Know Your 2025 TA - Commuter Benefits
Dear Crew,
We are highlighting TA improvements and answering crew questions.
Today’s newsletter focuses on Commuter Benefits in our TA and our LOA - Call In Honest (CIH).
We all know that Norse has commuters at every base, despite the company maintaining that we are not a “commuter airline.” With the closure of MIA base, we will have even more people commuting in the U.S. than ever before.
It was very important for us to secure benefits for commuters in our TA to reflect the reality of what is currently happening at Norse.
That starts with defining what a “commuter” is in the TA. Second, we negotiated a policy that allows crew not to be penalised if they are commuting by air and are unable to make their flights due to overbooked flights, weather delays, etc.Third, we wanted to ensure that people who were not using airport parking were able to receive some financial benefit for their commute to and from work using public transportation.
Additionally, Norse has several staff agreements with airlines around the world that we can use.
Definitions (Article 2):
Commuters - Crew members who do not live in base and who travel via air to base for duty
Call In Honest Policy - LOA:
- This agreement is on a trial basis until December 31, 2025. It allows crew to not be disciplined if they are unable to commute by air to work
- The crew member must have physical proof (printed boarding passes) of at least 2 travel attempts
- Crew may be reassigned to another pairing, put on standby or will have their pay deducted for missing the trip as an unpaid leave of absence
- You are allowed 6 CIH events per year
For more details about this policy, please refer to LOA - Call In Honest Policy
Wex Commuter Benefits Card
This allows for money to be taken from your pay check pre tax for transportation to and from work
- You can contribute a minimum $10 per month ($5 per pay period) up to $325 per month (pre-tax)
- It can be used for public transportation such as train, bus, subway, vanpool (vehicle that seats six or more adults, excluding driver), ferry, UberPOOL, Lyft, Lyft Shared, etc.
- For those who do not take parking at the airport, Norse will match your contribution up to $25 per pay period ($50 per month)
- If the transit you are using does not take the card, you can reimburse yourself using your Wex Card fund on the website or in the app
- Your never expire and do roll over month to month
- More information is available on ADP website in the 2025/2026 Benefits Guide.
- Enrolment ends on April 14, 2025! Please sign up using the employee navigator link for benefits enrolment that was sent on April 1, 2025 to your flynorse email address.
Staff Travel Agreements
Norse has worked hard to build staff travel agreements for crew.
You can find the list of all airlines using this spreadsheet: Staff Travel Agreement Status.xlsx
Additionally, there are 3 airlines within the US that allow “jumpseating benefits”
- Jetblue
- Spirit
- Allegiant
You can review additional details about our staff travel agreements, including policies, on our website HERE
There was a Teams meeting at 11am ET on April 7, 2025 to discuss the updated staff travel policy. (Staff Travel 3.0). The recording of the meeting will be made available to the crew by the company.
Once access for all crew members is granted, we will share it on our Facebook page and our webpage related to flight benefits linked above.
Finally, you can find the digital version of our Executive Summary that will be mailed out to crew with their ballots posted on our 2025 TA page.
Reminder:
You can find all the information about our TA at norseafa.org/2025TA
Submit any questions you may have about the TA to https://forms.gle/PNNCSFGEqVR95EoL8 and we will be sure to answer them in upcoming communications
Thank you and Solidarity,
Your Negotiations Team: Kat, Ted, Dylan and Jhen
