10/20/2015 – The APWU won an important grievance involving Maintenance Craft staffing at Bulk Mail Centers on Oct. 19, when Arbitrator Ira Jaffe issued a stinging rebuke to the Postal Service. Maintenance Craft Director Steve Raymer praised the ruling.
The arbitrator directed the USPS to rescind Maintenance Management Order 112-10 (MMO 112-10) and restore the staffing and staffing regulations that were in effect before it was issued (MMO 022-04). The 2010 MMO instructed managers at BMCs (also known as Network Distribution Centers) to utilize the Electronic Work Hour Estimator Program (e-WHEP) to determine staffing, replacing a program known as “BMC-Gold.” The use of the new program resulted in the elimination of jobs at all the BMCs that utilized it, Raymer said.
Arbitrator Jaffe laid the blame for the inconvenience his ruling might cause the Postal Service squarely on management. “Any resulting disruption in the development of post-Award maintenance staffing for NDCs is unfortunate, but is the product of the Postal Service’s failures to have provided sufficient and accurate information to the Union at the time that the changes were first being considered for formal implementation,” he wrote.
He ruled that the Postal Service failed to meet its obligations under Article 19 of the Collective Bargaining Agreement, which requires management to furnish the union with specific information when it proposes changes to handbooks and manuals. “The Postal Service failed to introduce significant and detailed, first hand information that made clear the projected impact of the proposed changes on wages, hours, and working conditions at the time that the changes were developed and proposed or the actual impact of the changes on wages, hours, and working conditions based upon subsequent events,” he said.
Management’s “significant failures to comply with Article 19 cannot be dismissed as harmless error,” Jaffe concluded.
Speaking on behalf of Maintenance Assistant Director Idowu Balogun, who served as case officer for the grievance, and Assistant Director Terry Martinez, Raymer said, “We are all pleased with the outcome.
“This was the result of a great team effort by our Maintenance Craft officers and attorneys” he added. “The bad faith exhibited by the Postal Service at the arbitration hearing, including raising arguments there for the first time, was some of the worst we have experienced. We had our concerns about this arbitrator being new to the Postal Service and we are very glad he saw through management’s shenanigans.
“The Postal Service now has a clear, meaningful and significant path to follow in order to comply with the procedures of Article 19,” Raymer said.
Arbitrator Jaffe refrained from issuing a monetary remedy, concluding that such damages were beyond the scope of the case before him. He said, however, that grievances filed locally should address matters that could generate monetary remedies, such as overtime assignments, the effects of staffing reductions, etc.
Click here for more background on the case.
US Post Office Mismanagement makes the Clinton Crime Foundation look like a kids lemon aid stand………both criminals of the highest order, both corrupt, evil fed govt clowns that in a saner time would be in jail.
This is just continued ineptness from postal management.
They relate themselves to unions comparable to the
Hatfield’s and McCoy’s! For years now the postal service
has had to revert and monetarily reward union members
because of callousness. They contractually have a right to
“mismanage” if you can believe that one! Which in many
different area’s have cost them more then it should have.
Overtime is still abundant in Boston for clerks in automation
and even more so for mail handlers throughout the bldg.
(4) supervisors currently sit in an office at the BMEU for
15 clerks, average amount of mailings per day 70! A friend
of mine works there and says 3 out 4 have limited knowledge!
They dish it out like water and seems like nobody checks what’s
going on…….good for the craft, but again this is part of what
contributes to being financially strapped
So what.
Mgmt. ignores the various contracts on a daily basis.
And that is how they’ll handle this ruling too.
Heck, they ignore cease and desist orders, think some pesky little ruling matters to them ?