- A glitch in scheduling software briefly left thousands of American Airlines flights without pilots.
- The airline is now giving 200% premiums to pilots who take on these flights, its union said.
- The scheduling issues at American come amid a period of travel chaos around the world.
American Airlines pilots are getting triple pay for working on flights affected by a scheduling glitch which briefly left thousands of flights without pilots.
Over the weekend, 12,000 American Airlines flights set for July briefly didn't have pilots scheduled after a glitch in scheduling software allowed pilots to drop assignments, the Allied Pilots Association (APA) said. The glitch has since been resolved and American says that it doesn't expect it to impact travel plans.
The APA said Wednesday that the airline, which has around 15,000 pilots, had agreed to pay a 200% premium to pilots who fly the routes that had been been removed and then "non-contractually added" to pilots' schedules, CNBC first reported.
"APA steadfastly maintains that management had no right to add trips to pilots' schedules," the union said. "That noted, with a deal now in place, pilots who had trips placed on their schedules as a result of the snafu should fly those trips. Pilots who still desire to drop or trade these trips may do so using normal trip-trading tools."
American did not immediately respond to Insider's request for comment, made outside of regular working hours.
The scheduling issues at American come amid a period of mounting travel chaos.
Flights have been canceled, delayed, and changed and passengers have in some cases been left standing in line for security for hours or arriving in their destinations without luggage because of labor shortages at both airports and airlines, staff strikes, technical problems, and bad weather.
On Wednesday, 26% of American Airlines flights were delayed and 6% were canceled, according to flight-tracking site FlightAware.
American CEO Robert Isom said in June that the airline had grounded about 100 regional jets because it couldn't find enough workers. It has since said that it was cutting routes to the cities of Islip and Ithaca in New York, Toledo, Ohio, and Dubuque, Iowa because of a shortage of regional pilots for its wholly-owned subsidiaries Piedmont Airlines and Envoy Air.
The airline has reportedly offered pilots pay rises of up to $64,000, and said it would improve scheduling and work-life balance.
An American spokesperson previously told Insider that it may take "some time" before staffing levels return to normal.