Across Long Island, management has continuously and willfully ignored clear contractual scheduling provisions, particularly when dealing with CCA’s who are deliberately left off the posted schedule, or being listed as “on call”, and then expected to be available by phone that morning.
Management’s repeated attempt to treat carriers as “on call” is unacceptable. Let there be no confusion: carriers are not required to be on call. A posted schedule should never identify a carrier as “on call.” If management needs an employee to report to work, management must properly schedule that employee. They cannot evade their scheduling responsibilities by making phone calls, sending text messages, or later claiming that an employee “failed to report” because they did not answer.
JCAM Page 8-3 states in part:
Stand-by. PTFs and CCAs may not be required to remain on stand by or remain at home for a call-in on days they are not scheduled to work.
Carriers are under no obligation to answer their personal phones while off the clock or when they are not scheduled. Management does not control an employee’s personal time, and an unanswered phone call does not create a duty to report. Any effort to discipline a carrier, or otherwise hold a carrier accountable for not answering the phone must be challenged.
This has become a major issue for CCA’s on Long Island. Leaving a CCA off the schedule, and then expecting that CCA to remain available for management’s last-minute call is nothing more than an improper attempt to create an on-call workforce without contractual authority. Management must post and follow a legitimate schedule, not shift the burden of its mismanagement onto their employees.
JCAM Page 41-65, Memorandum of Understanding Re: New Employee Experience, Retention, and Mentoring Program, states in part:
All CCAs and PTFs will receive a defined work schedule, identifying anticipated non-scheduled days, start and end times, and route assignments. This schedule will be posted by the close of business on the Wednesday of the preceding week.
Carriers always retain the choice to answer their phone. If you are not scheduled but want additional hours, you may answer management’s call and accept available work. That is your decision, not an obligation. The choice to seek work does not give management the right to demand that you remain reachable at all times.
Carriers on the Non-Scheduled Day Overtime List are also not considered “on call.” Management cannot charge a carrier for missing an eight-hour overtime opportunity just because management called in the morning and the carrier did not answer. An unanswered call is not a refusal, nor a valid reason to charge an employee for a missed opportunity. Management must comply with the contractual rules governing the scheduling and assignment of overtime.
M-00754 states in part:
The question in these grievances is whether management violated Article 8 by recording as an overtime opportunity the supervisor's unsuccessful attempts of calling the grievant in to work on his/her nonscheduled day.
It was mutually agreed to full settlement of these cases as follows:
1. An employee who cannot be contacted to work on his/her nonscheduled day will not have that call recorded as a missed opportunity.
2. The day in question also will not be counted as a day where the employee was available for overtime.
If management has placed employees “on call,” failed to post a schedule for any CCA’s, disciplined anyone for not answering the phone, or charged a Non-Scheduled Day Overtime List carrier for a missed eight-hour overtime day because they could not be reached, immediately speak with your steward and/or full-time officer. These violations should be documented and grieved. Management must be held accountable for its ongoing disregard of the contract.
