 Form 10-K

    Labor discussion, flight-attendant rejected-agreement paragraph.

    Source type and review qualification

    Company SEC filing. Corroborates failed ratification and continued bargaining, not a full proposal comparison.

23. [23] American/US Airways/APFA/CWA-AFA Negotiations Protocol Agreement

    A.1–5; B.1–6. Four physical pages.

    Source type and review qualification

    Signed bargaining protocol. Signed public copy visually checked in this phase. User-supplied award Appendix D is a differently formatted /s/ reproduction; no byte identity claimed. Separate triggers, agreed extensions and effectiveness conditions apply.

24. [24] United/CWA-AFA June 25, 2014 negotiations protocol

    Target, progress-review, acceptance, ratification and termination provisions.

    Source type and review qualification

    Retained executed protocol findings. Retained-original reading reused from CO/UA and deadlines research, not a fresh full-original retrieval here. Existing CHR/CON holds preserved.

25. [25] United proposed Board of Mediation process, August 18, 2015

    Whole-package recommendation; party acceptance/ratification and termination conditions.

    Source type and review qualification

    Retained company proposal findings. Proposal, not adopted compulsory interest arbitration. Retained-source findings reused; outcome of hypothetical acceptance unestablished.

26. [26] American/APFA December 13, 2014 interest-arbitration award and appendices

    Original physical PDF 19–26: operative disposition and complete joint factual stipulation; NPA Appendix D 34–37.

    Source type and review qualification

    Original award excerpts and stipulation. Twelve supplied original pages available in the deadlines delta; full reasoning, wage Appendix E and procedural rules not newly supplied in this subset. $112m is stipulated annual incremental employer cost, not personal cash or delay loss.

27. [27] American Airlines Group, December 18, 2014 Form 8-K

    Item 7.01; post-award wage agreement and January 1 effectiveness.

    Source type and review qualification

    Company SEC filing. Separate later agreement, not the arbitration award itself.

28. [28] American Airlines, third-quarter 2015 Form 10-Q

    Labor Agreements; December 23 additional wage decision.

    Source type and review qualification

    Company SEC filing. Company account of subsequent 4% change; not employee payroll or avoided-loss calculation.

29. [29] APFA Q&A headed October 11, 2013

    First arbitration explanation.

    Source type and review qualification

    Attributed union rationale. Union’s stated rationale, not a neutral finding about other carriers. Page contains a mistaken CO/UA closing-date reference; not adopted in this report. URL and displayed Q&A dates differ.

30. [30] Details on Bargaining and Representation Agreements, January 29, 2014

    Introductory explanation and valuation Q&A.

    Source type and review qualification

    Attributed union rationale. CWA-AFA’s stated reasoning; not an assurance that every predecessor provision or individual position improved.

31. [31] Southwest Retirement Savings Plan, 2025-plan-year Form 11-K

    Filed June 26, 2026; Note 1, printed 5–9.

    Source type and review qualification

    Plan financial filing. Describes administration and contributions in the inspected filing; not assurance that every later agreement or plan amendment has been obtained. HTML filing re-opened in this phase.

32. [32] Southwest Retirement Savings Plan, restated May 31, 2024

    Preamble; §2.1(ss)(v), §3.1, §11.1 and relevant contribution provisions.

    Source type and review qualification

    SEC-filed plan text. Service and loan provisions are conditional; technical-operations plan merger is not a FA transfer date. Governing plan text re-opened in this phase.