Latest / United We Scan / Candidate Q & A Part 4

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Candidate Q & A Part 4 · United We Scan

• 0:14
  Welcome to the United We Scan Podcast, the podcast by rural
• 0:18
  carriers for rural carriers. The views expressed in this
• 0:22
  podcast are of the presenters and the presenters only and do
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  not represent the views, opinions, or strategies of the
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  Please leave a comment or question for us below.
• 0:47
  Thank you. Now here are the hosts of the
• 0:50
  United We Scan podcast. Welcome back, everybody.
• 0:54
  Episode 80, we're gonna be doing our candidate Q&A Part 4 today.
• 1:00
  Hopefully we'll get through these last bit of questions and
• 1:03
  then we'll post up another round so we'll can do a couple more
• 1:07
  prior leading up into National Convention.
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  Before we start, the Q and AI have an e-mail that I want to
• 1:14
  read and answer to, but let's start off with the normal
• 1:19
  conversation. How was your week, James?
• 1:22
  Well the mail was about normal for the post office for me.
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  No major issues except for somebody had a rollaway runaway
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  in our district so we had a nice stand up talk about that.
• 1:35
  Seems to happen once in a great while when those those occur.
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  Our area was in the news recently for a city carrier
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  driving up on people's lawns to deliver to the mailbox on the
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  sidewalk instead of doing it like The Walking route it's
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  supposed to be. So I went out there and actually
• 1:53
  checked the area and yeah, it's a walking route for sure.
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  I'm thinking managerial directive probably told them you
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  need to start going faster on this route so you can grab
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  another pivot, you know, our office time and all that stuff.
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  So I don't know what's going to happen for that guy, but yeah,
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  that's one big mess that they're getting themselves into there.
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  And then ended up talking with quite a few carriers this week
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  about issues going on. And unfortunately, it's sad to
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  hear that these things are happening to carriers even now.
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  And I mean, it's just one thing after another that that the
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  carriers need help with. They need their stewards with,
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  they need their AD Rs, their D Rs involved in and they're
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  getting ignored. So other than that, that's
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  pretty much been my week. How's your week been?
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  Toasty. Hot, very hot.
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  Humidity is up, heat is up, but other than that, mail volumes
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  been down significantly. There's actually been a day
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  where I've gotten done before 2:00.
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  It's a little strange. Packages are staying about the
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  same. The other day yesterday, most of
• 3:10
  my packages actually went in the mailbox.
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  So it made it a little bit easier of a day not having to
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  dismount as many times and got to stay in the AC of the Metris.
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  Other than that, everything's been normal.
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  Everything's been the same. So can't really complain about
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  you, Bill. Oh God, I'm suffering through,
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  you know, another week off as my medical.
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  I hope to be back by the 22nd. But you know, again, that that's
• 3:39
  up to management and doesn't matter to me because I'll I'll
• 3:42
  just take the more time off. It doesn't hurt me at all.
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  But it is funny because being off doesn't mean I'm out of
• 3:51
  communication. And you said earlier that get a
• 3:54
  lot of comments from people at the Tennessee State convention
• 3:58
  and the United we scan podcasters were the topic of
• 4:02
  discussion, you know, through their 2 1/2 day event.
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  I had a very interesting call from a young lady who got EP for
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  not wearing her shoulder harness seat belt on shoulder harness
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  was behind her and forward her some information that would make
• 4:18
  it easier for her local union representative to blow that one
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  out of the water. But it's, you know, she's not a
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  new carrier is she's 17 years into this profession.
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  And for the life of me, I can't understand why they keep coming
• 4:35
  after us. Well, that's easy because they
• 4:37
  can and they get away with it. The the union steward that's
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  handling this case would have been able to throw this thing
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  out with one discussion with the postmaster.
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  And this is where James is going to have to be, you know, hands
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  on involved, making sure that these people are better trained
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  than what they are, that they're not sitting back and collecting
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  their paychecks from the NSS for a job they're not doing.
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  We've already had, you know, one round of clear outs from the
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  NSS, but they were to be expected.
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  Now we're having realignments and just like the SD and CS,
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  they don't make any damn sense. But that'll be addressed once we
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  we get in office. Other than that, I mean, life's
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  good. Humidity is high, temperature's
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  high. And you know, life goes on and
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  I'm always available wherever, and people do take advantage of
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  that. So my phone's always on for him.
• 5:32
  About you Kristen, how was your week?
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  My week wasn't too bad I Monday was hell in a handbag as usual
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  and Tuesday I was nothing and I was done at I was back to the
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  office at 12:58 Wednesday, yeah you know normal day.
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  Thursday I was in the office all day playing mapping facilitator
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  since our postmaster is out of the office currently or who
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  knows how long and our supervisor has no clue how to do
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  mapping. So I was asked to actually
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  facilitate again. So I got to sleep in on Thursday
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  and enjoyed that and went in a little bit later, did my mapping
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  of my route and waited for the carriers to start coming back to
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  get their mapping done. So Friday was another normal
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  day. I worked my K day yesterday
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  because we do have a carrier out right now.
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  Hurt himself and another carrier absolutely had to have his K day
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  off due to some vet appointments.
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  So I'm like, yeah, I'll work so he can make sure he's off.
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  But other than that, you know, I'm looking forward to having a
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  three day week this coming week. I'm did take leave.
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  I was able to get leave on Friday and my daughter's having
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  a another anatomy scan 32 weeks from the sounds of it, maybe
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  he's catching up and growth and we'll see what's going on and
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  what the next steps will be come Friday.
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  For some reason the supervisor asked me to work Saturday.
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  I'm thinking, no, I already have leave protecting my K day.
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  You're not gonna, you can't force me.
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  And thanks for asking, but no, not doing it.
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  So yeah, my week wasn't all that bad.
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  Really, really good. So so we're going to get going
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  here. I am going to go over this
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  e-mail real quick and make a few responses and then we'll dive
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  into our Q&A questions. So I got this the other day.
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  Very, very well. Written e-mail I will say that
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  this I I was fairly impressed with the wording says greetings
• 7:46
  United scan fam I hope this message finds you well.
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  I wanted to take a moment to anonymous anonymously express
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  some concerns regarding the challenges faced by Rural
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  Carrier Associates RC AS within the United States Postal
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  Service. As dedicated employees, we
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  strive to fulfill our responsibilities with diligence
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  and commitment. However, several issues
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  significantly impact our quality of life and job satisfaction.
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  First, I wanted to acknowledge the hard work and dedication of
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  all regular carriers. Ioffer my utmost gratitude and
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  respect to them. However, the conditions for RC
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  As are particularly disheartening in war attention.
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  One of the most pressing concerns is the requirement for
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  RC AS to work primarily on weekends and holidays.
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  This schedule deprives us of valuable time with our families
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  during these important occasions.
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  The inability to celebrate holidays and weekends with our
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  loved ones takes a considerable emotional toll, affecting our
• 8:51
  overall well-being and morale. We signed up for this job with
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  the hope that it'll be worthwhile in the end, but the
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  reality often falls short. Additionally, the lack of
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  benefits for RC AS further exuberates these challenges.
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  Despite our hard work and dedication, we do not receive
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  the same benefits as full time employees, such as retirement
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  plans and paid time off. This disparity not only effects
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  our financial security but also makes it difficult to balance
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  work and personal life effectively.
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  Another significant issue is the constant pressure and backlash
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  from upper management. It often feels as though there
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  is a little consideration for the physical and mental strain
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  imposed on us. Prioritizing speed over safety
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  is a serious concern, as safety should always come first.
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  The stress of walking on egg shells during the 90 day
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  probationary period takes a substantial mental toll as well,
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  especially when we are being told that we are getting Npos
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  and higher management in trouble.
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  Insight. I've never been out past 7:30
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  when I first started subbing MY48K.
