Are You One of the 30,000 Delta Wants To Buyout?

If your company offered you the ability to voluntarily retire, would you take it? That’s what Delta Airlines (DAL) did yesterday when it offered volunteer severance and retirement packages to 30,000 employees in hopes of cutting at least 2,000 jobs. “If we need to, we'll go deeper,” Delta CFO Ed Bastian told analysts on Tuesday at a JP Morgan (JPM) investor conference. Oil prices hit an all-time high this week, at $111 a barrel, almost twice what they were last year, putting increasing pressure on the airline industry to off-set costs any way it can. 

According to a Delta spokesperson, the severance packages are targeted towards mainline employees—people working on the frontline, administrative, and management side–and will not be extended to pilots who are unionized. Administrative and management employees need a minimum of one year with the company to qualify for the “early-out” offer, while frontline employees (flight attendants, ticket agents, and baggage handlers) need to have at least 10 years under their belt in order to take the early retirement. And, of course, employees who are already up for retirement  are also eligible to accept the buy-out package. 

Delta has not disclosed the terms of the buy-out, but whatever it is, it might be hard for Delta employees to negotiate. “With a buy-out of this magnitude, it’s a bit more difficult,” says Morris Armstrong, a financial planner in Danbury, Conn. “When companies offer buyouts to a 100 or so people, it’s easier to negotiate your own individual package.” If you can negotiate, predetermine the minimum that you’ll accept. “Make sure whatever it is, you’ll be comfortable with it and not regret it later on,” says Hallie Crawford, a certified career coach based in Atlanta, Ga., the same city where Delta is based. “Quality of life is a good standard to give you an outline. Then give yourself a buffer so you won’t get in a situation where you feel desperate and stuck.”