A POWERFUL VOICE FOR THE WORKING PEOPLE OF AMERICA
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Company Disrupts Negotiations:
Threatens to fire up to 100 members
To All Members:
The Company has just announced during negotiations that it is holding investigatory interviews with up to as many as 100 employees, questioning whether the status of their dependents has been accurately claimed and justified. They claim they are offering shop stewards in each case which means they are considering discipline. They refused to guarantee that they would not take discipline up to and including termination against employees they feel may have broken their rules.
The Company’s action is clearly intended to intimidate members and to disrupt negotiations by attacking and threatening to fire our members barely a week before the contract is set to expire. The Union was immediately forced to get legal advice and to do what we can to protect our members.
We are demanding a list of everyone who is or has been interviewed, when the interviews will be conducted, and what the Company is questioning in each case, as well as the potential penalty. When we requested the information immediately, the Company instructed your Committee to go back to work.
We very strongly recommend to any member questioned with regard to their dependents, that they demand the presence of their steward and that both the member and the steward call their respective union offices before meeting with the Company, and if possible sooner if either knows of the Company’s intent to perform an investigation. Your Union office can assist in any investigation.
In the meantime the Union is doing whatever it can to stop the Company’s unjustified activity and protect our members.
As soon as we have more information we will let you know.
Per JSC Chair Frias, please use the following guidelines when called upon to represent a member regarding Dependent Audit Investigations.
Thank you.
Steward’s script for Dependent Audit Investigations Please take detailed notes and get them to the Union Office ASAP. Feel free to ask for recesses whenever you feel it is necessary and call the Union Office for advice. The Union does not believe the Company has the right to take action against any of our members because of their dependent verification. Part of your job is to make sure we do not give them an excuse during the investigation.
If the Co. attempts to hold the investigation over the phone, please state the following:
“The Union objects strongly to holding any investigations over the phone - we do not know who is on the phone, what documents they are looking at, whether they are even Company employees or whether they are recording the conversation illegally. We will continue the interview under protest and we demand an immediate recess.”
Why are we here?
What relationship are you concerned about?
What is the problem that you have identified with the relationship?
What documentation is involved?
When did you first receive documentation that may have been a cause of concern?
Is there any documentation which the Company believes is missing and if so what?
May we please have copies of all documents which the company has scrutinized and which have any bearing on this case?
At some point during the interview please state the following:
“For the record on behalf of the Union I want to make two things clear:
1. The rules for dependent eligibility are extremely complicated, are usually in documents rarely used by employees, and never gone over with employees by their supervisors.
2. It is the Union’s belief that the Company has had considerably more than 90 days in which to take action on their concerns in this case and you have not done so. You are now precluded from doing so by Section 6.5 of the Contract.”
