Delta lays out elements of restructuring plan.
Delta announced some parts of their restructuring plan this morning and it isn't pretty. The airline will cut up to 7,000 jobs, reduce wages and cut back at its Dallas-Fort Worth hub. The job cuts represent about 10% of its work force and will take place over the next 18 months. The airline will reduce administrative costs by 15%, and that will include management cuts. Employees will have to wait till the end of the month to find our how large their pay cuts will be. All employees except the pilots will be affected. The pilots are the only unionized group at the airline. Delta will no longer use DFW as one of its hub cities but will expand at Cincinnati, Salt Lake City and Atlanta with the re-deployed aircraft from DFW. Even with these changes CEO Gerald Grinstein says that bankruptcy is still a real possibility. The airline must get $1 billion in concessions from its pilots. Delta is expanding Song by 12 aircraft. The airline plans to put an employee reward program in place that will include a combination of equity, profit sharing and incentive pay-outs tied to company performance, but not till the end of the year. It will beef up service in Atlanta, adding more flights than any airline has ever flown from a single city, while staggering its schedule there to reduce congestion. There was no mention of restructuring fares at this time.