Yes.

 

I think that happened in Kokomo IN Delphi plant. If i'm not mistaken most of the union workers went from around $27/hr to I think $14-$17 range, that is the ones that did not accept the buyout. The union helped those guys out until Delphi it rock bottom and filed bankruptcy. I'm not saying the Union is to blame for Delphi, there are many other factors, but I believe the Union did have a contribution.

I'm also one of the luck ones that my company takes care of its employees pretty well and there is absolutely no unions in my field of work so it is up to me to make sure I get what I deserve and trust me there have been a few heated discussions but everything has worked out to my favor. If sometime it doesn't I'll pack my bags and go. Hell maybe then I'll go join and Union to see first hand what all of the hype is about. I just won't go near the UAW, things are way to messed up to get involved in that area.

 

In the situations mentioned, a union could help in many ways.

dkstone:::When the time comes for your job field is asked for reductions.
If you unionize, you can elect officers who may have better knowledge of the companies budgets and money flow (we all aren't accountants) So as a group in your field you could protect some benefits or negotiate reductions instead of having the company set the reductions and you have to swallow them.

Screwbuilder:::A union would enable you to "bump" a junior seniority member down untill the most junior employee is either layed off, or gets "bumped" into a position that his\her seniority will hold. 5 yrs later, hello margaritaville.

Of course this would depend on who your union (all members) set up bylaws and collective bargaining.

Unions are just saying that as a group, you have more power.
Say a guy who doesn't do your job normally during the regular workweek but was asked to do your job on a Sat and Sun getting appropriate overtime pay.
Unionized you would be able to greive the situation and get payed for the weekend while your at home with the family!! That's right paid for not working!!!!!
The guy who did your work would still get his pay, but the company would now know to ask the PERSON WHO NORMALLY DOES THE JOB DURING THE REGULAR WORKWEEK, Giving that person first choice to overtime since it is his\her work. Understand?
Otherwise the person who is nose to tail with the boss gets all the overtime right?? We all see this in non-union shops, in a union enviroment it doesn't happen. If it does we make sure the person is paid.

PLEASE CLINK THE LINK TO MY CONTRACT TO SEE WHAT I'M TALKING ABOUT..

 

We all know companies don't have a majic money well out back that they pull wages out of. They are not a bottomless pit of money. It's the endless non-sense like that, that causes outsourcing and cut backs.

Plus I guess I was raised a little different, I'd feel like such a wimp for filing a greivance over that.... That is soooo a scenario that anyone with a smidge of social skills should be able to handel man ot man like a man. If they dont have enough back bone for that or the skills to pull off such an easy mix up, then I really really really dont want to be working next to that moron.....

 

No it puts a end to having the person who is the bosses favorite getting all the overtime in that situation.

Depending on contract.
Simple here at Boeing, the person who normally does the job during the workweek has first dibs if his work needs to be done on a weekend (mind you we have 22k plus employees and fractions of people in the same job code)
If he refuses the weekend o.t. the person next senior is offered and so on.
If the management cannot fulfill the overtime requirement with people from that particular shop, he is then contractually allowed to go outside that organization to find a person "in the same job code" to do the work.

It was managements fault for not following the contract, if they followed it the extra pay wouldn't be needed.
It isn't just about the pay it's about fairness in the work place.

Here::: http://www.iam751.org/2005_contract/...0AGREEMENT.pdf

When you start here you start at minimum, following the progression steps till max pay, no brown nosers getting favortisim from the management, everyone progresses the same way.http://www.iam751.org/framebrowser.p...org/wage-card/

Sorry I always chime in late on this. I'm on the left coast and work 2nd shift.
But seriously take a look and I'll do my best to decipher situations that may or may not come out in favor of the employee, but always fair.

 

Why weren't you available to do the job in question that weekend? What benefit is it to the company to pay an employee for work, when he isn't working at that time?

Here's my morals and scruples talking again - if I'm not at work, not producing for the company at that particular point in time, what reason do they have to pay me for that? Sorry, that just ain't me, I can't sit around on my *** at home with the family, getting paid for work I'm not doing.

 

Management did not ask the person who normally does the work.
If you normally do the work during the week, wouldn't you want first rights to overtime?
What if you wanted to work but they brought someone in to do the work instead?

If they had asked you and you refused it would be different.
The fact the management didn't follow contract language enabled you to get paid while enjoying your weekend.

