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 [January 29th]One Time Lump Sum Payment A) Eligible:
B) Ineligible:
All employees not declared ineligible by B (listed above), shall receive the one time COLA even if retired since December 18, 2001. (Sept. 9. 1991, Bullet Point 2) This information was provided by Vice President Cliff Guffey, APWU. |
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| [January 23rd] Report on Executive Benefits May Further Demoralize Postal Service Two recent audits by the inspector general at the U.S. Postal Service have, shall we say, raised a few eyebrows at the agency's L'Enfant Plaza headquarters. Inspector General Karla W. Corcoran found that a Postal Service program to help executives with their moving costs was more generous than the relocation perks offered by several large corporations and funneled postal money to some officials who were not eligible for the perk. Corcoran's second report revealed that the U.S. Postal Inspection Service -- the post office's law enforcement arm -- gave bonuses to 100 percent of its executives during fiscal 1999 and 2000. The Inspection Service used boilerplate language to justify the awards -- which averaged $10,000 in 2000 -- and did not cite individual accomplishments by the executives. The Inspection Service gave a total of $55,000 to five executives just weeks before they retired, the IG's office found. For numerous employees, the reports fuel speculation about cronyism and favoritism at the Postal Service. That's not healthy, because the Postal Service is a troubled agency. It fell $1.7 billion further into debt last year and faces, for the short term at least, the prospect of reduced mail volume because of fears of anthrax contamination. Questions about the moving program for top management were raised almost two years ago, when the Postal Service acknowledged that it had paid $248,000 in relocation benefits to two headquarters executives for moves of 10 miles and 30 miles in Northern Virginia. One of the executives retired and the other was reassigned. The new audit, covering January 1997 to October 2000, shows that 48 executives -- including 23 in the Washington area -- received relocation benefits. Of the 48, 10 were not eligible for the aid, the IG's office found. Five employees took advantage of the aid "multiple times, regardless of their eligibility," the report said. Some of the payments financed moves to three cities not covered by the program. In addition, documents on some loans were incomplete or missing. The relocation program, Corcoran decided, "was administered based on informal policies." Because the Postal Service had not explained the program to all of its executives, "there could be a perception that all eligible employees were not treated fairly and equally," the IG's office said. Like many compensation efforts, the program started with a laudable goal: to allow executives to transfer from low-cost areas to high-cost cities without lowering their standard of living. Under the program, Corcoran said, the Postal Service purchases a home for an executive at the new duty station. The executive contributes the equity from the sale of the prior residence and makes mortgage payments to the Postal Service based on the value of the prior home. "In essence, an executive living in a $150,000 home with four bedrooms and a two-car garage in Memphis can move to Washington, live in a $500,000 home and still pay the same mortgage payment they were paying in Memphis," she said. At the time of the review, there were 30 homes in the program valued at a total of $12.3 million. In its audit of the Inspection Service bonus program, the IG's office also raised questions of fairness. The report compared the Inspection Service program with practices at the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms, the Drug Enforcement Administration, U.S. Customs Service, U.S. Marshals Service and FBI. The Inspection Service spent 8.9 percent of executive salaries on bonuses in fiscal 2000, compared with an average of 3.7 percent at the five other agencies. Awards went to 100 percent of eligible executives at the Inspection Service, compared with an average of 38 percent at the five law enforcement agencies. Only 18 percent of non-executive postal inspectors got cash awards, and the awards averaged $1,500, or about a tenth of what the executives got, the IG found. The way the Inspection Service program was handled could subject the agency to "the appearance of impropriety," the IG's report said it The Postal Service has imposed tighter controls on moving expenses for executives and taken steps to provide the benefit to all executives. But Inspection Service officials disputed several of the audit's findings, saying it needs a flexible bonus program "to drive organizational change and performance." The IG's office, however, said it intends to pursue the matter. By Stephen Barr The Washington Post |
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| [January 20th] Senior Postal Executives Receive Low Interest Home Loans The U.S. Postal Service has been quietly subsidizing millions of dollars in home loans for a handful of senior executives in a little-known program that was operated with few controls and offered benefits not unlike those given executives in private industry or government. In all, the Postal Service's inspector general said a total of 30 postal executives are now getting cheap home loans on houses valued from $300,000 to $583,245 under the program. The total value of the homes underwritten by the agency came to $12.3 million. "The program was only offered to a small number of eligible Postal Service employees and controls over the program needed strengthening," John M. Seeba, assistant inspector general for financial management, said in the report disclosed this week. The report said the members of the agency's board of governors, who oversee the agency had agreed with the conclusions and ordered management to correct the problems. Disclosure of the