Boeing machinist bonuses lower in 2015, despite company gains

SEATTLE – Boeing will pay its machinists an annual bonus of 3.1 percent of their total 2014 gross wages in their Feb. 19 paycheck, the company said Friday.

The average payout to individuals will be $2,294 for a total of $77.9 million in additional pay for the nearly 34,000 eligible machinists, the company said.

Despite Boeing’s announcement of record profits in 2014, the payout falls short of the maximum 4 percent bonus the machinists received last year.

Boeing said worker safety performance brought down the bonus rate.

The bonus announcement came after the local leadership of the International Association of Machinists tried at the last minute to raise the payout for its members.

However, Boeing spokesman Doug Alder insisted “there were no negotiations” over the bonus.

Last week, Boeing executives disappointed their non-management, salaried employees when they announced bonuses lower than a year earlier.

The machinist union has a separate incentive plan, based not on financial performance but on preset targets to improve productivity, quality and safety.

On Wednesday, IAM district 751 President Jon Holden in a message to his members said the union was talking with management “to identify ways to raise the (bonus) payout.” He wrote “the last estimate we had from the Boeing Co., in November,” was the bonus for 2014 would be just 2.8 percent.

“We feel that it’s essential that the (bonus) payout adequately reward our members for the outstanding work they did in 2014,” Holden’s message added.

Boeing said the targets that determine the size of the bonus are set early in the year and are agreed to by the union and management.

“There is discussion to set the parameters, but at the end, the numbers are what the numbers are,” Alder said.