"Comair has a comprehensive contingency plan in place and intends to continue its daily operations," said Wrenelle Stander, Comair’s executive director in the airline division, via an emailed statement. 

Stander said the company was served with the strike notice at 1pm. "This allows those airport ground staff represented by NUMSA to strike from 13h00 on Thursday, April 18, 2019."

The notice follows the CCMA issuing a certificate of non-resolution on March 26, 2019, after the parties were unable to reach an agreement about a salary discrepancy dispute. 

Just over 700 of Comair’s 2 200 airport ground staff are NUMSA members.

“We will do everything possible to keep customers informed and minimise the impact of any strike action. We encourage customers to check-in online or at the self-service kiosks at the airports and to drop their bags at the bag-drop counter. Employees from across the business have volunteered to help limit possible disruption,” said Stander. 

The company was "open to ongoing engagement with NUMSA", she added, but said that Comair was unable to support the union's demand to increase the salaries of 683 employees in the bargaining unit to match the highest of the 21 outlier salaries. 

In its statement, NUMSA general-secretary Irvin Jim said the union had tried to resolve the salary dispute "since last year". 

Jim said proposals made to Comair - that were rejected - were that all workers with a "wage gap" of less than R1000 should be immediately bridged by the employee. Workers with a wage gap of between R1000 and R2000 should be bridged within 12 months and those with a wage gap of more than R5000 should be bridged within a three year period. 

"Instead, they have made the outrageous proposal that the high earners should be denied wage increases until the salaries of other workers catch-up. This is completely unacceptable! Why should one group of workers be punished and denied wage increases, when it was management's failure which led to the creation of this problem in the first place? This proposal is unfair and this is why we reject it and we are now on the verge of a strike," said Jim. 

African News Agency (ANA)