new benefit comes as the agency is battling for its financial health, seeking a boost in first-class stamp prices to 37 cents, a move that it says is essential for continued mail service. It also comes as the agency has weathered renewed Congressional criticism over the large bonuses it has continued to pay its executive and mangers despite the agency's $1.7 billion loss last year. Attention to the benefits given top executives first surfaced in the spring of 2000 when the inspector general disclosed that two of the agency's top financial officers received a total of $248,000 in "relocation benefits" when they purchased new homes in the Washington area. Neither officer's work location changed and the outcry over the benefit forced one to resign and the other to move to another job at the agency. The new report by the inspector general disclosed that a total of 48 current or former postal executive participated in the program from January 1997 to October 2000. The program was designed to help the agency keep its senior executives, partly on the grounds that federal pay caps prevent them from receiving pay comparable to private industry. Some of the executives seem to have abused the program. Seeba reported that 1,000 executives were supposedly eligible, but word of the program was not well known. Five employees, however, participated in the program multiple times; four twice and one three times. But Seeba said in his report that he surveyed 31 private industry and government agencies and could not find a similar program, although some companies helped their employees secure lower mortgage rates. None of the beneficiaries were named in the report, but the IG said some were not the high-level executives for whom the program was supposedly intended and that the program was not limited to high-cost areas, where home purchases could be costly. Here's how the postal program worked: "An employee purchased a home in Memphis, Tenn., in 1993 for $185,000. The initial mortgage on the home was for $175,00. The employee sold the residence in 2000 for $200,000 upon reassignment to Washington, D.C. The employee pays off the mortgage balance of $168,00, leaving $32,000 of equity to be put into the new home. "The employee finds a new home in the Washington metro area for $340,000 that is purchased by the Postal Service. The employee invests $32,000 of equity in the new residence, leaving a balance of $308,000. The employee's new fixed mortgage is set at $190,000. The Postal Service provides the employee with a 30-year mortgage on this amount which equates to a monthly payment of $1,329. This represents a savings of $825 if the employee's monthly mortgage payment was based on $308,000. The deputy postmaster general must now approve any such loans. They are now restricted to high-cost cities. |
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| [January 16th] Possible Pay Implementation Dates We've received an inter-office memo from the national that discusses possible pay implementation dates, inlcuding Slotting Lump Sum, Step Increase Settlement HOC NA 39, and the $499 Lump Sum payment. If you would like to view or print an actual copy of the APWU InterOffice Memo, you will need the Adobe Reader. Don't have it? Go get it free at Adobe's website.
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| [January 15th] BMC Restaffing Planned for March 2002 Bids were slated to be abolished and clerks excessed beginning in March 2002 at the Pittsburgh BMC. Construction on the PSM3 will begin sometime that month with completion expected in August. The installation of PSM4 is uncertain for this year, due to budgetary constraints. Primary operations for critical dispatch will take place between 0630 and 0030 to facilitate same-day processing. Management anticipates more mail will be processed on daylight than is currently handled. Their original plans included excessing eight clerks out of keying positions, and canvassing them into new jobs. Management was uncertain what jobs would be created for these excessed keyers, but management noted that the newly created jobs would possibly be abolished before the year's end. In the daylight manual sections, management plans to excess six clerks' jobs, and they are uncertain whether or not these six people will remain on daylight. So, their plan is to reduce staffing while increasing the volume of mail processed on the tour. On Tour 3, the afternoon shift, management planned to increase keying jobs. Their plans included abolishing all bids to change start times and/or layoffs in both the manual and keying sections. The eight junior manual distribution clerks were to be excessed. Any clerk who opted not to bid into one of the 1600 start times would have her/his bid abolished, become an unassigned, and be canvassed into a 1600 start time. This plan would have resulted in thirty-nine clerks becoming unassigned regulars to be placed wherever management felt they were needed. During our five hour meeting, the Union was able to negotiate the following: Tour 2 daylight keyers: there will be no excessing. Impacted bid jobs will be reposted and as people move, the unneeded vacancies will be reverted. Tour 2, daylight manual distribution clerks will have no excessing. Impacted bid jobs will be reposted and as people move, the unneeded vacancies will be reverted. There will possibly be one dock clerk excessed, management is re-evaluating this situation and will get back to us on it. One dock clerk job will be reposted. Tour 3 afternoon keyers: all bids will be reposted with a 1600 start time. All SPBS clerks, formerly impacted, are now safe. Manual distribution clerks will now have no excessing. All manual bids will be reposted with a 1600 start time. The Tour Office job will be posted with a new start time and Saturday/Sunday layoffs. A tour office relief job will be posted with a 1600 start, attached to IPP Section 26, with Monday/Tuesday layoffs. Two vacated SPBS bids will be posted as vacancies. The Tour 3 dock clerk bids will be reposted