Another “NEW” Program?
At the end of this September, the Branch was notified by our National Union that the East Meadow Post Office was chosen as the first office to “test” the new “2 into 1” process.
Currently, East Meadow has 33 routes. The program will take 16 of those routes and place them on the same case. Thus, there will be 2 routes on the same carrier casing equipment. One carrier will tentatively report at 6:30 AM and the other is supposed to report at 8AM. The goal of course is to get the 6:30 AM carrier out to the street by 8AM.
There will be one piece of carrier equipment for the 2 routes. When the 8AM carrier reports, they will “flip” the addresses for their route. Presently, I have not seen how this is to be accomplished but have been told that it “works!”
Initially the carriers who were to be selected were to be volunteers.
There was no problem with getting volunteers for the 6:30 start time. They were selected by seniority. (It should also be noted that these carriers who currently have a 8AM start will be paid “out-of-schedule” overtime for work performed from 6:30 to 8AM.
As concerns the carriers who will be the carrier “partners” there were several volunteers who came forward but in the end, several carriers had to be selected by “inverse” seniority.
The intent of this “test” is to try to conserve office space because of the recent increase in parcels that has occurred because of COVID 19. The plan calls for the allowing of 690 additional square feet for the office(space). The duration of this “test is supposed to be for approximately 4 months. According to the agreement with the National parties, everything(routes and equipment) is supposed to be return on January 21, 2022 to its previous format.
The equipment is supposed to be placed in a facility and District management is required to tell the Union where the equipment is being housed. Besides the East Meadow post office, over 100 other post office facilities are to establish in this same process by October 30th.
This could all just be a temporary change or it could be the beginning of a massive National change. The fact that the National parties(union and management) have agreed to this process can be considered a step in the right direction if the parties sincerely evaluate the pros and cons during this “test” period.
The letter carriers in East Meadow currently take both of their “rest” breaks on the street because of COVID 19. This provides some additional office time for the carriers who start early. The Union has also proposed that the carrier do their vehicle inspection prior to loading so that when the carriers report
They immediately begin casing their mail. The reason for this is to try to get the 6:30 carriers away from the route before 8AM when the second wave of carriers reports.
There will be a lot of cooperation required and the District has committed to getting the mail to the office early so that when the carriers report (at 6:30) they have mail to case. The East Meadow mail is sorted by the Western Nassau mail plant which is several miles away.
Again, coordination (management, clerk and carrier craft) will be paramount if this process is to be successful. Only time will tell what the results of this “test” will be.
Finally, what happens when the test is over. Will management negotiate with the Union if and where they want to adapt this change or will they take a unilateral action. I recently talked to a Union representative of the ST LOUIS Letter Carrier local Branch 343 and he told me they did this same test in two of his local areas. That was about 10 years ago. The carriers there, are still using this same process but the rest of the Branch did not adopt this process.
Yours for the Union.
