But what will the company give up in return?

UPS is reportedly interested in early contract negotiations—and why wouldn’t they be?

It’s a good time for any corporation to be at the bargaining table. The economy is down and unions are on the defensive.

“Ken Hall told the Teamster Convention there would be no early negotiations unless the economy turns around,” said Steve Kelly, a UPS driver steward and one of Washington Local 252’s delegates to the Teamster Convention.  “That makes sense to me.”

Use Our Leverage

UPS has the added incentive of wanting to settle the contract early so they can ensure shippers there will be no disruption of service because of a strike or contract dispute.

The threat of losing business to FedEx is real, but it also gives our union leverage.

If UPS wants early negotiations, the company should have to deliver something in return.

“UPS was making record profits during the last negotiations and Hoffa and Hall gave them concessions. We shouldn’t make the same mistake,” Kelly said.

Other UPSers point out that early negotiations benefit the company. They say our union shouldn’t agree to early talks without getting something big in return.

Respect Our Contract

“I want to see the contract we have respected before we talk about a new one,” said David Thornsberry, a shop steward from Louisville Local 89.

“UPS promised to fill 22.3 jobs, create more driving jobs, and stop production harassment and 9.5 violations. The IBT needs to make UPS live up to these agreements before we start negotiating any new deal,” Thornsberry said.

TDU’s Make UPS Deliver network unites stewards and other UPS Teamsters who want to mobilize for a good contract—whenever negotiations begin.

“Last time, our voices weren’t heard,” said Kelly, “We can’t let that happen again.”

“Ken Hall told the Teamster Convention there would be no early negotiations unless the economy turns around. That makes sense to me.

“UPS was making record profits during the last negotiations and Hoffa and Hall gave them concessions. Last time, our voices weren’t heard. We can’t let that happen again.”

Steve Kelly, Package Car, Local 252 Steward, Tumwater, Wash.

“I want to see the contract we have respected before we talk about a new one. UPS promised to fill 22.3 jobs, create more driving jobs, and stop production harassment and 9.5 violations.

“The IBT needs to make UPS live up to these agreements—before we start negotiating any new deal.”

David Thornsberry, Package Car, Local 89 Steward, Louisville, Ky.

Members have the right to a separate vote on their supplement, as well as a vote on the national contract. TDU fought to win this right; it was put into the IBT Constitution in 1991.

Members’ rights vary widely from supplement to supplement.

Language on Cover Drivers (Utility Drivers) is all over the map and so are pay rates. Part-time temporary cover drivers in the South make 85 percent of package car driver rate; in the Atlantic Area they’re paid just 75 percent of the package driver rate.

In some supplements, UPS can use low-paid seasonal drivers for six months a year, during peak and during the summer—which helps UPS get out of creating full-time driver jobs.

Language on helpers is even more varied and problematic depending on the supplements.

Strong national standards in these areas would mean better jobs and more full-time positions.

Teamsters under some supplements enjoy superior rights that should be spread across the country.  For example:

• The Central Region supplement doesn’t require members to sign an Opt-In list to file a 9.5 grievance for excessive overtime.
• In Upstate New York, New England and throughout the Western Region, UPS has to pay Teamster pension contributions for part-timers—a big plus.
• Under the New Jersey Local 177 Supplement, UPS has to pay escalating penalties when the union repeatedly catches the same supervisor working—a minimum of two hours at double-time pay on the second violation and a minimum of four hours at double-time pay on the third violation.

The Chicago Local 705 agreement provides for expedited arbitration of deadlocked disciplinary grievances. An arbitrator sits in on the grievance committee hearings and casts the deciding vote in deadlocked grievances.

The arbitrator’s decision is issued right from the bench—without written briefs and delays. Instead of waiting up to a year to get an arbitration decision, a fired Teamster gets in front of an arbitrator in two months or less. (Note: The Local 705 agreement is independent of the national contract and not a supplement.)

These are just a few examples. Stewards and members are connecting through TDU’s Make UPS Deliver network to share ideas about how they can work together to eliminate weak supplemental language and win the best contract language from other supplements.

Have an idea for language that needs to be fixed in your supplement? Want to learn more about contract language in other supplements? Contact TDU today.

Central Supplement: Close Loopholes on Discipline

“The Central Supplement has a big loophole that guts Innocent Until Proven Guilty.

“Under Article 17(i), the company can terminate employees for ‘other serious offenses.’ Management uses this as a catch-all phrase to fire people who haven’t committed a cardinal infraction. Article 17(d) allows the company to fire a driver for any accident that cause more than $4,400 in damage.

“As far as I know, we’re the only supplement that has these loopholes. It’s time to close them.”

John Youngermann, Local 688, St. Louis, Feeder Driver

Will growing volume mean more jobs—or just more production harassment?

Profits aren’t the only thing on the rise at UPS. Volume is also up—and the company expects volume to increase even faster in 2012.

UPS says Teamsters will handle two to three percent more packages in 2012.

Excessive overtime and production harassment are already at all-time highs.