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  Most recently I've been getting back before 4:30, but that's
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  still not good enough. Many of us wonder if we will
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  actually make it through the probation period or if we will
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  be let go without fair consideration.
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  It raises the question of why RCA protection under the Union
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  only begins after 90 days. I believe that providing RCA's
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  with more equitable benefits in creating a more predictable and
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  balanced schedule would greatly enhance job satisfaction and
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  employee retention. Moreover, it would demonstrate a
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  commitment to the well-being of all employees, recognizing the
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  crucial role that even Rcas play in the excess of USPS.
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  Thank you for taking the time to consider these concerns.
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  I appreciate any insights you can provide to help me better
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  understand these issues and bring them to light.
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  All right, So I very, very well written e-mail.
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  I, I, I do have to say I was thoroughly impressed and I, I do
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  get the concerns as somebody who was an RCA for nearly nine
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  years, I'm going to lead off with when I first hired in in
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  December of 2014, RC as had absolutely no benefits
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  whatsoever. We did not have insurance
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  available to us. We did not have annual leave
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  available to us with the exception only if you were a
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  designated 79 or designated 74. Those were the two, only two
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  exceptions. RC as had back initially, when a
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  little bit later on we did get the insurance benefits offered
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  to us, that primarily came down because of Obamacare going into
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  effect and the health insurance we had at the time was crap and
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  you had to work a minimum of so many hours in order to be able
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  to eligible for it and all that stuff.
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  That has actually gotten better. They switched providers, rates
• 12:10
  have gotten better, premiums have gotten better.
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  But again, you know, like I said.
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  When I first heard that was it. We only worked Saturdays or when
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  the regular took time off. When I hired into an office that
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  is nearly three times as big as the one that I am in now, you
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  know I we were nearly fully staffed.
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  We had 1416 routes total between the main office and the two RMP
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  OS11 aux route and that was in one of the RMPOS.
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  We had 15 Subs when I hired. When I got hired in we the other
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  office had two J routes. They had alternating Saturdays
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  so the one sub was fine. At that RMPO we were fully
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  staffed. This job has always been a feast
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  or famine. Literally relief days,
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  predominantly at the time before the formula offices were getting
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  were, were blowing up, Yeah, 'cause people couldn't keep
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  relieve replacements or couldn't find them.
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  So when you had a fully staffed office, you worked Saturdays.
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  That was the only day you were guaranteed.
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  That's the only day I worked for quite a long time was Saturdays
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  unless my regular took vacation or was going to convention or
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  conferences or boosters. And I think I was good six
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  months into the job before I even was placed on another
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  route, which happened to be the four hour aux route was the 2nd
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  route I ever ran and it was six months in.
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  So yeah, you know, there has been changes.
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  And then with the most recent contract that yes, did expire
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  back on May 20th is when RCAS started earning annual leave.
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  So I mean, it took that long for RCAS to start earning annual
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  leave. Now the only difference with a
• 14:11
  designation 74 and 79 is you also earn sick leave on top of
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  the annual leave and you do earn the annual leave for all hours
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  work, not just when you're working your 7479 assignment
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  like it was in the past. So that there has been
• 14:28
  improvements on that. Yes, there is this job again is
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  you are a relief carrier, your job is to cover when a regular
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  is not there, whether it's their relief day vacation or if
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  they're out on medical or whatever the beads needs are of
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  them not running their route. That is the purpose of the
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  relief carrier is that position to get your foot into the door
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  PTF positions. Now especially with the formula
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  offices, it is a career leave replacement.
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  So you do have those career benefits and you, you know, you
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  do potentially move up quicker than an RCA would because the RC
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  As are going to be lower in seniority to the PTF 'cause
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  there are a career position. So they do have the TSP and the
• 15:19
  better choices for health insurance and what not.
• 15:25
  Like I said, there have been drastic change.
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  There have been improvements to the RC As and benefits and
• 15:31
  what's offered to them throughout the years.
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  But initially when this job when I like I said when I first
• 15:36
  started because I'm returning to me because I've started before
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  James, I started before Toasty. So I know it was like to walk in
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  and you only work in the one day a week, you have absolutely no
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  benefits whatsoever. And I think at the time, the
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  rate that I hired in that was 1575, maybe right around 16.
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  I think there was a wage increase from the time that I
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  got hired into the time I actually started.
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  So, so it was right in there. So it has gotten a little bit
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  better in that aspect. But again, it's not and I and I
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  understand many, many, many RC as are working 4050 sixty plus
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  hours a week. I've been there as an RCA.
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  I know what that's like. I've been, I was around prior to
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  Amazon. I know it was like to not have
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  to work Sundays and holidays except for during the Christmas
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  overtime period was the only time that we would come in on a
• 16:38
  Sunday to run packages. So it lightened the load a
• 16:41
  little bit for Monday. And then I was there when Amazon
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  came in and now I'm giving up Sundays and holidays to run
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  Amazon. I've seen the progression of it
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  and I've also seen to where you're going from fully staffed
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  offices down to offices that may only have one or two Rcas.
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  Before I went full time I was the one and only RCA in my
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  office for six routes and an aux route the only one during
• 17:10
  Christmas time. I have literally experienced it
• 17:15
  all in, in a 10 year time frame for the most part.
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  So I understand that. I, I, I thoroughly do.
• 17:24
  And I agree, management doesn't need to treat us that the way
• 17:28
  that they are treating us. And that comes even down to new
• 17:32
  regulars and even regular carriers in general.
• 17:34
  We're getting treated like dirt just as much as our CAS are our
• 17:39
  CAS In most instances, unless they're brown nosing management,
• 17:46
  they've got a target on their back.
• 17:48
  And do I agree with it? Absolutely not.
• 17:50
  Do I want to fight for every single one of those Rcas that
• 17:54
  enjoy their job and want to be able to to benefit for, you
• 17:59
  know, getting through it to be a regular and have those benefits
• 18:05
  and have a retirement to look forward to?
• 18:08
  Absolutely. I do it.
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  It's I don't agree with it, but like I said, their husband and
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  I'm just going to come back with the over the last nine years
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  going on 10 years, there has been progression on the RC as
• 18:24
  and having benefits. They say if you started 10 years
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  ago, you had absolutely no benefits whatsoever, none.
• 18:31
  Anybody else want to add anything real quick?
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  Well, I'm going to go on the next part that that the e-mail
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  said. And that was the no protection
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  within your 90 days. That is the one biggest problem
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  I have with the Postal Service and the rural craft.
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  We are the only union in the Postal Service that does not
• 18:59
  protect its carriers that don't know any better.
• 19:03
  We are the only union in the craft that does not allow
• 19:05
  stewards or other carriers to file grievances on behalf of the
• 19:11
  contract. I'm still looking for the
• 19:13
  specific language in the contract our in our MO, us with
• 19:17
  management or the constitution of our craft to find where it
• 19:21
  says that stewards can't do that.
• 19:23
  I haven't found it. If somebody has that, they can
• 19:25
  send it to me, but I haven't seen it in actual writing.
• 19:30
  But I've been told it. I've been told that in your 90
• 19:33
  days, you have no protection. I've been told that you can file
• 19:38
  grievances in your 90 days, but management will just fire you in
• 19:42
  retaliation for it for some unknown reason that they're
• 19:45
  going to come up with to make it so that way there's no way that
• 19:48
  you can fight it at all. I've been told that you can
• 19:52
  grieve for everything except termination.
• 19:55
  I've heard all different kinds of ways about it.
• 19:57
  But until we have a leadership that stands and protects all
• 20:02
  carriers. From hostile management, as
• 20:06
  stated in this e-mail, our 90 day probationary period Rcas are
• 20:12
  paying dues for absolutely nothing in those 90 days and
• 20:17
  it's 90 working days, not calendar days in the rural
• 20:20
  craft. So you could do it in 90 days,
• 20:24
  you could have 90 working days in three months, four months.