Get it? It's not that your getting paid for doing nothing, it's the fact the company violated a bargaining agreement.
No violations no greivences.

 

For that hypothetical situation, the company offered that solution to the union in the CBA. Someone will get reprimanded for not following the company set guidelines. The company agrees to do it that way.

 

Aside from the guilt from my own morals being similar to Quintin's, I could feel a little better on that because it is in contract...... BUT...... Knowing I was contributing to running my own company into the ground, taking myself and my fellow employees out of work in the long run...... thats another set of guilt that I am definatly not prepared to live with. Especially when there is a better way.

The proper way to handel such a situation would be to go talk to the supervisor that passed you up face to face and inform them you wanted the OT.... of course me personally they would laugh in my face because I am the biggest OT dodger there is..... but as mentioned before, if it's simply that they are playing favorites...... is that really a place you want to work?

If it's just a supervisor, and it coninues, then I would go over thier head and complain and still probably transfer out of thier department because I WONT.. work for someone with even those tendencies. If it's a plant manager then call corporate.... If it's an owner or upper managment playing favorites, or the situation isnt resolve satisfactory, then I'd shake thier hand and wish them the best of luck as I turned and walked out the door.

I don't want to, and won't associate myself and my charecter with that kind of people and definatly can no longer trust them enough for me to continue to do business with them (aka our employment agreement). It's time for me to terminate the agreement and start taking steps to distance myself and my charecter from being associated with them. There are 1000's of better places to work, even here in Podunk Town, Ozarks USA.

 

You speak as if only union workers have no morals or character though you have to know there are non union workers who lack morals and character. Such is life. They get weeded out, only there are specific guidelines bargained into the contract that have to be followed in order for a union member to be fired.

 

That is what happens, the managers manager get wind of what happened and is repremanded. Not the worker, so now there is no hostility to a fellow co-worker.

Plus, YOU don't have to worry about getting in managements face, Stewards, and Business Representatives ( Unions contract Police basically) Do that for you.

Say a manager gives a less senior person a promotion, with a Bargaining Agreement the people that are more senior can grieve it.
Giving the promotion to the most senior person.
Fairness plain and simple.
Consistancy as well.
It's not like grievences are filed everyday (although at a company as big as Boeing it's possible) Management gets it when their leadership gets on them about following the agreement.

 

Actually no that was mostly about immoral managment and how I wouldn't work for them or help them in any way or be in a business agreement of any kind with them if that is really an issue you guys face.....


I don't NEED or want anyone to go to bat or talk for me...... I am a big boy I can, will and want to do it myself. There is no reason that can possiably warrant any self respecting man to get in someones face over business.... if I had to worry about conflicts.... I wouldn't be working there.......

 

Sounds like you are a pretty knowledgable person.

You negotiate your pay scale, retirement, medical benefits etc..right?

So when your company starts reducing the benefits you negotiated for, how do you protect yourself? Or do you quit and find work elsewhere?
How do you and your co-workers feel when a guy with 25 yrs goes out the door and the guy with 5 yrs who blows your boss gets to stay?

I'm not being sarcastic, I'm just wondering.
I've been union since I came out of HS so to tell you the truth I really don't know what it is like to only be worth whatever the company tells you your worth, or tells you that we will give you this but we are taking that.

Does your company have a HR dept? Have they helped you in any way?

I can tell you I hear friends of mine being abused by the company (whether their story is true or not IDK) but with the example above how who you deal with it?

 

We've got a local HR and a corporate HR by having the 2 at our disposal that provides the checks and balances that you dont have teh HR person against you. I've never had to use either and dont know anyone has for anything other than insurance questions. Also our company is employee owned, once hired you begin getting shares, the longer your there the more shares you have, the more shares you have the more leverage that you have. Also in that way we decide our benefits as well. By everyone being part owner then there isnt alot of conflict. It's as close to utopian as you can get. Not saying there isn't disagreements, but they rarely escalate in any type of fight or conflict. The only reall scarey thing that our corporate could do that would really turn everything topsy turby until everyone figured out what happened, is if they decided to increase the cost of shares by doing a 3:2 reverse share split....... That would cause Chaos and while everyone was trying to figure out what just happened, then they might could slide something through on us. As soon as we caught it, then we'd throw it back.

 

Gotcha.