United Airlines Will Hire 1,100 Agents in Southland

United Airlines said Thursday that it plans to hire more than 1,100 reservation agents in the Los Angeles area this year.

The nation’s biggest carrier said it will begin interviewing candidates Tuesday in an unusual setting--aboard a 400-seat Boeing 747 jumbo jet parked near United’s air freight facility on Avion Drive at Los Angeles International Airport.

The jobs, which will be added to about 1,000 United reservation agents already working in Los Angeles, have starting salaries of about $15,000 a year, said Tony Molinaro, a spokesman at United’s headquarters near Chicago.

United, a unit of UAL Corp., had previously said it would need to hire new agents to offset earlier employment cuts, particularly with the carrier’s aggressive launch of its short-haul service--Shuttle by United--in California and other parts of the West. The Shuttle now has 378 departures daily.

“We’re understaffed, and people are waiting too long on hold” when calling for reservations, Molinaro said.

The action is unrelated to the recent decision by United and other U.S. airlines to cap travel agents’ commissions, he said. That move is expected to, among other things, prompt more travelers to call airlines directly for reservations.