• 20:28
  But there are carriers out there that go to the one year mark,
• 20:32
  which is the other end of that 90 working days or one year,
• 20:36
  whichever comes first. That's another problem that I
• 20:40
  have. It should be 90 calendar days.
• 20:42
  Well, with the city. Craft it's 90 working days or
• 20:46
  120 calendar days. I could get on board with seeing
• 20:51
  something more similar to that 120 calendar days or 90 days
• 20:55
  worked. Now, the reason why I I am going
• 20:59
  to think that it was that way again comes down to a fully
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  staffed office. Like back in the day when you
• 21:07
  had people on a wait list to get into the post office and you
• 21:12
  were only working one day a week and maybe.
• 21:18
  A. A.
• 21:18
  A full. Week or two here and there, if
• 21:21
  your regular one on vacation or maybe got injured or or
• 21:25
  something like that. And so then you may have a few
• 21:28
  more. So it may have taken a full year
• 21:31
  to actually rate those 90 days worked.
• 21:35
  Again, I think that is another policy, not policy, but
• 21:38
  something contractual that is outdated for the times that we
• 21:42
  have now. I really think that 90 working
• 21:46
  days or one calendar year is outdated given of the times that
• 21:51
  we're in now. Well, do you want a a person who
• 21:54
  started last century's opinion? Absolutely.
• 22:00
  When when I joined the post office as an RCA we were all
• 22:05
  guaranteed Saturdays. We had a non formula office and
• 22:08
  weren't expected to sit around by the phone that like they want
• 22:12
  you to nowadays because we had a sufficient number of of Subs.
• 22:16
  The problem of it is that as management moved into this
• 22:19
  micromanaging the atmosphere, the environment changed and they
• 22:24
  were demanding that you be available.
• 22:25
  You, you had to be on call. And of course, when, when you're
• 22:29
  working one day a week and you and you're working on apov route
• 22:33
  and you have a dedicated, have a dedicated vehicle that can, you
• 22:37
  know, work for both your family life and, you know, delivering
• 22:40
  a, a route makes it hard on people working one day a week.
• 22:46
  With the shortage of carriers, everybody's getting more than
• 22:48
  one day a week. You know, I, I'd say in 70% of
• 22:53
  our offices across the country, especially if you have a
• 22:56
  Princess in your office like you do Kristen, you know, you have
• 22:59
  to be available all the time. But the fact of the matter is
• 23:02
  that A, it's a part time job. B.
• 23:05
  They don't have to guarantee you anything more than one day a
• 23:08
  week. That's.
• 23:09
  And and that's if. You're assigned AK route.
• 23:13
  If you're assigned AJ route, you're only guaranteed two days
• 23:16
  a month, and if you're and if you're assigned an H route,
• 23:20
  well. Good.
• 23:20
  Luck. I've been there.
• 23:23
  I've been there. When I transferred into my
• 23:25
  office, I transferred into an H route.
• 23:28
  The carrier was out on OWCP. They came back three weeks after
• 23:33
  I transferred in. I had That was the first time I
• 23:36
  ever had two pay periods with zero hours.
• 23:41
  And you know, if you, if you follow along the conversation,
• 23:43
  like I said, it's a part time job and that's how it started
• 23:46
  out for me. And it got to the point where I
• 23:50
  had more hours available to me. I was fortunate enough to be
• 23:54
  able to go to 3rd shift on my primary job, which I took so
• 23:57
  that I can make a doing the mail during the day.
• 24:01
  Not everybody has that opportunity.
• 24:03
  You know, they don't have the job opportunities in their small
• 24:05
  towns out in the middle of Iowa have, you know, in suburban
• 24:09
  areas where you know, there's more than abundance of, you
• 24:12
  know, people available to work or not work, you know, in some
• 24:15
  cases. But you're trying to survive on
• 24:18
  a part time job with the promise of a career.
• 24:22
  And I think that's the frustrating part because you're
• 24:24
  not getting any benefits, you know, and even if you are now
• 24:28
  getting the medical benefits and it's at a discounted rate, it's
• 24:31
  still something out of your pocket.
• 24:33
  And if you're only working one or two days a week, what do you
• 24:36
  have left to, you know, to pay the bills with?
• 24:38
  I mean, there, there's got to be some kind of balance there and
• 24:42
  it, and it's a very delicate balance.
• 24:44
  And I, and I don't know the answer to it.
• 24:46
  OK, I'll admit it. I don't know the answer to it.
• 24:50
  And you know, the fact that they take you, you know, move you
• 24:52
  into offices up to 50 miles away is not an appropriate answer for
• 24:56
  me because of the fact that, you know, you can have a 10 hour day
• 25:00
  turned into a 14 hour day because you're spending three
• 25:02
  hours traveling. That that just doesn't, it
• 25:05
  doesn't float in my case, OK, as far as, you know, the 90 day.
• 25:11
  And, and this is what pisses me off is that the union waits
• 25:14
  several pay periods, but then they start taking out union dues
• 25:19
  before your 90 days are up because they're not looking at
• 25:21
  90 calendar date, just 90 calendar.
• 25:24
  It's supposed to be 90 working days.
• 25:26
  So if it takes you six months to get those 90 days, unions taking
• 25:31
  funds out of your paycheck, whether you got one day a week
• 25:34
  or whether you got five days a week or 6.
• 25:37
  And that's a hit. That's a big hit.
• 25:39
  And that's, and James was well to point out that don't create
• 25:43
  the PTF positions just so that they they can pay their full
• 25:47
  share of the union dues, keep their dues down at a sub level
• 25:51
  because of the fact that they can't afford the extra burden of
• 25:56
  paying the, you know, a full member's dues.
• 26:00
  There's, there's a lot of things that have to be and, and some of
• 26:04
  them won't get resolved in the near future, but we have to
• 26:07
  start working on them and we have to work on them together.
• 26:11
  One of the things that we need to work on most desperately is
• 26:14
  management's attitude, because until that change, our, our
• 26:19
  entire work environment is going to be in flux with micromanaging
• 26:23
  the threats to hostility, you know, the disparity of treatment
• 26:27
  in some people's cases. We have to get that under
• 26:30
  control because until we get management to do their job, be
• 26:35
  responsible, adhere to the contract, and then the NSS has
• 26:39
  to turn around and worse, their hand so that we're not settling
• 26:43
  for language. We're settling for financial
• 26:45
  penalties because we are the aggrieved party.
• 26:48
  There shouldn't be the language for that's doesn't, you know,
• 26:52
  worse words than or as in the case in the mini mail surveys,
• 26:56
  no action required. I mean, folks, we're in the
• 27:00
  battle for our lives here and our livelihoods and the people
• 27:04
  behind us and we've got to do something this year because God
• 27:08
  help us if Don Madison stays president.
• 27:10
  I, I, I, I fear for the, the health of the union.
• 27:14
  I really do. And there any minute end of the
• 27:17
  mini rant. And for those that don't know,
• 27:20
  during a lot of these conferences and conventions, Don
• 27:25
  has mentioned possibly making almost every office formula
• 27:30
  office as a solution. And to me that just that kind of
• 27:36
  rains my years. I don't like being a formula
• 27:38
  office. I loved having my Mondays.
• 27:40
  I have I volunteered Mondays before we went formula.
• 27:42
  Now I'm on Thursdays, which isn't bad.
• 27:44
  You know, it's a nice break in the middle of the week, but not
• 27:48
  even going to something like, well, maybe we can do a rotating
• 27:51
  schedule or even putting anything else.
• 27:53
  He just says every office should be formula office.
• 27:55
  That's what City side does. So if you think it's bad now,
• 27:58
  it's going to get worse. And like Bill said, I I fear too
• 28:02
  for the health of the the union if that goes through.
