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Union Asks IG
To Probe Use of Postal Property

(This article first appeared in the May/June 2008 issue of The American Postal Worker magazine.)

APWU President William Burrus has asked the USPS Office of Inspector General to investigate two important and related issues that affect MVS jobs:

The first involves management’s practice of allowing Highway Contract Route subcontractors to park on postal property free of charge; the second is the policy of allowing subcontractors to alter the price of contracts without re-bidding them — sometimes within weeks of the original bid.

As President Burrus noted in his Feb. 22 request for an investigation, allowing contractors to park their vehicles on postal property without cost is a high-value perk that obscures the true cost of subcontracting.

A parking space for a passenger vehicle costs about $200 a month in downtown Washington. Parking a tractor-trailer is considerably more expensive than that, and although the value of this free parking is not factored into the costs that HCR contractors submit during the bid process, it is reflected in the comparative costs when the Postal Vehicle Service competes for work.

The contractors get to park for free and the USPS operation gets charged for it. Figure that one out.

There are also safety and security issues regarding the parking policy that could have frightening consequences. At the Los Angeles P&DC, contractor vehicles routinely are allowed on postal property carrying passengers who are not required to show identification. And virtually anyone can sneak onto a postal lot inside a fence at the large southern California facility.

Another concern is the fact that contractors store “dead” vehicles in the Los Angeles lot often for months at a time, denying USPS employees the use of parking spaces. This practice continues, despite a Local Memorandum of Understanding that designates the lot for employee parking.

Triple the Cost

In his letter to the OIG, the APWU president pointed out that the USPS often awards an HCR contract at one price and then almost immediately accepts escalated costs. President Burrus noted the example of a contract at the Phoenix P&DC, let out for about $150,000, which 17 days later showed a cost of more than half-a-million dollars: You know something is not kosher when the price of a contract triples in just 17 days.

These policies have important implications for postal workers — especially MVS employees — because they tip the scales in favor of subcontractors at the expense of postal employees. They also raise concern for postal customers who must pay the costs, and for competing contractors who may be unfairly disadvantaged in the bidding process.

POM, DSI, 943/944 Tests

In November, we signed a Memorandum of Understanding settling our grievance protesting changes to the Postal Operations Manual (POM). But as of mid-April, the USPS had not yet issued Article 19 statements rescinding the changes to Chapters 5 and 7. There is simply no good reason for the delay. We will post the settlement on these pages soon. Please read it carefully.

More recently, we received correspondence regarding the posting of the Driver Safety Instructor duty assignments. This issue has been a source of irritation for quite some time, with the Postal Service insisting on posting these jobs district-wide.

However, the contract is clear on this point: AllMVS duty assignments are to be posted installation-wide only. (In its correspondence dated Feb. 21, 2008, the USPS agreed with us that there is no mechanism for a district-wide posting.)

Regarding qualifications for upgraded MVS positions, we posted on the Web site that the APWU and USPS had settled this issue of which exams employees must take to qualify for jobs upgraded in 2001. It seems that the Postal Service has altered its position.

Despite correspondence that offers language to the contrary (e.g., a USPS letter dated Jan. 18, 2006), management now says that the Automotive Mechanic (PS-7) must complete both the 943 and 944 written tests. Although the USPS mischaracterized the Lead Automotive Technician as Lead Mechanic, the correspondence from 2006 lists the levels correctly: The 943 test is for the PS-7, and the 944 test is for PS-8 and PS-9.

We initiated a dispute, and by the time you read this it will most likely have been appealed to arbitration. If you have been denied a promotion to PS-7 because of a failed 944 test, we strongly recommend that a grievance be filed, and a copy forwarded to APWU headquarters.

As a remedy, the grievance should request that the employee be made whole, with his or her seniority adjusted to the date the job was filled. The employee should also be compensated for all lost wages and overtime opportunities.

Insulin-Dependent Step 4

TheMotorVehicle Service Division has reached a pre-arbitration settlement with the USPS rescinding the policy that prevented insulin-dependent diabetics with valid Commercial Drivers Licenses from operating postal vehicles that weigh more than 26,000 pounds.

The settlement resolves case #Q00V-4Q-C05069239, which was filed at the national level onMarch 7, 2005, as an interpretive dispute. It is the culmination of a long-standing disagreement between the APWU and the Postal Service.

The APWU has been fighting for the rights of diabetics — as well as for otherMVS employees with other medical conditions — formore than a decade. During the 1990s, much of the focus was on establishing appropriate procedures for resolving differing opinions between employees’ physicians and the USPS. Those procedures remain in effect.

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