burrheadd
KING Of GIFS
Thought you were done here?
On Topic: UPS attempting to terminate newer driver after filing grievances
- Thread starter OrlandoCitySC
- Start date
Thought you were done here?
Browntown2014
Well-Known Member
Must be nice to have an old man route.
Indecisi0n
Well-Known Member
WhoHello all:
Unfortunately this is about the horrible side of the job. Harassment, intimidation, petty disciplinary measures etc. I'm a newer driver who hasn't been with the company a year yet. After qualifying and becoming a full-fledged employee and union member everything was fantastic for about 6 months.
But then one of the on-car supervisors began getting hostile with me, harassing and intimidating me because I was not performing well enough on a route in his opinion I was covering that was under his supervision and not my own on-car supervisor's. This continued for a couple weeks at least before I asked my union shop steward if there was anything we could do. This was in June. So my shop steward suggested we have a meeting with the Center Manager to discuss the conduct of the On-Car Supervisor who was harassing me. We had said conversation with the Center Manager and end result of that meeting was Center Manager said this On-Car Sup would not be allowed to meet with me anymore without a shop steward present as well as any other On-Car Sup and that if I continued to have any problems with this guy to let the Center Manager know right away.
Ever since then, this On-Car Sup had it out for me continuing to harass me and after discussing with me shop steward again and my union, we decided I should file a grievance for harassment. So I did. Then he left me alone for a little while and all was fine. But then he started targeting me again and trying to nail me for every little thing he could and anything he could. Even riding along with me to supposedly show me where I could improve on that route I was covering but all that happened with that was he helped me all day long and we only got done in time by mere minutes but in order to do so he made me skip my breaks to get the NDA back in time for the day. So that further proved I was being way over-dispatched, which is what I was saying the entire time to begin with. The driver who owned the route I was covering would go out with about 50 stops and had several years worth of area knowledge on that route and they were sending me out with over 100 stops almost daily and sometime up to 130 stops.
Fast forward a couple months into August of this year and he's still harassing me and now even following me around on routes I'd be covering every single day to try and nail me on anything he could. During all this I decided okay, beforehand I had never filed any grievances whatsoever and it wasn't until he became really hostile and nasty with me that I finally decided to file the harassment grievance. But now after more conversations with my union rep and shop steward we decided I should try to opt-in and get on the 9.5 list at my Center because another thing they were doing to me is piling so many stops on me for junk routes and the like that I was having to work 14-hour days almost everyday and by the end of the week always putting the max hours we're allowed.
It took about a month but I was finally able to opt-in. Prior to this I didn't know for sure all the rules about signing up to cover routes for guys on vacation and that if they pulled you off the route you still had 9.5 protection because you didn't volunteer and everything related to that because this same harassing supervisor lied straight to my face several times on covering routes so that he could pull me off the one they were trying to slam me on and assign to a few other drivers willing to run all day and skip their breaks to get those 130 stops or so done.
So now we're into September and I've opted in and am on the 9.5 list so at least they can't make me eat dinner at midnight five days per week because I wouldn't get off until 11pm after an 8:45am start time. So I was feeling like a had a little bit more control over how much they could screw me. But all the while this same supervisor is still trying to find ways to harass me.
So on 9/28/16 this supervisor brings me into the office and tells me he was following me around the previous day on the route I was covering and said he observed me clocked out for lunch but still inside the place I was at for lunch five more minutes after I showed myself punched back in. All I did was take a piss after I finished eating and headed back out to my truck. In said meeting he told me I was to be clocked out while using the restroom. I've never been asked to clock out to use the restroom for any job I've ever had in my entire life. Not to mention it is illegal. Afterward, I asked my shop steward who was in the meeting and my union rep afterward to give me some advice and both said to either go deliver a few more stops and then stop somewhere different to use the restroom or to use the restroom before my lunch and then clocking out immediately afterward or if I had to go bad enough to go while still on break and make it a part of my lunch.
So I never did use the bathroom after my break ever again but did sometimes used it before my lunch and clocking out which still I thought to be fine because having to use the bathroom is just a part of everyday life. And I never abused it nor could it ever be construed that way. In my opinion it was better to do it that way than to be miles away from a bathroom and needing to go and then having to drive way out of my way and stop delivering to go to a gas station or something to use the restroom, which would take way longer than trying to hold it until I was at a reasonable stopping point at go just before lunch. Like during all of our childhoods when your mother would call out it's time for dinner so go get washed up and use the bathroom if you need to before you come to the table. Made perfect sense to me anyway and like I said it's not like I was abusing bathroom usage by any stretch of the imagination. I thought I was doing them a favor saving them time, money and fuel not driving way out of my way and abandoning my route to go find a restroom and go and then going way back out to where I was and continuing my route.