with new start times. Two dock clerk bids will be created with 2130 start times. This plan should result in there being a bid for every full-time regular in the building, meaning no unassigneds. Maintenance operations support will repost three bids with changes. Management will post the notice of intent for each job and award bids based on the PARs. In the motor vehicle craft, management intends to change some start times by half an hour. Other jobs will have layoff day changes or changes in start times of an hour and a half to two and a half hours. The CGOs will work with management to canvas the impacted assignments. Management intends to hire three PTF Tractor Trailer Operators by June of this year, bringing the total TTO complement to 30 drivers. Management originally intended to repost three of the four daylight VOA positions. We were able to convince them to leave these jobs alone and fill their weekend needs by placing PTFs in the section on Saturdays and Sundays. Significant changes are being made to two of the Tour 3 VOA bids. They will be reposted. Likewise, two Tour 1 VOA jobs will have layoff day changes, requiring reposting. Bids for the impacted jobs will be posted on March 1, 2002, awarded on March 20, 2002, and occupied by March 23, 2002. Management began the meeting by announcing that volume at the BMC continues to decline. We are running at 12% under the same period last year. Management's proposed changes were based on volumes received at the gate. There were no statistics available to show the volume processed through the facility and the amount of hours and workers needed to process set volumes. |
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| [January 8th] Priority Transfers Update The Local continues to battle management over the rejection of career employees who requested transfer to the PMPC/L&DC at Warrendale. So far, management has changed their position and accepted one of our formerly rejected applicants. We are researching the packets of information and preparing to present a case for each rejected applicant. In the meantime, management has agreed to reopen transfer opportunities until January 13, 2002, for all clerk employees who wish to transfer as Part-Time Flexible clerks to the new facility. All transfers will have a seniority date of December 29, 2001, when they reach the facility. It should be noted that the Local maintains the new facility is a priority center and that all transferees should transfer as full-time regulars with full seniority. We are working with the National on clarifying this issue, and we are attempting to sort this out before the situation becomes more complex. |
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| [January 7th] National Constitution... A Proposed Change This proposed constitutional change was received at Local headquarters on Friday, January 4, 2002. It is troubling for a number of reasons. We have just ended National Negotiations and the proposed benefit that our National officers seek was not negotiated by them for the rank and file members. It is less than two months since these same National officers who would benefit from this additional benefit were sworn into office to begin a new term. If this was their top priority, to gain further benefits for themselves, then I would question, who are they working for? It doesn't sound like they are working for you and me. The National Officers work for the rank and file members, and it is never wise to allow your representatives to enjoy better fringe benefits than you enjoy yourself. It gives them less incentive to strive to gain those benefits for you, their employer. With a new Administration at our National headquarters, I had hoped for a change to a more member-friendly organization. When the rank-and-file members have fully-paid health insurance benefits, our National Officers should enjoy the same. Until then, they should pay their fair share, as we do. |
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| [January 7th] BMC Excessing Update Notice was received that "excessing of the twelve (12) clerk positions from the Pittsburgh BMC due to the installation of the Primary Singulate Induction Unit is postponed." Rumor has it that funding was turned down. As we receive new information, we will provide that information to you. |
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| [January 2nd] Mail Crews Work Through Latest Anthrax Scare By William J. Gorta, NYPost January 1, 2002 -- Manhattan postal workers, for the second straight day, yesterday defied their union's call to stay home from the Morgan mail facility, where traces of anthrax were rediscovered last week. The contaminated sorting machine, along with several others, had been cleaned in October, when anthrax was first discovered there. Diane Todd, a Postal Service spokeswoman, said the machine would be shut down for about a week to clean the "very negligible trace of anthrax" - possibly residue from October. Postal officials said staffing yesterday was unaffected, despite a call from William Smith, president of the New York Metro Area Postal Union, for workers to stay home until the extent of the contamination is clear. Morgan handles 12.5 million pieces of mail a day. "Attendance has been normal so far," said postal official Pat McGovern. Smith said he'll ask a judge to shut the facility until it's thoroughly tested and sanitized |
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| [January 1st] Happy New Year to Everyone from your Union!
May it be a prosperous and healthy New Year for you and your loved ones! |
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| Past Issues of the Bulletin Board [December 2001] [November 2001] [October 2001] [September 2001] [August 2001] | |||||
| Use our Search function to look up further back-issues of the Bulletin Board. | |||||
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| Copyright ©2001 Pittsburgh Metro Local, APWU, AFL-CIO | |||||
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