• 28:06
  I agree. I'm I I worry every day.
• 28:11
  You, you know, ladies and gentlemen, you, you got to worry
• 28:13
  about the fact that you have a national board whose only
• 28:17
  interest is padding their retirement, not carrying their
• 28:20
  routes, not being held accountable.
• 28:23
  And this National Convention, we can make them accountable,
• 28:27
  voting them out. If, if you want things to
• 28:29
  change, then you better vote for change.
• 28:32
  And I don't want to be president for four, 5-6 years.
• 28:36
  I just want to be in there for a couple years so that we can
• 28:38
  establish a, a framework that the groundwork in regards to the
• 28:43
  national steward system becoming the, the shining knight for the
• 28:48
  rural carrier craft. You know, making them
• 28:51
  accountable, make giving them the, the arms they need, the
• 28:54
  battle management everywhere, anywhere and every time.
• 28:59
  I don't want to be there forever.
• 29:00
  I, I've, you know, got grandchildren, but I don't see
• 29:04
  this union left to the, to the vices of these individuals that
• 29:08
  are now in position because they don't care.
• 29:13
  How many, how many people know about Don Madsen having a route
• 29:17
  320 miles away from where he lives in California?
• 29:20
  How many know that Mike Swain has ADR out of New Jersey,
• 29:25
  Jersey for PA 2 headed on a route, another route while he's
• 29:29
  ADR because it was closer to home and bigger than the one he
• 29:33
  had. How many times has Ronnie done
• 29:35
  that when he was in Tennessee? You know, these people are only
• 29:40
  acting in their own self-interest.
• 29:42
  And when, you know, when I make a comment about, you know,
• 29:44
  Kristen going to a concert and she'll she'll get her to leave
• 29:48
  denied by me, you know, we're there for service, OK, You can
• 29:52
  have your vacations, you know, and and trust me, I don't need
• 29:55
  to bother you on vacation. But when it comes to, you know,
• 29:58
  Monday to Sunday, 84, seven, like 711, we're going to be
• 30:02
  open. Absolutely.
• 30:04
  And that's our that's our job, that's our responsibility.
• 30:08
  We we had one comment in here I want I have to agree with voting
• 30:12
  in our AD, Rs and Dr. positions instead of being appointed.
• 30:16
  I do have to agree, I I I could definitely see where voting in
• 30:21
  the ADR and Dr. positions at like state convention would be
• 30:27
  better in some cases. I can see, I can see both sides
• 30:31
  of that I can see both sides of. That I can too.
• 30:34
  I I I can too. But I do agree that the
• 30:38
  accountability of being elected into that position would be
• 30:43
  greater than just being appointed.
• 30:46
  And I also think that it would also leave them to be held more
• 30:52
  accountable by the membership in that aspect.
• 30:56
  But at the same time, there is something to be said about an
• 30:59
  ADR and Dr. that actually have been doing the job.
• 31:04
  You know, we're, we're area stewards that got selected to do
• 31:08
  the position because the state board believes that they were
• 31:12
  the best candidate for the job and they make the arguments to
• 31:15
  the national board to appoint them that way.
• 31:18
  So I understand both sides of it.
• 31:20
  If you have a good state board with good AD Rs or good D Rs,
• 31:25
  you're you're golden. But then you have the ones that
• 31:28
  get into those positions and then decide that, OK, I'm not
• 31:33
  talking to this person because I don't like them anymore.
• 31:36
  I'm not going to respond to them for a week just to make them
• 31:40
  sweat, things like that. Or in some instances I'll get
• 31:44
  back to you when they don't, you know.
• 31:46
  And you know, I am also worried about the direction that this
• 31:50
  union is going to go, not only with this next contract because
• 31:55
  like Bill said, office is going formula.
• 31:58
  You know, we you spent your RCA years, years, a lot of people, a
• 32:03
  lot of years only having weekdays off.
• 32:07
  So becoming a regular carrier and having that Saturday or that
• 32:11
  Monday off was a benefit that you got when you went regular,
• 32:16
  and now Mastan and the crew want to take that away so they can
• 32:21
  get full dues from PTFSI Don't think so.
• 32:24
  I put forth a resolution this year that passed in Michigan
• 32:28
  that RCA's pay half dues between RCAPTFS pay half dues between
• 32:35
  RCA's and regular carriers because they only gained the
• 32:40
  benefit of a guaranteed one extra route a week.
• 32:45
  So they get 2 two days a week, but they have to pay regular
• 32:50
  carrier dues. No, and I don't think well.
• 32:54
  James, that'll cost us $11 million in dues.
• 32:58
  I need those $11 million, OK. And and.
• 33:00
  If you're a PTF in in a smaller office and you only have.
• 33:04
  If math. And look, OK, if you're a PTF in
• 33:08
  a smaller office and you're only assigned two or three K routes,
• 33:12
  you're only working two or three days a week and you are a career
• 33:15
  employee, You also are, you have to remember, not only you're
• 33:18
  paying, you know, depending if you have family coverage on your
• 33:22
  health insurance, you're, I mean, for example, I have rural
• 33:25
  carrier benefit plan. I paid $234 a paycheck.
• 33:30
  So yeah, yeah, you're making a few dollars more an hour, But
• 33:34
  now you're having health insurance, now you're having
• 33:36
  your pension, you're first take it out.
• 33:39
  Now you're having your TSP taken out.
• 33:42
  Now you're paying full, full dues out in the excess of 30
• 33:46
  plus dollars a paycheck. I mean that.
• 33:49
  So how much do you have left out of your paycheck?
• 33:52
  50-60, a hundred 150 bucks. Exactly as much.
• 33:56
  And I mean, if anything, you know, we've all heard it at the
• 34:02
  conventions and at the conferences about losing $17
• 34:07
  million worth of dues for non dues paying Craft members $17
• 34:13
  million. Now my question is, why hasn't
• 34:17
  anyone on the national board gone out and asked these
• 34:21
  carriers why they pulled their dues?
• 34:25
  Why hasn't anybody taken the time to actually ask the Craft
• 34:30
  what's going on? That's the disconnect.
• 34:33
  People don't listen to the people on the street.
• 34:37
  They don't listen to the issues that the carriers are dealing
• 34:39
  with. They just look at spreadsheets
• 34:41
  and bell curves just like management.
• 34:44
  They're acting just like management because they're too
• 34:48
  busy playing games with each other.
• 34:51
  Figure out exactly where this craft needs to go.
• 34:54
  That is my biggest problem here and my biggest fear is that they
• 34:58
  continue to play games while management continues to get the
• 35:01
  upper hand on us. Look at the city craft hour
• 35:05
  office times, 23 minute loading times.
• 35:08
  You don't even have time to use the restroom on the route, don't
• 35:12
  have time to take your lunch on the route because you're trying
• 35:16
  to make the truck. Or you're driving on sidewalks
• 35:20
  instead of walking. You have carriers, you have
• 35:26
  carriers out there who are pushing themselves beyond the
• 35:29
  limit in order to make these made-up metrics that management
• 35:33
  has made and then turn around and get yelled at for doing an
• 35:37
  extra unscanned parcel for an extra trip to door or maybe even
• 35:42
  a stamp stock sale. And they actually sold a stamp
• 35:46
  on the route. Management and union leadership
• 35:51
  are acting almost identical these days, and it's scary
• 35:56
  because all they're doing is looking at computers.
• 35:59
  I'm not getting actual answers. Yep, I've said that before too.
• 36:04
  Like why not? Why not have a leader that goes
• 36:06
  out there and asks what can we do to get you to join?
• 36:10
  What would make you see value in order to pay the dues to become
• 36:15
  a member? What?
• 36:16
  What do you need to see out of us in order for you to join?
• 36:21
  Then you're going to get an answer, and then you're going to
• 36:23
  be able to say, OK, this is what we need to start implementing.
