British Airways has pledged there will be no compulsory redundancies following the restructure of its global divisions.
The carrier is replacing its four regional zones with two – short haul and long haul – and cutting the number of departments from 15 to 12. A total of 16,000 jobs are affected by the cost-cutting move (Travel Weekly February 24).
Director of passenger business and cargo Charles Gurassa said: “There will be redeployment within the company, but no compulsory redundancies. Changes will be in the UK at Waterside [BA’s headquarters] and overseas.”
He denied there was pressure from Oneworld partners to make the changes, but confirmed it would make co-operation easier with carriers including American Airlines and Cathay Pacific.
“The changes are more functional than geographical, to improve routes and to be more profitable on routes,” said Gurassa.
Existing managers will start moving to newly created posts next Monday following the two-month review of the passenger, business and cargo divisions.
Regional director Europe George Cooper becomes short-haul director; regional director Asia Pacific John Wood is the new Americas director; and regional director UK/Africa/Middle East David Noyes is appointed Africa, Middle East and Asia director.
Regional director Americas Peter Spencer is to be found a new role within the reorganised departments.
Gurassa added:”The new short-haul and long-haul divisions bring us into line with how our engineers, terminal and cabin-crew staff operations are set up.”