So this past Monday, I called in to see if I was working because I am a newer driver, still lower on the seniority list, and Monday's I am sometimes laid off for the day because it's slow and the volume is low. The office clerk gal answered the phone and said I was scheduled to work so to come on in. Upon arriving I went in the office and looked at the board and my name wasn't by any route and so I asked the same office clerk gal what route I was on and that's when my Center Manager and my own On-Car Supervisor (not the On-Car Sup who had been harassing me the whole time) swarmed around me and both stated I was NOT working but was needed in the Center Manager's office for a meeting immediately. And I was like great, here we go!
Before I went in though my shop steward (a great man) pulled me aside in private real quick and said they were going to try to terminate me for "stealing time." That's how they have to frame it, as theft, because you can't just come out and tell someone they have to clock out to use the bathroom. So my shop steward told me how the meeting would proceed and then we went in the Center Manager's office where my own On-Car Supervisor, the Center Manager, some Security Loss Prevention guy were waiting for us.
The meeting commences and the Security guy is doing all the talking and stated that him and my On-Car Supervisor were following me around Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday of the previous week (week of October 10th, 2016) and that they observed me "stealing time" these three days which they explain as "discrepancies in my timecard activities." So the Security guy is doing the questioning and he says on Tuesday we observed you going into Taco Bell at 2:20pm, yet you did not clock out until 2:30pm, can you explain this discrepancy in your timecard? To which I would say yes, there is no discrepancy in my timecard I was taking a. Is that alright? The exact same line of questioning continued for the three days in question.
The HUGE kicker is that the week prior to when they were following me around (the week of October 3rd, 2016) they pulled me off the route I signed up for all week long and also ignored my 9.5 rights everyday so I ended up filing four grievances for seniority violations for pulling me off the route since I was the only one who signed up to cover the route in question for a driver on vacation and then I filed three more grievances for the three days I was forced to work more than 9.5 hours. So a total of seven grievances I filed and turned in on 10/10/16 at around 5pm. I came in in street clothes and turned them in because I was laid off that Monday. Then, less than 24 hours later, Tuesday 10/11/16 when I was working, this Security Loss Prevention guy and my On-Car Supervisor "randomly" decide to start following me around for the week to look for any wrongdoing? Yeah right!! This is so crystal clear that this is just continued intimidation, harassment and more retaliation.
But the meeting concludes with my Center Manager saying he is taking me out of service for "stealing time" and I will be issued a termination letter, which I will receive in the mail, and that I will have to turn in my browns.
So now I'm waiting for said termination letter and then the next step is a Center level hearing, followed by almost 100% sure another hearing in Seattle the 2nd week of November. I have complete confidence in my union rep and his ability to punch thousands of holes in their BS attempts to fire me but I'm still shocked at UPS' behavior.
I've never had a job where harassment, intimidation and retaliation was so blatant and sadistic. Any advice welcome.
s at a Taco Bell ?
35years
Gravy route
No,
The 3rd district court ruled in 2015 restroom breaks of short duration (20 minutes or less) were compensatable in all work situations. In addition specific rulings have made it clear that "mobile work crews" enjoy the same access to paid rest breaks.
BrownTexas
Well-Known Member
I don't agree. ODS at any time can see that you have nothing to do. It is their job to dispatch. Not my job to let them know. They might get upset, but no way you get fired.
BrownTexas
Well-Known Member
I think you get your job back if you have a great union rep. But I would be smarter next time. Rookie move for sure. You call them out on their wrong doings, you better not have any of your own.
OrlandoCitySC
Well-Known Member
Little over a year if you count peak driving but just under a year as to when I became full-time permanent.
Mustacheyouaquestion
60 minute lunch
When you gotta go, you gotta go. No law says when you are allowed to go or to go when it is convenient for the company. This load of cr@p (PUN) will be overturned when they look at the record of harassment.
OrlandoCitySC
Well-Known Member
New driver pretty much. Absolutely no record whatsoever. And I had no record of anything either when they began harassing me for no reason before I ever filed anything against them.
35years
Gravy route
2015 3rd district court decision:
Perez v. American Future Systems, Inc., Dist. Court, ED Pennsylvania 2015 - Google Scholar
and here:
FLSA 101: When do you have to pay employees for rest breaks?
Note that one of the 2 exceptions to the "bright line rule" is extending an authorized break with an unauthorized one. What the OP did in extending his break is not protected.
The court ruled that rest room breaks under 20 minutes are paid. Prior OSHA rulings left the question of being paid or not up in the air.