• 36:26
  This is what we need to start doing.
• 36:27
  We need to start being more transparent.
• 36:28
  We need to put out weekly updates.
• 36:30
  We need to, you know, do this or that.
• 36:33
  OK, now we know what we need to do.
• 36:35
  People can write resolutions to that.
• 36:37
  We can make that a part of our constitution, and we can start
• 36:39
  being better. We can start being a very
• 36:42
  valuable asset to all carriers. But that's not the leadership
• 36:47
  that we have right now. And neither is your resolution
• 36:50
  part of the 20 or 30 that they want to present to the post
• 36:53
  office, not part of the other 300 they threw away.
• 36:57
  But good news is, is that's that's a change for the union
• 37:01
  and it's just a notification to management that the due
• 37:04
  structure has changed for PTS. So it is a binding resolution at
• 37:11
  National. Yes, it is.
• 37:13
  It would be a constitutional change, all right.
• 37:16
  So we're going to let's, we got a dozen questions to go through.
• 37:19
  A couple of these are a little similar to ones we've asked in
• 37:22
  the past, but we'll go over them again.
• 37:25
  And I'm going to start off with this first one.
• 37:30
  Are you guys ready? Yep.
• 37:33
  All right. Is there any interest in trying
• 37:36
  to eliminate the H route status providing much needed homework
• 37:42
  life balance? This could help boost carrier
• 37:45
  retention and help boost RCA to CRCA talks.
• 37:51
  We are all we are a small office that got wrecked by wrecks.
• 37:55
  Went from 2K routes 1J and 1H down to all H routes after first
• 38:00
  count. We now have one J.
• 38:03
  Lost all but one RCA once the routes went to H routes and
• 38:07
  cannot get anyone hired once they are told no hours are
• 38:11
  promised. I respect high low option
• 38:15
  concerns for older carriers but we have young carriers with
• 38:19
  children that are struggling to justify the careers that doesn't
• 38:22
  let them watch their children grow up.
• 38:24
  Thanks. Well, that's a tickle on the
• 38:29
  barrel because what you're going to do, are you going to
• 38:31
  eliminate 1H route to build the other routes up and then have to
• 38:35
  excise a carrier. I guarantee you that carrier is
• 38:39
  going to think that's not fair. You you have an H route, which
• 38:44
  is a small route on an hourly basis day-to-day.
• 38:48
  So hopefully, hopefully you can get done in time to get to the
• 38:51
  soccer game or to the baseball game or whatever.
• 38:55
  Realistically there, there's not much I see plausible in regards
• 39:01
  to doing anything except for like I said, you know, taking
• 39:04
  one route and divvy it up and excising the carrier.
• 39:08
  That's the most obvious, you know, approach.
• 39:11
  So it's not fair, but that's the only only way you're going to be
• 39:15
  able to do it really. I yeah, definitely.
• 39:18
  That's the only way I see that as well.
• 39:20
  I mean, I, you know, you've heard in the past about how they
• 39:23
  want to do away with J routes, but, you know, even on that
• 39:28
  aspect, what are you going to just doing away with H routes
• 39:33
  again? You're going to fall into the
• 39:35
  issue of excising carriers. That's the biggest one that I
• 39:39
  can see. I I at this time, I wouldn't
• 39:43
  think about it. Even with the J routes, Kristen,
• 39:47
  OK, you're you're off one Saturday, your family's doing
• 39:51
  nothing the next Saturday you have to work your family's doing
• 39:53
  something. I mean it it, it's a hit or miss
• 39:56
  situation there too, so it. It really is.
• 40:00
  You know it, it's a shit deal, but it it's the only deal we
• 40:03
  have right now. It's James.
• 40:05
  You have something. Well, I was actually going to
• 40:13
  say that H routes are very important to the Postal Service.
• 40:17
  And I also think that the issue is broader than just one office
• 40:24
  overall. I know we've talked about a
• 40:28
  carrier who is a perpetual RCA in an office that has no chance
• 40:33
  for growth and will never become an H route because the route
• 40:38
  isn't just too small for that. So it is a perpetual RCA on a
• 40:42
  hold down a route. And if that route were to hit 42
• 40:48
  standard hours, that RCA would become a career regular carrier
• 40:53
  with an H route. If you got rid of H routes, what
• 40:56
  would you do with that carrier? Would you?
• 40:57
  Would he have to wait until it became AJ route?
• 41:00
  At that point he'd want to eliminate J routes.
• 41:02
  Now he's got to wait until it's a full K route to become a
• 41:05
  regular carrier. You know, it's, it's unfortunate
• 41:09
  that H routes are here, but it's one way that we can stay at 40
• 41:13
  hours plus week even if routes get low enough that we're doing
• 41:19
  6 1/2, seven hours a day. Then James, with that line of
• 41:23
  reasoning, if you create another J route again, you're back into
• 41:27
  that situation on having family time on your drop day versus,
• 41:31
  you know, the day you're working.
• 41:33
  Either way, you're creating a a mini monster in trying to effect
• 41:38
  the a change for this individual, for this office,
• 41:41
  which doesn't exactly typify, you know, what's across the
• 41:45
  country. Now I will say in that office,
• 41:49
  if management wanted to reconfigure the routes when a
• 41:54
  carrier retired or left their route where they would be back
• 41:58
  up to K routes, that could be a way to make that happen.
• 42:03
  But that would be a management discretion on that to adjust
• 42:06
  those routes to a higher evaluation with the route that
• 42:09
  has been vacated. That that and that that solution
• 42:13
  there as well as the J routes goes back to that first letter
• 42:17
  she read about the people in one day a week, you know, two days a
• 42:21
  week. And they're looking for more
• 42:23
  income than that. There's.
• 42:26
  There's. Such a when, when, when I
• 42:29
  started work Saturdays and, and we didn't have any Sunday work.
• 42:33
  And that was it. That you, you knew that was a
• 42:36
  game plan. While the economy has shifted
• 42:38
  and, you know, inflation has gone through the roof.
• 42:42
  You, you you can't make it on the table two and Table 4
• 42:46
  nowadays. And, and I understand that.
• 42:49
  And we go to the store today and, you know, I got a 6%
• 42:52
  discount because I had a Philly's cap on.
• 42:54
  I didn't know. Yeah, but they gave me a 6%
• 42:56
  discount. The bill was still $168 for me
• 43:00
  and my wife. The only thing that she bought
• 43:02
  that, you know, extraneous was a $50.00 gift card for one of her
• 43:05
  workers that, you know, that, you know, her birthday's coming
• 43:08
  up. Still, you know, that's a lot of
• 43:10
  money for two people doing it for a family of four or five.
• 43:16
  I I hear you on that toasty. Toasty, you have any comments?
• 43:21
  Even even with coupons it's it's still rough.
• 43:24
  It's and especially when growing, growing kids.
• 43:26
  I have an 11 year old and he's starting to eat us out of a
• 43:29
  budget. I have a pregnant 17 year old,
• 43:35
  but no, I, you know, I, I see that as a Table 2 step one
• 43:40
  regular. I, you know, I do live paycheck
• 43:44
  to paycheck. You know, I have my, my weekend
• 43:48
  away coming up in a couple weeks that, you know, I hopefully to
• 43:52
  have a little extra spending money, But I'm not doing what I
• 43:54
  did last year because then I have to save for Reno because I
• 43:58
  don't want to have to take out another loan to be able to go to
• 44:03
  National Convention again this year.
• 44:04
  I have taken out loans as an RCA to go to the conferences and,
• 44:11
  and conventions that I have to travel.
• 44:14
  Well, even some that are even a little closer to home because I
• 44:17
  didn't have the extra money because I do have a car payment.
