United sued over allegedly letting only ‘young, blonde’ cabin crew work with sports stars.
Two flight attendants have sued United Airlines for race, age, and sex discrimination on chartered sports flights.
The airline has been accused of only using “young, white, female, and predominantly blonde/blue-eyed” on NFL charter flights for the Los Angeles Rams, Kansas City Chiefs and New Orleans Saints.
The lawsuit has been filed in California by Kim Guillory and Sharon Tesler – two veteran flight attendants employed by United, who are seeking financial compensation, including punitive damages.
Kim Guillory, a black woman aged over 39-years, has worked for United Airlines and Continental Airlines since 1992, whilst Tesler, who identifies as Jewish, has worked for United since 1986.
“United has not only demeaned its hard-working and long-standing loyal employees, but created an egregious workplace culture in which discrimination, harassment, and retaliation have taken root and flourished,” the suit reads.
Both women claim they put themselves forward for NFL charter flights but were unable to be assigned despite their seniority.
When Guillory raised the issue she was told the flight was only open to a preferred list of flight attendants which consists “entirely of youthful, white flight attendants”.
United released a statement in response to the allegations, saying: “While we cannot comment on this ongoing litigation, the flight attendants included in our sports team charter program are largely representative of our overall flight attendant population in regards to age and race.”
“Importantly, flight attendant eligibility to work a charter flight is based solely on performance and attendance and has nothing to do with age, race or gender.”
United said the average age of cabin crew on its sports team charter flights is 46.
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