Cathay Pacific and Alaska Airlines are the latest carriers to reward its respective employees with salary bonuses.
Alaska Airlines announced that it is paying out $327 million in the company’s annual Performance Based Pay (PBP), the largest payout in the program’s 22-year history. The carrier said the payout equates to six weeks of additional pay for each employee.
The airline described 2024 as a “pivotal” year for both Alaska Airlines and Horizon Air. The company had a rocky start to 2024 when a plugged door of a 737 MAX 9 blew out mid-flight on Alaska Airlines flight AS1282.
“Just a year ago after flight 1282 which resulted in one third of our mainline Alaska fleet being grounded and our operations severely disrupted, we were uncertain how the rest of the year would unfold,” the airline said in a statement.
Despite the challenge, Alaska said its team “rose to the challenge”, and was able to restore the airline’s operations back to being safe and reliable.
The airline said its PBP payout is in addition to the approximately $22.7 million in 2024 operational bonuses that employees earned for achieving quarterly on-time and safety goals.
The combined quarterly and annual 2024 payouts paid to employees totals nearly $350 million.
Meanwhile, Cathay Pacific announced that due to its strong financial performance throughout 2024, its employees will be rewarded a bonus of at least one month’s salary.
The South China Morning Post reported that the Group’s CEO Ronald Lam Siu-por commended his team via a letter, praising the carrier’s robust recovery post-pandemic and strategic fiscal achievements.
The airline said it is committed to allocating more than HK$100 billion ($12.8 billion) toward enhancing customer experiences and sustaining its operational growth.