The employees of liquidated Spirit Airlines (Fort Lauderdale International) are filing a class-action lawsuit in the Southern District of New York, claiming that the company violated federal labour laws after abruptly shutting down operations on May 2, and cutting workforce numbers without advance notice.
In the complaint, the former staff claim the company could not provide prior notice of the layoffs because it was “actively seeking capital to avoid these layoffs and closures and notice would have precluded the company from obtaining the capital needed,” as reported by ABC News.
They are seeking damages equal to 60 days of wages and benefits under the Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification Act (WARN Act).
In related news, the founder and chief executive of Breeze Airways, David Neeleman, has said in an interview with Yahoo Finance that Spirit collapsed because its business model stopped working effectively and the company “could no longer raise its revenues to cover its expenses.”
Unlike Breeze, which operates a regional jet fleet, Spirit “decided to go with bigger and bigger airplanes” and fill them with seats. When legacy competitors offered their own basic economy seats on the same routes, Spirit struggled to compete, he said.
Meanwhile, a content creator has launched a crowdfunding campaign arguing that if a fifth of US citizens each pitched in USD45, Spirit Airlines could be bought and operated as a publicly owned company. According to his website, 371,552 individuals have so far pledged USD337 million towards buying the liquidated company, despite calls from experts saying the plan is farcical and impossible to realise.
