Worker With Headaches Forced to Stay and Work

A worker, S, in Building A, who has been suffering from headaches the past four or six months told me that when he has asked to go home due to the severity of his headaches he has been told no by some of his supervisors because his doctor had “cleared him to 100% full duty.”

Some back-story on this guy.  S had been suffering headaches since (I believe) a package fell on his head (or some sort of related work injury) around four months or so ago.  He originally went to the UPS snakes doctors at US Health Works (who should be avoided at all costs!) and they gave him some medication but then released him for full duty.  The medication ended up making him drowsy (he said he felt a little drunk when taking the pills) which is really bad when you are around heavy machinery with moving parts and gears all day.

When he came to me I pointed him toward the union who pointed him to another doctor who he could trust.  Not surprisingly the doctor had S take two weeks off and gave him different medication, which didn’t fully get rid of his head aches but didn’t make him feel drowsy.

So now because he is back at work and is back from paid leave management is forcing him to stay on the job despite him still having severe (but not crippling like before) headaches.

Lessons

1. If you are feeling sick or cannot complete your job you must tell management that you would like to go home right away.
2. If they refuse then tell them you won’t go back to work until you have a shop steward present.  They can’t fire you for refusing to work until they give you a warning in front of a shop steward.  Once your shop steward is there she or he should be able to convince management to send you home.
3. If they threaten your job and really push you then your shop steward should be able to work out some type of compromise until the end of the night.  Immediately, the next day, go to your union and file a grievance.

Stewards and Bosses

A shop steward asked the “Teamster Trouble Maker” if he can yell at his boss concerning grievances.  Not only can stewards yell (which I don’t recommend) they can:

• Make gestures at management;
• Call your boss a liar;
• Threaten legal action against the company;
• Or warn the boss that his actions may lead to collective action from the union.

This is due to the fact that the National Labor Relations Board and the NLRA courts recognize that a steward can’t do her or his job as an effective bargaining unit representative if she or he is in a “master-servant” relationship with management during those times when a steward is acting in official capacity as a representative for the union and the workers.  Instead of a “master-servant” relationship the steward is now considered on “equal footing” with management during those times.

Double-Teaming

Just this morning at around 2:30 am or so, while I was loading on PD-12 one of my fellow co-workers, “J.” came up to me and told me about a run in he had with his building supervisor, Building A supervisor “B.”

J. was loading in bay doors 85 and 83 and was also helping out a new hire in bay door 84 when his supervisor (the PD-7 supervisor) came up to him and ordered him back into one of the other trailers.

Exhausted and exacerbated (understandably) J. threw up his hands and exclaimed something along the lines of, “I’m working as fast as I can, I can only do so much!”

Apparently his supervisor got upset and/or thought J. was refusing an order, which he wasn’t, he was simply informing him of his dissatisfaction with the whole situation he was under (which, in my opinion, was too much work for one person).  So his supervisor went to B.

B., not known for his subtleties and who I had a run in the day before where in he made a very simple situation very complicated and heated, decided to corner J. inside the trailer he was working in and started interrogating him, along with the other supervisor, about what had happened.

According to J. he was alone in his trailer and B. and his PD supervisor came in to the trailer.  J. continued to work but B. forcfully told him, “Hey, stop working, I’m talking to you.”

After that B. apparently was very upset with J. and he accousted him and started talking about obeying orders and following the rules.

When I latter went to B. he told me that was not the case, he just wanted to know what had happened and that he had the other supervisor there to straigthen the whole situation out between those two just to make sure that his supervisor wasn’t at fault.  However, B. kept giving me different answers to why he was in the trailer to begin with and why he needed to even talk to J. to begin with.  We ended up agreeing on setting up a meeting for the next shift.  Which will happen wihtin the hour I post this.

Lesson:

Regardless of what happened between J. and his supervisor B. should not have entered that trailer, even according to three of the other supervisors I talked to they said that was very unprofesional and that B. was essnetially a very inept supervisor.

If B. wanted to talk to J. he should not have cornered him in a trailer and outnumbered him two to one while asking him questions, interrogating him, if you will.  According to the National Master UPS Agreement ratified last August and good until July 31, 2013, it states:

The Employer recognizes the employees right to be given requested representation by a Steward…at such a time as the employee reasonably contemplates disciplinary action…there shall be a steward present whenver the Employer meets with an employee conerning grievances or discipline or investigatory interviews. (National Master Article 4)

J. did resonably contemplate disciplinary action being taken against him by B. (he told me so) due to B.’s tone and demenor and B. was conducting an “investigatory” interview.

“This is bullshit.”

I was called over to Building A on the 21st of this month in order to be present when the building supervisor gave a notice of discipline to an employee.  He was informing the employee that he had too many misloads and that he was giving him a letter of warning.  Shop stewards need to be present during warnings and interrogations for two reasons: one reason is to make sure there is no abuse by management of the employee the second is that if there is no shop steward present its as if there was never a warning given, which would defeat the purpose of the warning.

The supervisor wanted to give the employee, “A.”, the warning right at his PD, which was PD-3 (1).  The problem  with that is that all the other employees can see A. being reprimanded by the supervisor.  This brings up a couple of problems; (1) it is hard to conduct a conversation in a loud environment with moving machinery, employees going back and forth, and boxes being moved everywhere, (2) it is embarrassing for the employee to have his or her shit on blast, (3) the other employees have no business knowing what is going on with their co-workers.  One day, as on that day, A. may be given a verbal warning on misloads (loading the wrong parcels in a trailer) but the next day A. might be being interrogated for drug or alcohol use.

When A. came down I told the supervisor that we needed to go to the office to give the warning.

He said, “No, we’re doing it right here.”

“No we’re not.”  I answered back.  “It has to be done in a secluded area away from the employees.

“No, no no,” shot back the supervisor, “we are doing it right here.”

After explaining to him why it could not be done right in the open he began to become incredulous.  I then said, “This is bullshit.”  Which got him all riled up.  Eventually, however, he capitulated as he saw he was getting no where in this argument, that I was getting quite hostile, and that I would leave before any warning could be given.

The main problem I had was how unprofessional this supervisor was.  Any other supervisor would have said, “OK, the office is fine,” or “How about over there, that’s private enough,” etc.  But no, not this supervisor.  He thinks he is the end all be all in contract and worker rights disputes.  He took a very simple situation and turned it into an all out argument that lasted a good five minutes.

At least he keeps things interesting and lively.

Lesson:

All verbal warnings must be given in private no matter what.

Notes:

1. PD stands for parcel delivery.  It is a station supervised by one managemenet personal and staffed by three to six employees who load trailers that are docked in the bay doors of the PD.