• 44:20
  I do have kids. I, you know, I do have my
• 44:22
  household bills I have to pay. So yeah, it's is it is hard It
• 44:29
  it definitely is. But yeah, I don't see how
• 44:33
  eliminating an H route status be feasible at this point in time.
• 44:40
  All right. Did you have anything else on
• 44:41
  the H routes Toasty? I mean, other than, I mean,
• 44:46
  it's, it's a pickle. It's, it's difficult to figure
• 44:50
  out what to do, you know, try to give people more hours.
• 44:53
  But at the same time, you know, oh, well, it's evaluated at 40
• 44:57
  hours. That's full time status.
• 44:59
  Or you just got to try to, you know, roll the dice.
• 45:02
  You got to have to. We're going to have to try to
• 45:04
  see what we can do, what we can figure out, you know, go through
• 45:08
  the numbers, see how many, how many offices are affected by
• 45:12
  this. Great.
• 45:14
  The next question, and I know we've covered a couple similar
• 45:17
  questions, but we're going to go ahead and put this out here
• 45:19
  again in case anybody's got anything to add.
• 45:22
  What 3 items ideas would you fight tooth and nail for to help
• 45:26
  butter this craft? OK, first thing, get rid of
• 45:31
  table two and table four thing go after management through the
• 45:35
  NSS and protecting our carriers. Thing is open up the National
• 45:40
  Rural Letter Carriers Association so that all carriers
• 45:45
  get information, whether it's through Facebook, whether it's
• 45:48
  through rule info net. We'll we'll direct you that way
• 45:52
  if you're not a member. Information is powered knowledge
• 45:56
  is power for you know the more you can stand up for yourself
• 46:00
  and protect your rights and your paycheck.
• 46:02
  Everything's in that order, all. Right.
• 46:04
  Yeah, definitely fighting for to get rid of table two and table
• 46:08
  four. It's definitely number one
• 46:11
  again, the way management I you know, I'm going to side with
• 46:15
  Bill on the on the first top two and don't, yeah, don't get me
• 46:19
  started on management. I've had my own issues as well.
• 46:24
  And my third item is going to be training of RC as leave
• 46:29
  replacements in general. I have PT FS in my office, but
• 46:33
  I'm I'm including you as well because we do have PT FS to get
• 46:37
  hired in off the street across the country.
• 46:40
  Leave replacements in general in training.
• 46:43
  I know we have new Academy and OJT stuff that has is starting
• 46:48
  to hit our facilitators, which is great.
• 46:51
  I have not yet had a chance to see it.
• 46:53
  But the biggest thing there is definitely going to be training
• 46:59
  the Academy facilitators. Now one instance that has come
• 47:03
  up recently that's a little bit more directly to me, but I think
• 47:07
  it could go across the board here is with the OJI program.
• 47:13
  When that first started several years ago, it was intended that
• 47:17
  regulars are OJIS. However, there was no language
• 47:21
  or policy on ever written on who could be an OJI.
• 47:27
  Again. It was up to management and who
• 47:29
  they sent or who they to have as an OJI.
• 47:33
  We all know I was still an RCA, but when I became an OJ I I have
• 47:37
  absolutely no problems with leave replacements being OJISI
• 47:42
  believe there are some really good ones out there that are are
• 47:46
  and can be excellent OJIS. But I do feel that an OJI if you
• 47:54
  are a leave replacement, I need to fill the shoes of being an
• 47:59
  OJI that you need some time in the post office prior to being
• 48:05
  an OJ. I, I think there needs to be a
• 48:08
  clear, clear wording, clear policy on that and that I would
• 48:13
  definitely take to USPS to have somebody that's only four, 5-6
• 48:20
  months in. Y'all know, as a leave
• 48:22
  replacement. You don't know everything when
• 48:25
  you're only maybe six months in four months in five months in
• 48:29
  whatever it should be. I if you cannot bid to be on to
• 48:33
  a regular route until you have a full gear in and you should not
• 48:39
  be able to train new leave replacements without having at
• 48:45
  least 12 months in at least that is, that is the absolute minimum
• 48:52
  I feel that you should be able to be to be qualified as an OJI
• 48:57
  because when you're only a few months in, you don't know
• 49:00
  everything. And especially with Rex now and
• 49:04
  all the scans, not just the six mandatory scans, but all the
• 49:08
  ones out on the routes. If you have offices that have
• 49:11
  both PO VS and government vehicles and you've only ran
• 49:15
  government vehicles, you've never ran a POV.
• 49:18
  How are you going to assist in training an RCA that gets placed
• 49:22
  onto a POV route if you've never delivered out of a POV?
• 49:27
  Especially all the different types of PO VS.
• 49:29
  Not necessarily a right hand drive.
• 49:31
  Not everybody can get one. I personally have never
• 49:34
  delivered out of a right hand drive POV.
• 49:37
  I've always been out of a left hand drive POV on several
• 49:41
  different setups. Oh, yes, I that that would be,
• 49:45
  you know, Table 2, Table 4, The way management is just
• 49:50
  horrendous in the majority of the offices.
• 49:54
  And then I definitely top top three.
• 49:58
  And that third one most definitely is training and
• 50:02
  setting up some sort of parameters for the OJI program
• 50:06
  to make sure that we have Ojis in every office or an OJI is
• 50:12
  available to go to a nearby office even if they are a leave
• 50:16
  replacement. I like I said, no problems with
• 50:18
  leave replacements being Ojis as long as they've had least 12
• 50:24
  months in. And I do think that an OJI
• 50:27
  should have to take an entry, a test as as a like an Academy
• 50:33
  facilitator has to do. They have to pass a test before
• 50:36
  they can even go on to training for Academy to be an Academy
• 50:39
  facilitator. I do believe OJI should do the
• 50:41
  same thing as well. So yeah, that's my top three,
• 50:45
  James. Well, very first thing I want to
• 50:49
  do is the directive that we are not selling for language where
• 50:56
  language already exists. It's something like contractual
• 51:01
  violation or an order of consideration violation or
• 51:05
  something like that. Carrier needs to be made whole,
• 51:09
  not just management won't do it again.
• 51:12
  It's time for management to have a financial incentive.
• 51:18
  Stop violating the contract. Stop violating the postal
• 51:24
  documents. We have already the step fours,
• 51:27
  all the Mous and stuff like that.
• 51:30
  Just recently the city carriers settled another grievance,
• 51:36
  Chicago for $2500 per carrier, per carrier.
• 51:44
  Imagine what that could do for somebody on table two or four.
• 51:47
  You know, the next thing I want to do is I want to make the
• 51:51
  website more accessible with the vice president.
• 51:55
  One of the biggest problems I have with the website.
• 51:59
  Find my steward. Anybody who has never been on
• 52:04
  that website doesn't know where to look to find their steward.
• 52:08
  Had to tell so many people where to look to find their steward on
• 52:10
  the website. They should be on the homepage.
• 52:14
  Easy to find, easy to put in your zip code and it should be
• 52:18
  updated regularly. Yes, there are stewards still on
• 52:23
  there that have retired, have quit, that have been removed
• 52:27
  from office. They're still on their listed as
• 52:30
  the active steward. I for after I transferred and
• 52:35
  became the local steward in my office, I was still listed in my
• 52:40
  former office couple years. So yes, I completely agree on
• 52:45
  that. So the the rest of the website,
• 52:49
  you know. Why is our search API only
• 52:51
  allowed to do one word searches? You can't put in what you're
• 52:55
  looking for. Now I do have the website up
• 52:59
  right now and there is on the home page without going under
• 53:02
  departments to steward operations to find your steward.
• 53:06
  Right below that blue box is find stewards by zip code right
• 53:10
  on the home page. I've never saw that there
• 53:13
  before. And Scroll down further down,
• 53:19
  way down on the website on my computer.
• 53:21
  I have to actually scroll the page down to find it.
• 53:23
  It should be right up. It should be right at the top.
