Author Archives: AdminUN

About AdminUN

FEDSMILL staff has over 40 years of federal sector labor relations experience on the union as well as management side of the table and even some time as a neutral.

UPDATE! – MONEY FOR HIGHER-GRADED WORK I love standing around, preferably in a bar, listening to a couple of well-respected, high-class union lawyers talk about a problem employees are having.  More than a few times in my career it has … Continue reading

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COURT SAYS, “SLEEPWAKING INTO CO-WORKER’S” BED NOT PROTECTED We can’t think of the last time we agreed with an employment law decision out of the 5th Circuit Federal Court of Appeals in Louisiana.  Indeed, we often wonder whether it is … Continue reading

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HOW TO STOP RAMPANT SELECTING OFFICIAL INCOMPETENCE Thanks to the managements’ rights provision of the labor law federal selecting officials foolishly think they have something akin to Papal infallibility when they rule as to who should be selected for promotion. … Continue reading

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DOES FMLA COVER ABORTION AND TRAVEL TO GET AN ABORTION?  We want to pass along a very thoughtful piece from the folks at FMLA INSIGHTS that attempts to answer that.  Click here for a link.

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BARGAINERS BEWARE OF THIS BEGINNER’S BLUNDER As we have noted before, one way a union can stop an agency from rocketing through bargaining just to get the dispute before the FSIP is to file a ULP alleging that the agency … Continue reading

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WHEN HAIR TRUMPS URINE An agency suspended a firefighter for 30 days who tested positive for illegal drugs after being selected in a random test. Because the employee was absolutely convinced that he had not used drugs, he tried to … Continue reading

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REMEMBER THIS AFGE AWOL DECISION One of the reasons we activated Fedsmill was to overcome the disadvantage regional and local union leaders are at when they have no way to hear about case victories from other unions.  That hobbles them … Continue reading

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CBP SCREWS EMPLOYEE WITH ITS ADMINISTRATIVE INCOMPETENCE CBP reassigned an employee from the Bahamas to Houston. Trying to be extra careful about the costs of the move the employee inquired whether he could be reimbursed if he shipped his POV … Continue reading

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THE LEVEL 2 PERFORMANCE APPRAISAL TRAP The word is quietly passing around among managers urging those agencies that have an appraisal system with a level between Fully Successful and Unacceptable for each element to abolish that rating level. It is … Continue reading

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ARBITRATORS CAN’T, BUT UNION REPS CAN FLRA just issued a decision overturning an arbitrator’s decision on how to award back pay for unpaid overtime that highlights a very powerful club unions have in these cases. After deciding the agency had … Continue reading

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