FLRA just added some clarity to the issue of when are employees entitled to back pay. In NTEU, 66 FLRA 1024 the employee had been denied the right to work overtime because there was a pending investigation of his conduct. There was no dispute about his performance, just conduct and just one incident. This was a very big deal because the employee was in a job where employees could and regularly did earn up to $35,000 a year in overtime. Continue reading
If the average federal employee only knew how vulnerable he/she is to being fired for performance-based reasons, employee pharmaceutical bills would double. Management can unilaterally set the performance standards, need only produce some evidence that the employee failed to meet one of them, and choose the penalty with virtually no second-guessing by MSPB or the courts. That’s why a recent AFGE victory is very good news, whether grieving a low performance appraisal or defending against a proposed removal for unacceptable performance. Continue reading
This is not about the federal sector, but it is a story about employee relations and employment law that should be told and retold as often as possible. EEOC just announced that it caught a private sector employer, Henry’s Turkey Service, paying some of its employees only $65. a month. Although the evidence showed that the employees performed at the same level as other employees doing the same work for $11. an hour, management apparently believed it could pay them far less because they were mentally impaired disabled workers. (The job was to hand-gut dead turkeys.) Continue reading
Normally, we oppose term limits for elected union officers. If the leader is doing a good job in the eyes of the membership, let them decide via elections whether to return him/her to office—no matter how long the leader has held the job. But, there is one big exception. Continue reading
This has almost nothing to do with federal sector labor relations; it is merely about social justice. At a time when a record number of Americans are living in poverty, isn’t it comforting to know that the absurdly wealthy, multi-millionaire CEOs are getting raises? In fact, their raises averaged 5% for the year. Check it out if you do not believe us. What makes this particularly exciting is to know that this is the group that demanded the President show more fiscal restraint with federal employees by freezing their pay. NO wonder they do everything possible to crush unions.
The Family Medical Leave Act does not impose the same qualification rules on everyone. The biggest difference flows from whether an employee is covered under Title I or Tile II, namely whether an employee must work 1,250 hours in a year before qualifying. Continue reading
The Impasses Panel just sent a very loud and clear message to unions working for employers that bargain with multiple unions. The Panel is more than willing to take away bargaining rights from the last union to settle with management in a mid-term bargaining dispute. Continue reading
Can an employee receive admin leave on a day in which he/she was off on annual leave? Yes, according to the FLRA. Continue reading