• 53:26
  Find my steward, you know it. It should be right next to the
• 53:29
  search box. Practically, the API needs to be
• 53:33
  done on the website because if you're looking for a topic or
• 53:38
  something like that, you should be able to search that topic and
• 53:41
  bring up that information. So the Steward resource guide
• 53:46
  says see also time and attendance.
• 53:49
  It should be clickable, able to click that and go to time and
• 53:52
  attendance, have to go to T then time and attendance, cleaning up
• 53:57
  the website, taking every document on their searchable,
• 54:01
  things like that. Just fixing communication in
• 54:04
  that aspect. And Speaking of communication,
• 54:07
  the other thing I want to do is open communication through the
• 54:12
  Steward system, top to bottom, bottom to top.
• 54:16
  I want everybody to be able to get an answer within 24 to 48
• 54:21
  hours from anybody in the chain. Top to bottom want everybody to
• 54:28
  get the answer they're looking for.
• 54:29
  Because a lot of carriers, unless it's financial, have 14
• 54:33
  days to file a grievance, 14 days if you have somebody who's
• 54:37
  turning around and saying I'll get back to you and they don't
• 54:40
  get back to you until it's the 15th day.
• 54:43
  But it was 14 days from the day they called you.
• 54:46
  Not right. I want that opened up.
• 54:49
  And finally, I want training materials out to the stewards on
• 54:54
  issues that are currently occurring to carriers, issues
• 54:59
  that are grievable. Things need to be put out to the
• 55:01
  stewards immediately. Shouldn't be 2-3 months before
• 55:05
  we file a Step 4 on it. It should be.
• 55:08
  Here are things that are going on in specific offices across
• 55:11
  the country. It's going to possibly spread to
• 55:13
  yours, so here's the information you need to know.
• 55:17
  Are you proactively saying that we should be ahead of the curve
• 55:22
  and address the situation before it becomes a national issue?
• 55:25
  Saying that our union needs to be proactive instead of reactive
• 55:32
  need to have. That that that's the kind of
• 55:34
  radical shit to get you in trouble.
• 55:39
  You know, when you're when you're constantly just reacting
• 55:44
  to the things that are happening, you know, oh, it's an
• 55:47
  isolated incident here. OK, so it's an isolated incident
• 55:50
  here. Well, we know management likes
• 55:52
  to take what's going on in one office and spread it around the
• 55:55
  country and see which offices will pick it up.
• 55:58
  Well, if the director of Stewart Operations sends out an e-mail,
• 56:01
  blast every steward in the country, regional DRADR area and
• 56:09
  local steward. Hey, this just happened in this
• 56:12
  office. Watch out for it and yours.
• 56:14
  Let us know if it happens. Here's how you can fight it.
• 56:18
  Imagine what that would do to management's plan of oh, well,
• 56:22
  we'll implement. You have to be out of the office
• 56:24
  from in two hours. Hey, this office just said
• 56:27
  everybody needs to be out in two hours.
• 56:29
  Now blast everybody. Management has told in this,
• 56:32
  this and this office that everybody has to be out in two
• 56:36
  hours. Happens in your office.
• 56:38
  Here's how you fight it. Send us an e-mail back.
• 56:41
  If they actually try to implement it in your office,
• 56:44
  we'll go to a national grievance on it.
• 56:46
  Active all. Right toasty.
• 56:48
  What are the three items that you would fight tooth and nail
• 56:51
  for to help better this craft? Number #1 Of course, the
• 56:56
  elimination of the two tier pay scale and it's ridiculous that
• 57:01
  somebody that joined, let's see, four years before I did and got
• 57:06
  hired on and without the hiring freeze in there makes $14,000 a
• 57:12
  year more than I do. At the same time, they made
• 57:15
  regular at the same date, start date that I did, it would be
• 57:18
  $14,000 more than me. We do the exact same job.
• 57:22
  There's really no difference. We need to get rid of that.
• 57:28
  I'd have to back up James because I will be working with
• 57:31
  him a lot. The no more settling for
• 57:33
  language. We need to unleash bounds on
• 57:37
  management. We need to go tooth, bite, tooth
• 57:40
  and nail to go ahead and get the Oracle penalties or incentives
• 57:45
  to them to stop doing these, you know, oh, let's go ahead and
• 57:49
  tell them end of shift duty is only 5 minutes, 25 minutes just
• 57:53
  to unload all the packages that I pick up from my package pick
• 57:55
  up. And three going to be just
• 58:00
  transparency, more transparency, give you all updates as the
• 58:04
  craft of what's going on, what we're fighting for, where our
• 58:08
  step fours are coming down the pipe, you know, share with that
• 58:12
  e-mail blast of hey, here's what management's trying to do.
• 58:16
  Well, you know, here to the whole craft.
• 58:18
  Here's what this is. Get with your local Stewart to
• 58:20
  go ahead and fight it if this is happening to you all.
• 58:24
  Right. Moving on the arbitration ruling
• 58:29
  that put Rex into place that it said that it had to be
• 58:32
  implemented and it has been, would it be possible to
• 58:36
  renegotiate methods with the new contract now that the obligation
• 58:41
  of the arbitration has been met? Well.
• 58:46
  Run that. Run it back.
• 58:47
  Back to gas. The arbitration ruling that put
• 58:52
  Rex into place said that had to be implemented, and it has been.
• 58:58
  Would it be possible to renegotiate evaluation methods
• 59:02
  with this new contract now that the obligation of the of the
• 59:07
  arbitration has been met? Well, I'd have to say
• 59:12
  Fiddlesticks on that, because the arbitrators also said that
• 59:15
  we had to have transparency, which we do not have.
• 59:20
  So therefore, no, I, I don't think that, you know, at any
• 59:25
  point should we be able to turn around and not us, but the post
• 59:30
  office, you know, recalculate any of the metrics that are
• 59:34
  involved in wrecks. And I'm sure they're going to,
• 59:37
  I, I have no doubt they're going to try to change the time
• 59:41
  standards. The thing that bothers me is
• 59:43
  that they, they haven't obeyed the 1st letter of law in regards
• 59:47
  to transparency which has been published in our national
• 59:51
  magazine which is on our website.
• 59:54
  There, there is no transparency, there is no penalty for them not
• 59:58
  providing the radar reports on a daily basis.
• 1:00:02
  And most offices including mine, get them sporadically because
• 1:00:06
  oh, the manager, you know, the internet's down.
• 1:00:09
  Oh, I love that one, the internet's down.
• 1:00:11
  Oh my God, if I hear that one more time.
• 1:00:13
  How are you making cash sales up the registers If the if the
• 1:00:16
  internet's down because they operate on the same system.
• 1:00:20
  It it befuddles me that the lies they get away with.
• 1:00:23
  And with the new steward in our office, it's every day We have
• 1:00:27
  our radar reports. Do we have our radar?
• 1:00:29
  I don't go ask the supervisor. I put the onus on him.
• 1:00:32
  He's my union representative. So should should any of the
• 1:00:37
  metrics be changed? No, by neither party.
• 1:00:41
  You know, unless the arbitrator's come back, you
• 1:00:44
  know, or the engineers come back and say something is in, you
• 1:00:48
  know, in, in our favor that I'm not voting for anything to be
• 1:00:51
  changed at all. I, I don't think that we should
• 1:00:54
  change it right now. Pretty fair except for the CB us
• 1:00:59
  in regards to coverage factor there and the mailboxes that
• 1:01:04
  don't get mail. And, and then that one bothers
• 1:01:07
  me because of the fact that the supervisors tell you to stop at
• 1:01:10
  mailbox whether they have mail or not.
• 1:01:12
  You know, so you can establish your bread crumbs going through
• 1:01:15
  the informed delivery or was was informed visibility where the
• 1:01:19
  DPS is your only metrics buying some delivery to that specific
• 1:01:25
  mailbox not taking into account raw mail from the clerks such as
• 1:01:29
  letters and flats or local newspapers.
