Travel Trade

When we negotiate, we aim to get the best deal possible for members, to raise standards and ensure that procedures and structures in place are fair and transparent to all. In all of the companies in which we have working relationships we have staff representatives, and these members ensure that the union and their management hear the views of their colleagues.

When changes are introduced by a company, such as Sunday working, longer hours, a new pay structure or a change to job roles, the union can ensure that these changes are fair.

Usually, a unionised company treats its staff more fairly. However, if the company doesn’t and there is a strong union membership, then staff have the ability to work together to demonstrate their frustrations and persuade the company to change their minds.

For example, in Thomas Cook we worked with our members whilst a pay freeze was in place after September 11th, to help persuade the company to lift the freeze and reward the staff. This action even involved MPs, and staff signed a petition and wrote to their MPs to highlight the issue. Due to the members action the freeze was lifted and staff at long last received pay increases.

There are some conditions in Travel that have become part of the culture of the industry, such as low pay, lack of training and limited career paths.

The only way to raise these standards is to unionise the whole industry.

One travel company, in such a highly competitive industry with such small margins, may not choose to raise these standards if they know that their competitors are not going to. However, if the whole industry was unionised and had a high density of union membership, then together we could make much more of an impact.

This is the TSSA vision - to have a powerful unionised industry that can raise standards overall.

That is why we have launched our travel trade charter to define minimum standards for staff in the industry and to work with employees to make sure they are delivered.