June 25, 2010

To All International Chemical Workers Union
Council/U FCW Gas Utility Groups

Re: Inter Union Gas Conference 2010

Greetings:

The Inter Union Gas Conference for 2010 will be held at Disney’s Yacht Club Resort, 1700 Epcot Resorts Boulevard, Lake Buena Vista, Florida 32830. The conference will run from September 13, 2010 through and including September 16, 2010. The room rate is $159.00 per night, Sunday through Thursday. Contact the Resort for room rates for Friday and Saturday prior to the Conference. The Conference rate of $159.00 is blocked off at this rate until August 12, 2010.

Reservations can be made by calling Disney’s Yacht Club Resort directly at 1-407-939-6244 and referring to the Inter Union Gas Conference. Reservations can also be made on line by going to www.disneyurl.com/InterUnionGasConference2010. Guests will receive an immediate e-mail stating their request has been received. Within 5 business days they will receive a second e-mail providing a confirmation number. If you need to modify or cancel your reservations, you must have your confirmation number, and must do it by telephone.

The registration fee is $100.00 per participant. Registration will be handled at the ICWUC caucus on Monday, September 1 3th at 9 a.m. If you will be paying by check it should be made out to the Utility Workers Union of America. If you would like to register early you may do so by filling out the attached registration form and sending it with your check, by August 15, 2010, to:

John Lewis, Vice President
International Chemical Workers Union Council/UFCW
3200 Inland Empire Blvd., Suite 160
Ontario, CA 91764

I hope that you and your local will participate, I look forward to seeing you there. If you have any questions contact me at (951) 294-2126.

Fraternally,

John Lewis

Members at Southern California Gas Company speak loud and clear!

On Friday, November 7, 2008 the Members at Southern California Gas Company spoke loud and clear.
The tentative Agreement that was recommended by the members of the Joint Steering Committee was soundly rejected by almost 70%. In meeting after meeting the membership continually voiced their opposition to the Wage package, the Sick Leave proposal, Higher Medical Costs, Cash Balance Retirement Plan for newer employees, and the Community Based Hiring Plan that by-passes some part-timers seniority.

The International Representatives and the Chair of the Joint Steering Committee have a meeting set with So Cal Gas Management on November 24th to discuss getting back together and continuing negotiations.
In the mean time we will be setting up meetings to give employees information on a strike authorization vote that we need the members to make.
As we get additional information we will pass that information on to you, through mailings, postings, postings on our various websites and through your E-Board members and Shop Stewards.

In Solidarity

John Lewis, Vice President, Regional Director

My Info

Recently, the Union met with the company and discussed “My Info” and the problems we have been having with this new system.

The Company informed the Union that they are going to start putting our appraisals on My Info. They want to still have the appraisals handed out to the employees but put a different version of the appraisal on-line. The wording on this on-line appraisal deals with goals and even thought the company has told us that they will put it in writing that they are not seeking to make appraisals goal oriented – we know, don’t we, that there’ll always be that one supervisor that will always do what they want.

The Company believes that the employees, our members, want this. We made it clear to the Company that we don’t want this for our members. We told them that we don’t see the value or need for this.

We believe that by putting our appraisals on-line management other than our own supervisors would be able to view our appraisals unnecessarily without having to go through the process of requesting them from Human Resources. The Company agreed, but told us that no one but our own supervisor has access to our personnel records, now maybe the Union just has trust issues - but let’s face it – if there’s a way for this to be abused by management it will be…There really is no benefit for the employee to have their appraisals on My Info since they’ll have a copy of the original.

The Company is insisting on this as the next logical step for the use of My Info.

We have asked the company not to proceed in this direction. We also asked to negotiate further regarding this issue.

Testing

We also discussed the pre-qualification exams and the job families. The Company is trying to put a test on every job that a represented person can bid for. Too bad the Company doesn’t have that same requirement for their management positions.

But – we argued to the Company that we don’t understand how the tests are rated and we need to have more discussion on the eleven tests and on the rating of the tests in relation to the jobs in the families.

Meal

As we’re all aware last September the Company implemented the lunch by five hours of work.

The Union has found that in some places, before a person is able to claim get their one hour of pay for missing the 5 hour time frame a supervisor has to approve this. We need to be aware that failure to pay this hour is also a breech of the Labor Code and can result in the company paying even more.

In the Customer Contact Centers we are told that a person has to miss the 5 hour lunch by 2 minutes before the hour is given. This is also a breach of the Labor Code and not acceptable.

If anyone is not getting their hour pay or have been denied the one hour pay – please let us know….

Also, some people have requested back pay and have put in requests to get this pay.
The law is not very clear on whether the statute of limitations is one year or three years…but if anyone is interested in a Class Action Lawsuit please see your Union Representative.

That’s all for now – please e-mail us with any other items that you all have concerns over

Remember – UNIONS WORK!!!!