United Airlines said Friday that it will lay off more than 4,700 workers in Houston and Dallas beginning Oct. 1, according to its Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification (WARN) Act notice filed in Texas.
The layoffs come as United said on Wednesday it could cut as many as 36,000 employees nationwide — nearly 40% of its workforce — due to the pandemic, which has crippled air travel globally.
“The COVID-19 pandemic has caused so much change in our personal and professional lives and will result in us being a smaller airline,” said Kate Gebo, executive vice president of human resources and labor relations for United in a letter to the Texas Workforce Commission (TWC). “Based on current demand, while we are hopeful the reductions for our frontline team members will be temporary, we presently anticipate that they will last six months or longer.”
United said it will be cutting 71 jobs at DFW International Airport and 3,904 at Houston’s George Bush Intercontinental Airport. An additional 781 employees received layoff notices at two other facilities in Houston, a major hub for United.
“Even if demand continues to slowly improve, it is unfortunately very likely that we will need to adjust the size of the company to reflect lower demand levels and implement a workforce reduction to reduce our labor expenses, beginning on Oct. 1,” Gebo said.
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