The National Mediation Board (NMB) on November 24 opened the polls for Flexjet and Flight Options pilots to decide on union representation. The decision will be by majority vote in an election that will run through December 15.

The vote follows an NMB ruling in late September recognizing Flight Options and Flexjet as a single carrier. The International Local Brotherhood of Teamsters (IBT), which has been seeking to organize the current 310 Flexjet pilots as one group with the 380 Flight Options pilots it already represented, had sought the ruling for representation purposes under the Railway Labor Act. IBT Local 1108 president Efrem Vojta called the election “one of the most historical votes for all pilots in the fractional industry…This is a very significant event and everyone is watching.”

As the polls were preparing to open, the NetJets Association of Shared Aircraft Pilots offered its support for representation. “No professional pilot, especially during and after a merger, can afford to be without a union,” said NJASAP president Pedro Leroux. “This is an undeniable truth that has been borne out time and time again in aviation, a fact I am confident our Flexjet and Flight Options peers understand.”

Flexjet chairman Kenn Ricci also had encouraged workers to vote, telling them in a letter following the NMB ruling that the vote is an opportunity to establish the culture of the company going forward, as well as an opportunity for Flight Options pilots “to re-establish a direct relationship with the company.”