Alternative Work Schedules
(Flexible and Compressed Work
Schedules)
Summary of the Situation
Situation 1. DCMA West arbitrarily and illegally denied bargaining unit employees who were working a Compressed Work Schedule a holiday off in excess of 8 hours duration. Employees were charged leave in order to have a holiday off equal to the normal work schedule they were on. AFGE Local 2128 filed a union grievance and went to arbitration over this problem. The union won and DCMA was ordered to give all adversely effected employees back pay plus interest for their losses during the years 1996, 1997, 1998 and the first two holidays of 1999. As of April 2004, DCMA is still in the process of calculating the employees back pay.
Situation 2. Because an employee unfriendly Alternative Work Schedule Agreement that was negotiated in October 1998 and continues in effect to this day, employees continue to suffer harm because DCMA management continues to take advantage of employees and DCMA refuses to follow the statutory requirements for Flexible and Compressed Work Schedules Act. AFGE Local 2128 has raised these employee unfriendly situations to DCMA managements attention and AFGE has attempted to negotiate improvements to the AWS program through the negotiation of a completely new AWS Agreement. DCMA West initially refused to bargain a new AWS Agreement with the Local, but after the union filed an Unfair Labor Practice charge, DCMA West agreed to engage the union in negotiations. AFGE meet with DCMA West in an attempt to reach an agreement, but that failed. AFGE Local 2128 then called an impasse and sent the impasse to the Federal Services Impasses Panel (FSIP) for a final resolution. Now DCMA Headquarters has gotten into the act and is telling the FSIP that the Local has no authority to negotiate with the agency at any level. DCMA Headquarters is attempting to get the FSIP to decline jurisdiction of this bargaining impasse. DCMA wishes for the existing employee and family un-friendly AWS Agreement to remain in place while DCMA management continues to abuse agency employees and their work schedules. Because of ongoing work schedule practices employees are being forced to work overtime without compensation, they are being denied the work schedule of their choice, they are being improperly being charged excessive amounts of personal leave and some employees are being required to work on schedules that cover 24 hours per day, seven days per week.
The Details
Here is a problem that has gone on for years (1996 to the present). When DCMA reduced the number of Districts, the employees of DCMA South were transferred into DCMA West. This was in the early days of Alternative Work Schedules and the employees impacted by this change had been working a 5/4/9 compressed work schedule prior to the change. After the change, they were allowed to work the 5/4/9 as well as the 4/10 compressed work schedule. Well these employees soon learned that DCMA West had written a supplement to the agency AWS Regulation and this supplement limited the number of hours that an employee could have off on a holiday to 8 hours off, no matter what work schedule they were on. This DCMA West requirement is in direct violation to the Compressed Work Schedule Statute. In the later part of 1998, the Local discovered that DCMA West was not allowing employees to have a holiday off equal to the hours they worked on their compressed work schedules. Employees were being required to change their workweek or take annual leave, sick leave, credit hours or Time Off Awards in order to have a 9 or 10 hour holiday.
The Local filed a grievance which went unresolved and the union invoked arbitration. The union won, but DCMA filed exceptions to this arbitration award with the FLRA. When the FLRA issued their decision, the arbitration award was upheld. From January 1996 and up through the first two holidays of 1999, DCMA continued to deny employees a holiday off equal to their normally worked compressed work schedule and the employees suffered lost leave. DCMA is still calculating back pay for this grievance.
You would think this would be a lesson for DCMA, but it wasn't. AFGE Local 2128 requested to re-negotiate its AWS agreement with DCMA West when that agreement expired. This request was prompted because of all the confusion and ongoing problems and losses that employees experience due to the Oct 1998 AWS agreement. DCMA also wants to unilaterally and without reason terminate or exclude employees from participation in any one of the flexible or compressed work schedules. Without justification, DCMA has employees working schedules that cover 24 hours a day 7 days per week. Some employees are working a Sunday through Thursday workweek while others are working a Tuesday through Saturday workweek. DCMA also continues to work employees 9 and 10 regular hour workdays without paying them overtime as required by the Flexible Work Schedules statute, while still only allowing them to have an 8 hour holiday off. DCMA West initially refused to re-open and negotiate the AWS agreement. Local 228 had to file an Unfair Labor Practice charge against DCMA West because of this refusal to negotiate. DCMA West finally decided they would settle the ULP and they entered into a FLRA negotiated ULP Settlement Agreement. The Local and DCMA West first negotiated "Bargaining Ground Rules". They exchanged written bargaining proposals and during three separate weeks to hash out their differences. When they came to an impasse, the FMCS was contacted to provide mediation assistance. When that also failed, the Local declared an impasse and sent the bargaining impasse to the Federal Services Impasses Panel for a final decision. You would think that things were progressing as well as they could under the circumstances, but DCMA Headquarters is now getting into the act and DCMA Headquarters is now asking the FSIP to deny jurisdiction on the impasse because DCMA is questioning the Local's right and authority to negotiate with the agency. Again, DCMA is going back on their word to the union (to re-negotiate a new AWS agreement) and DCMA is apparently intent on continuing the abuse of bargaining unit employees and their work schedules.
Note: Congress passed the Flexible and Compressed Work Schedules Act in an effort to be family friendly. Based on DCMAs ongoing abuses of its employees in this area, DCMA is neither Family Friendly or Employee Friendly.
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