Former flight attendants reveal strict rules they had to follow, including being a certain weight

Former flight attendants from one airline have revealed the strict rules they had to follow – including maintaining a certain weight, even after pregnancy.

Former flight attendants have revealed the strict rules they had to follow at work – including maintaining a certain weight, with spot weigh-ins to check.

The ex-Emirates staff said they had to stick to a rigid grooming regimen and would be punished by the “weight police” if they were deemed too heavy.

The cabin crew explained that Emirates has an “Appearance Management Program” for flight attendants.

Karla Bayson, 36, said image and uniform rules were strict, including neat hair, nail polish that was red, neutral or clear, and no visible tattoos, The Sun reports.

Karla, who worked at the UAE-based airline for nine years before leaving in 2021, said she had seen some of her colleagues receive warnings about their weight.

She told Insider that staff deemed overweight were given two weeks to “lose it”, and every fortnight they’d be “checked again”, on the condition that they had to lose weight to keep working.

Karla Bayson said women going on maternity leave had to sign a contract agreeing they would lose pregnancy weight before returning to work at Emirates. Picture: Twitter

She also said that expectant mothers had to sign a contract before going on maternity leave agreeing they would lose pregnancy weight before they returned to work.

Former flight attendant Maya Dukaric revealed that overweight flight attendants could be sacked if they don’t lose weight within a certain time.

“If you don’t lose in that exact period of time, you can lose your job,” she said.

“You’re always under the stress of pressure because you always think you need to be perfect.”

Maya said that “weight police” would walk through the airport and stop crew they thought had gained weight and say: “Hey babe. You need to slow it down.”

An HR business partner at Emirates, who wished to remain anonymous, said there was a ruthless culture of dobbing on each other over weight gain.

They said: “A culture of telling on each other to management is prevalent.”

They said that failure to lose weight would be punished with warnings, weight checks and pay cuts.

Maya Dukaric said that any flight attendants deemed to weigh too much could be sacked if they didn’t slim down. Picture: Instagram

And a former Emirates manager revealed that roughly 150 flight attendants out of 25,000 would be on the Appearance Management Program at any one time.

The latest claims from the former flight attendants come just months after another Emirates cabin crew member said she quit her job after she suffered through three years of weight checks.

Duygu Karaman, 37, said she was regularly prevented from boarding a flight and put on some scales to see if she had lost weight.

The last three years of her decade working at Emirates were spent having her BMI tracked and her body monitored, she claimed.

She told The Mirror: “It’s definitely not OK. I was really upset for so long and then I lost my self-confidence.

“Emirates is really strict with their grooming policy. You never see an old cabin crew. They want pretty looking people.”

A strict grooming policy operates in the airline. Picture: Alamy

“I’d get my weight checked unannounced before flights. I had to go into the weight room and be checked. I tried to keep it at that weight, but sometimes I would gain one or two kilos.

“I was so upset. When they caught me on the weight checks I had to go back to zero months, and you have to remain clear for a year to be let go.”

After 10 years in the job, the persistent weighing and body critique prompted Duygu to quit.

This article originally appeared on The Sun and has been republished with permission