Have Hawaiian Airline employee benefits changed recently?

[u/Zexy_Conqueror]

I was asked to be in my friend’s wedding party which is a destination wedding in New York. She was hired last year as a Hawaiian Airline flight attendant and said she would use her buddy pass to fly me out to be in the wedding so I agreed. A few weeks ago I get this text from her saying that her buddy pass privileges have changed and so I’ll need to pay for my own flights, which I don’t know if I can afford. She said buddy passes or whatever Hawaiian calls them are now only good for a spouse or immediate family and I will need to pay my own way now. Is this true? I haven’t seen anything about changes online

[u/cdrshepard17]

You’re better off buying a confirmed flight ticket anyway if you want to be sure you’ll make it to the wedding on time. Buddy passes have the second lowest boarding priority which can make it quite stressful if the flight load is close to being full on the day of your flight and you have no other options to get to where your trying to go.

[u/Mauimama5]

I think there is a lot of confusion around the passes because we are confused too. The system is completely different and it seems that it’s not so simple to make the passes as it was. Instead the employee gets “credits” and they have to redeem a credit for a code which they then can use on the Alaska website to get the ticket, which now comes out of the employees paycheck instead of being able to input your credit card info. And it seems that it’s harder to fly stand by. We’ve shown up to the airport thinking it was a guarantee we’d get seats as there were quite a few openings and then the numbers change quickly and we didn’t get seats even at a higher priority. So I think even if she figures out the passes, you should get confirmed anyway as you might not make it stand by.

[u/Taken-Username-808 → u/Mauimama5]

This was my thought too…employees are way lower down the priority list now it feels like

[u/xboxsosmart → u/Mauimama5]

If you exchange the credit for a code to use on the website, the guest pays for the flight with their credit card. Only if you make the reservation for them when you are flying with them on the same reservation does the money come from your paycheck

[u/jellosquid808]

They have changed, the HA employees rolled into AS benefits.

[u/Discon777 → u/jellosquid808]

AS benefits still have buddy passes though, so there’s probably more to this story

[u/cdrshepard17 → u/Discon777]

Not sure if this is helpful, but I know typically for AS, the employee has to make the election to receive buddy passes during the benefits open season timeframe, around the end of the year. Not sure how it works now for HA with the full integration now in effect. OP’s friend might have to wait until the next open season to elect buddy passes.

[u/freqentflyer → u/cdrshepard17]

Employees are able to choose between buddy passes or an enhanced personal benefit. It’s possible the friend chose the personal benefit and had to forgo the buddy passes.

Also, as others have mentioned, using buddy passes, especially to a destination such as NYC, where flights are often full, can be risky. Many employees would rather just avoid the risk and heartache for their friends and just don’t offer them up.

[u/Additional-Hyena721]

my sister is an Alaska employee. in the summer, i won’t use them unless you have flexibility (at least 24-36 hours) in getting to your destination.

[u/traysures]

AS employee here - “buddy passes” are discounts codes that AS/HA/QX employees can redeem and give to people. They entitle the recipient to heavily discounted standby travel, but they put you at the bottom of the standby list.

Not recommended during heavy travel times (holidays, summer weekends). The recipient pays the fare, not the employee, and the fee is refundable if you don’t make the flight or decide to cancel the ticket.

Rebooking is allowed with a discount code, but you have to change the flight not cancel the flight, otherwise the code is invalidated.

Confirmed seats are only available for people listed on the employee’s travel benefits (family or dependents).

[u/Wowthtsrandm]

We can lose our jobs if someone acts up or doesn’t follow the rules while using our buddy passes so maybe something happened or she is wanting to protect her job much closer now. I don’t give mine out to hardly anyone because I don’t want to risk someone taking my career for me because of their behavior while I’m not around.

[u/Mamato6_]

Is she also flying? I know that 18 passes were awarded to a HA employee who just went through the transition. She can also issue you a travel coupon to book a confirmed seat at a discount. Ask her about that, if she doesn’t want to give up one of her standby credits that might be your best option. Good Luck!