The International Union needs to make a stand and mobilize to make UPS create more full-time jobs—including driving jobs.

President Hoffa and Ken Hall, our union’s Secretary-Treasurer and Package Division Director, told a conference call of UPS stewards in October that the company has agreed to review its dispatches and hire more drivers to match the number of drivers employed when volume was previously at this level.

Hall pledged to launch a public campaign if UPS doesn’t fulfill its promises to curb production harassment, respect 9.5 rights and hire more drivers.

It’s time for Hoffa and Hall to put up or shut up.

Volume during peak was up by 3.3 percent. UPS has announced that volume will grow by two to three percent in 2012.

Teamsters in TDU’s Make UPS Deliver network are working together to hold Hoffa and Hall to their promises and to demand that UPS hire more drivers to handle growing volume.

Get involved. Contact TDU today.

Before Hoffa and Hall negotiate a new contract, shouldn’t they enforce the old one?

In 1997, UPS Teamsters united under the slogan Part-Time America Won’t Work.

Our successful strike made UPS combine 40,000 part-time jobs into 20,000 full-time 22.3 jobs over the next 10 years.

In the last contract, Hoffa and Hall gave away the language that makes UPS create more full-time jobs. But the company is still required to maintain 20,000 full-time 22.3 jobs nationally.

Where are these jobs? And how many full-time 22.3 positions has the company eliminated? The International Union has no idea.

Article 22.3 of the contract requires UPS to provide the company with a list of all of the full-time 22.3 jobs the company is maintaining. But the International Union admits that the list is hopelessly out of date and that the Package Division doesn’t track how many 22.3 jobs there are or where they are.

The IBT’s blind eye lets UPS play a shell game—and claim they’ve moved 22.3 jobs when in reality they’ve eliminated them.

Member Action Can Win Jobs

Teamster members and TDU have blown the whistle on the Full-Time Jobs Takeaway and we will keep up the heat. We’ve run articles and website stories, collected thousands of petition signatures, and held organizing meetings of concerned Teamsters and filed hundreds of grievances.

Membership action has started to pay off. After stonewalling, the IBT and UPS finally started settling grievances and creating 22.3 jobs in some locals.

But the IBT still can’t say how many Article 22.3 jobs are filled nationally—and how many UPS still has to create to be in compliance with the contract.

In this technology age, this is an easy problem to fix. The International Union can easily have UPS provide a list of every 22.3 position, who fills it, and the jobs performed.

This information should be posted on a website that can be accessed by Local Unions and stewards so that the information can be monitored and vacant positions can be filled.

The next contract needs to include stronger language to protect 22.3 jobs from being eliminated and to guarantee penalty pay when UPS violates the contract and stalls on creating 22.3 positions.

But there shouldn’t be any negotiations on a new contract until UPS is respecting the current one—including filling every 22.3 job that Teamster members are owed.

TDU’s Make UPS Deliver network continues to work with UPS Teamsters to audit 22.3 jobs in their local and file and win grievances to create more full-time jobs. Want to join the fight for more 22.3 jobs? Contact TDU to find out more.

UPS’s profits for the Fourth Quarter were $1.25 billion—not including a $527 million surcharge because of an accounting change in the way UPS tracks its pension expenses.

Including the accounting change, UPS made $725 million in the fourth quarter and $3.8 billion for the year.

UPS predicts that profits will grow 9 to 15 percent this year.  That could bring profits this year close to $5 billion.

Teamsters are driving the growth in profits. CEO Scott Davis told a conference call with analysts that “The U.S. is one of the few economies where expectations are greater than last year,” Davis said.

This safety devise has somehow missed the eye of the Department of Transportation: the DOT does not mandate its use. Therefore, in spite of the opinion of the vast majority of feeder drivers and the manufacturer of the unit, Holland USA, UPS contends that this device is optional, and sometimes forces drivers to move units without it working.

Memos from Holland USA clearly state, “…pintle- hook must be operated in conjunction with a snubbing air chamber, …failure to do so may result in damage to coupling and failure of the locking mechanism”.

Once again the company that talks that talk will not walk that walk. Is it any surprise to those of us who do the work? This hypocrisy will continue until we, the people that do the work, take an take a stand for safety. Until you, driver, are ready to take the plunge for safety don’t expect UPS to do the same!

By Michael A. Savwoir, UPS Feeder Driver, Local 41, Kansas City

That’s over six months since the last arbitration hearing held on October 18, 2011.This on a grievance that has been docketed for over three years. Once again UPS Freight drivers get the short end of the stick.

This is a prime reason for addressing issues of timely grievance resolution in the next contract negotiations. Arbitration may be the last step, but we have to have the authority to make it quicker than a slow crawl.

Click here to read Ken Hall’s memo.

It’s up to Teamster members to hold Hoffa and Hall to their pledge and to Make UPS Deliver on these commitments.

On national conference calls with Teamsters stewards in October, Hoffa and Ken Hall announced UPS management would curb production harassment, respect members’ 9.5 rights and eliminate the need for higher stop counts and excessive overtime by hiring more package drivers.