Prior rulings have stated;
1 You can take rest room breaks immediately (don't have to wait till you are near a restroom or on break)
2 Company provides transportation to restroom
3 Restroom must have running water
4 Restroom breaks of under 20 minutes are reasonable
So, if you break trace to use THE NEAREST public rest room at Taco Bell, you don't have to clock out unless you then stay for a meal etc.
Perez v. American Future Systems, Inc., Dist. Court, ED Pennsylvania 2015 - Google Scholar
and here:
FLSA 101: When do you have to pay employees for rest breaks?
Note that one of the 2 exceptions to the "bright line rule" is extending an authorized break with an unauthorized one. What the OP did in extending his break is not protected.
The court ruled that rest room breaks under 20 minutes are paid. Prior OSHA rulings left the question of being paid or not up in the air.
Prior rulings have stated;
1 You can take rest room breaks immediately (don't have to wait till you are near a restroom or on break)
2 Company provides transportation to restroom
3 Restroom must have running water
4 Restroom breaks of under 20 minutes are reasonable
So, if you break trace to use THE NEAREST public rest room at Taco Bell, you don't have to clock out unless you then stay for a meal etc.
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OrlandoCitySC
Well-Known Member
I did read the contract, several times over. And I can pretty much tell everything it says without even opening the book now. Plus, I was doing exactly what my Union Rep told me to do. Whenever they would harass me I would call him and ask what should I do. Then he would tell me and I would do it. The only ones caught red handed are management. You don't have to clock out to piss or poop. PERIOD. Therefore, there is no case, and never was a case. It's all a load of crap. If these idiots were true investigators or detectives trying to build cases to put criminals behind bars, Charlie Manson would be sitting next to you at a stop light in his brand new Volvo.
W
What The Hawk?
Guest
That's really ed up if you ask me. Everyone's gotta pee/take a at some point.
ed up if you ask me. Everyone's gotta pee/take a at some point.
OrlandoCitySC
Well-Known Member
Your P.I. skills are worthless in this case.
Let me tell you a story....have a seat
Honestly, I'll be truthful here.
I've been fired before. Did something stupid.
Hated the center manager, but he used his better P.I. skills to get me.
I sat home for 2 weeks not knowing if I'd work again.
Got my second chance, and make sure I don't make mistakes.
You have to be the bigger man and learn from it.
I did and so can you !
This job is worth the hassle if you remember you are ALWAYS being watched.
Thanks! This On-Car Sup in question used to be the Center Manager whose guts everyone hated but then he was demoted back down to On-Car Sup so maybe that's why he's such a jerk.
OrlandoCitySC
Well-Known Member
That is what I said but several, and I mean several, 25+ year drivers whom I know well, knew before I even worked there, all confirmed it. He swung and missed is the story. But later I guess that driver lost his job because the center manager rode with him for three days in a row later down the road on a rural route and they really didn't get along obviously so on the third day the driver ended up physically removing the center manager from his package car and driving off and leaving him in the middle of nowhere. So after that he did get canned but I'm sure he was planning on quitting at that point. I mean I wouldn't expect my job back after all that.
35years
Gravy route
I completely agree except in 2015 the 3rd District court ruled about rest room time being on'off the clock. Rest room breaks up to 20 minutes in duration are paid time.
Perez v. American Future Systems, Inc., Dist. Court, ED Pennsylvania 2015 - Google Scholar
The 2 exceptions are extending an authorized break (which could be argued in this case) and breaks to breast feed infants because there is specific wording in the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act which states breastfeeding time must be provided but not compensated.
Now...
What if UPS provides 2 (10 minute) paid breaks; If not already taken, could UPS force the driver to use this compensated time for restroom breaks?
OrlandoCitySC
Well-Known Member
Who
Me, when I run out of lunch meat and bread. Otherwise, eeew.
W
What The Hawk?
Guest
I work at a Taco Bell and people come in to use the PUBLIC restroom all the time. What the
, that dude has a stick up his ass and you shouldn't have been disciplined for doing something natural.
OrlandoCitySC
Well-Known Member
Have a link handy, I want to print it out.
35years
Gravy route
See my other posts for the links...
Or here...
Perez v. American Future Systems, Inc., Dist. Court, ED Pennsylvania 2015 - Google Scholar
Your situation might not be covered though. Extending breaks is specifically excluded in the ruling.
Also:
Casetext
Judge Carter concluded that "if an employer has `expressly and unambiguously communicated do the employee that: (1) the authorized break may only last for a specific length of time; (2) Any extension of such break is contrary to the employer's rules; and (3) Any extension of such a break will be punished,' then unauthorized extensions of authorized breaks need not be compensated." Lillehagen, 2014 WL 6989230, at *10 (citation omitted).
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