“We told UPS we are not going to tolerate harassment of our members. You can’t use the economy as an excuse,” Hoffa told the conference call.

Hall said that UPS management had decided that “the way to offset volume losses is to pile more work on existing drivers.”

Stress and Fatigue

That’s exactly right, and the results are the problems familiar to all UPS Teamsters. Routes are being cut and combined. Stop counts are up and so is SPORH harassment. UPSers are working longer hours and being ground under by stress and fatigue.

Our 9.5 rights are routinely violated and many members steer clear of filing 9.5 because they fear management retaliation and have lost faith in the grievance procedure.

Hoffa and Hall claimed management agreed to take immediate action to address these problems.

Specifically, Hall claimed that UPS management agreed to the following demands from the International Union:

1) Stop harassment rides.

2) Review dispatches and hire more drivers to match the number of drivers employed when volume was previously at this level.

3) Stop retaliation against drivers who file 9.5 grievances, specifically assigning supervisors to ride with drivers who file 9.5 grievances.

Hall told stewards, “This is the first time the company came to the table and said we admit we’re wrong and we’re going to change our ways.”

But whether management is really going to change their ways or if this was all an election year gimmick very much remains to be seen.

Management Gets Its Way

Until now, UPS management has been having its way with the Hoffa administration—a concessionary early agreement in 2008 and runaway contract violations ever since.

At the Teamster Convention, Hall threw down the gauntlet about upcoming negotiations, saying, “We’re not going to be talking about concessions.”  Hall has also said there will be no early negotiations unless the economy turns around.

When it comes to holding UPS to their pledge to curb production harassment, respect 9.5 rights and hire more drivers, Hall said, “We can’t just sit back and hope the company does the right thing.”

He pledged to launch a very public campaign targeting UPS if the company didn’t fulfill its promises.

That was in October. So far not much has changed and there has been no sign of a coordinated contract enforcement campaign—public or otherwise.

Teamsters have learned the hard way that when the Hoffa election train leaves the station, the platform stays behind.

With ongoing contract violations and upcoming contract negotiations, the stakes are too high for UPS Teamsters to let Hoffa-Hall or UPS management off the hook in 2012.

We Have to Step Up

“If UPS Teamsters want the production harassment and contract violations to stop, we’ve got to step up. We can’t sit back and wait for Hoffa, Hall or UPS management to do the right thing.

“TDU’s Make UPS Deliver network is our tool for sharing information and strategies—and uniting nationally to enforce our rights.”

Craig Karnia, Package Car, Local 705, Chicago

Put More People to Work

“Hoffa and Hall say UPS management has pledged to hire more package drivers.  Where I work, UPS brings on temp drivers who work the same shifts and drive the same routes I do, but for $11.50 an hour with no benefits and no job security.

“Our union needs to demand that our biggest and most profitable employer hire more package car drivers at the full union rate—to ease the pounding on Teamster members and to put more people to work in good union jobs.”

Bob Slezak, Package Car, Local 59, Cape Cod, Mass.

Delivering the Contract We Deserve

Contract negotiations will be here before we know it. The time to get ready is now. We need stronger language to protect members from production harassment, 9.5 violations, trumped up ‘dishonesty’ charges, new technology and unfair discipline. UPS Teamsters are the ones who have to live under the contract and we deserve a voice in bargaining. TDU will be holding meetings across the country to bring UPSers together to lay out a bargaining agenda for a contract that works for us—not just UPS management.

But who would ever think UPS, a multinational corporation, would actually employ such remedies? That’s just what happened on Oct. 5, when a broken fuel tank strap on a ‘94 Mack truck was replaced with a single rubber bungee cord.

A senior driver had refused to move this vehicle from Earth City, Mo. to Kansas City, Kan. (some 240 miles) the previous day, stating the obvious: “This repair is not road worthy.” So management forced a junior driver to make the move with the improved security of adding a second bungee cord.

After a intense debate and an eerie silence when asked, “Would you want your family following this vehicle down the road?” the junior driver sarcastically added a third bungee cord for good measure and hoped for intervention at the scale house 25 miles down the road.

We all know about UPS and “Safety First” but does management even know what safety is?

Maybe someone should tell them what it is not!

Safety is not reciting the ten point commentary. It is not putting yourself, your company, or the general motoring public at undue peril by taking unnecessary risks. And it is certainly not sending a tractor down the road with one soon-to-fail fuel tank strap and three bungee cords!

By Michael A. Savwoir, UPS Feeder Driver, Local 41, Kansas City

Company execs announced that UPS made $1.04 Billion in profits in the third quarter.  Brown’s profits increased by 5 percent compared to the third quarter last year and by 89 percent over its third quarter profits in 2009.

In all, UPS has made $3 billion in profits after taxes so far this year—before peak!  That’s a 25 percent increase over last year.

Compared to the third quarter last year, the company’s revenue is up 8 percent to $13.17 billion. UPS Freight revenue is up 5 percent and domestic package revenue is up 7 percent.

Click here to read a press report on UPS’s profits.