• 1:01:33
  If there is there is no in regards to being accurate
• 1:01:38
  metrics for each box bothers the hell out of me.
• 1:01:41
  And and you know I I love the thing that says you have to stop
• 1:01:45
  for five seconds. Decent RCA and an experience
• 1:01:50
  carrier. You can have the mail ready lid
• 1:01:53
  down mail in, lid up and gone in less than 3 seconds.
• 1:01:59
  Oh fart. So you know, don't tell me you
• 1:02:02
  know there there has to be if you have a one second, two
• 1:02:06
  second stop, guess what it counts this stuff with the the
• 1:02:10
  the mailboxes not getting mail that they're that they can
• 1:02:14
  track. I mean it goes back to the
• 1:02:18
  unscannable parcel. OK.
• 1:02:20
  And the arguments we have with diplomas or you know, your
• 1:02:24
  Snapfish photos of which you know most of them are coming,
• 1:02:28
  you know, first class, but some aren't.
• 1:02:30
  No, it's not. You know, you know an
• 1:02:32
  unscannable parcel. We have to prove that it is.
• 1:02:35
  No, it isn't. If we have to take it to the the
• 1:02:37
  garage, if we have to take it to the front door, it's an
• 1:02:41
  unscannable parcel. If it doesn't fit in my case,
• 1:02:44
  it's an unscannable parcel. Can't manipulate it.
• 1:02:47
  You know, like a flat or a letter.
• 1:02:49
  Put it into my one inch separation.
• 1:02:52
  It's an unscanable parcel. These are the types of things
• 1:02:54
  that haven't been resolved yet, so not dabbling into changing
• 1:02:58
  more in favor either party. Let's get the ones we have in
• 1:03:03
  place straightened out first. I am going to agree with Bill on
• 1:03:09
  all that and including also with, you know, the informed
• 1:03:12
  visibility with, you know, not having the true volume,
• 1:03:17
  especially with the the raw mail and the flats, as well as a box
• 1:03:23
  that may not have any mail that day, but their flags up because
• 1:03:26
  they get outgoing, they're getting credit for stopping at
• 1:03:29
  that box to pick up their outgoing mail.
• 1:03:33
  So yeah, that's honestly at this point now I you can't, does it
• 1:03:38
  need some fine tuning, tweaking? Absolutely.
• 1:03:41
  But at this point I would not want to try and renegotiate the
• 1:03:46
  new evaluation methods. Let's you know, I I would rather
• 1:03:50
  see. I mean, this one definitely has.
• 1:03:53
  Its pluses, but there's there's still way too many minuses that
• 1:03:56
  need to be fine-tuned in this as well.
• 1:03:59
  Let's fit Leah, let's, let's fix the Edsel before we move to a
• 1:04:02
  Mercedes, OK? Because there's there's plenty
• 1:04:06
  of bugs in this system. Do you have anything to add to
• 1:04:09
  that one? We had this conversation at
• 1:04:13
  state convention, actually, its resolutions put forth for
• 1:04:17
  changing standards. And as soon as you open that
• 1:04:22
  Pandora's box to change standards, you open the door for
• 1:04:27
  management to really change them in their favor, fight with us
• 1:04:31
  for us to change them in our favor.
• 1:04:34
  And unless you have leadership in the positions that are
• 1:04:38
  willing to go tooth and nail, fight for every penny you
• 1:04:42
  deserve that doesn't think rural carriers have had it too good
• 1:04:45
  for too long, The only thing to do is to keep the standards the
• 1:04:49
  way they are for now. Get management to follow the
• 1:04:53
  arbitration ruling that we had put down initially all the way
• 1:04:58
  to a tee. Right now, they are in violation
• 1:05:03
  of the arbitration ruling because they're supposed to be
• 1:05:06
  transparent on this, and they have been anything but
• 1:05:10
  transparent. Oh, standards right now need to
• 1:05:14
  stay the same, not get argued over, not get changed until we
• 1:05:19
  finally fulfill the full obligation of the arbitration.
• 1:05:23
  Do you have anything? Like to see is the actual back
• 1:05:27
  end program. What are what are they pulling
• 1:05:30
  the data from? How accurate is it?
• 1:05:34
  How is it calculated? Is it because you see rumors on
• 1:05:38
  on Facebook that package that you dropped off to the front
• 1:05:41
  door, is it for that address or is it just an average of all 506
• 1:05:46
  hundred 800 of your addresses? Well, yes, it's averaged
• 1:05:51
  throughout the year, but is it your whole route or is it just
• 1:05:55
  that specific address? Because then you know, there's
• 1:05:58
  others that are trying to say, well, if you, if it's your
• 1:06:01
  average, then it's better to try to put in parcel lockers because
• 1:06:05
  I have 1/2 CPU half curbside route.
• 1:06:08
  It's better to put parcels that are away in the parcel lockers
• 1:06:13
  and any that you know can't fit or you don't have enough parcel
• 1:06:16
  lockers for all of them do the ones that are closest to your
• 1:06:19
  line of travel. And I saw a big boost by doing
• 1:06:22
  that in my own evaluation. But that's just my experience.
• 1:06:25
  But I still don't know the back end program.
• 1:06:28
  I don't understand it. I can't see it because we have
• 1:06:31
  no transparency. Like Bill said, we need the
• 1:06:33
  transparency that we were promised.
• 1:06:36
  Matt and Ronnie Stutz was president.
• 1:06:38
  When you talked about the roll out of our ECS, we were supposed
• 1:06:41
  to have a website that we can go to and see our numbers daily,
• 1:06:45
  get to see that we need to have that transparency.
• 1:06:48
  We need to have a full back end. Here's how it's here's the
• 1:06:51
  report is pulled from, here's how it's calculated.
• 1:06:55
  OK, once we figure that out, then maybe we can start going
• 1:07:00
  through and say, OK, this one, you know, we don't get any
• 1:07:03
  credit for DPS. All we get is verify mail.
• 1:07:06
  Can we change that up a little bit please?
• 1:07:09
  You know, go through and make sure that every manager has
• 1:07:12
  somebody at the end of the day for end of shift duties as a
• 1:07:16
  mapping facilitator. Antonio, the largest cities in
• 1:07:20
  Texas behind Dallas and Houston and Austin has carriers that
• 1:07:26
  have not mapped since before the 1st mini mail survey.
• 1:07:30
  It's detrimental to them. If it's picking up different
• 1:07:34
  bread crumbs or it's having the wrong address on there, it's
• 1:07:37
  going to mess with their pay. We need to make sure that
• 1:07:39
  management has mapping facilitators.
• 1:07:41
  Everything's mapped correctly, everything's put in correctly.
• 1:07:44
  That management is actually trained on how to do the mini
• 1:07:47
  mail survey numbers, the measurements, everything like
• 1:07:50
  that correctly. But we don't have these
• 1:07:53
  arguments over. We'll authorize dismount.
• 1:07:54
  We already gave you times three. That's the old system.
• 1:07:58
  The old way. If you wanted to multiply it
• 1:08:00
  times three and say, OK, well, it's one for letters, one for
• 1:08:02
  flats, one for packages, you get that credit.
• 1:08:05
  Well, not anymore. We put that in, we put that in
• 1:08:08
  under authorized dismount. So that way you don't have to do
• 1:08:11
  any of the math or because before you were supposed to
• 1:08:14
  count, OK, At this stop, I did 5 trips.
• 1:08:16
  At the second stop I only did two, you know, at the business
• 1:08:19
  park. I only had one time then and
• 1:08:22
  this other one that has 10 units.
• 1:08:23
  I had to do 7 trips on that to average it out before.
• 1:08:27
  Well, now the system will do that automatically for you.
• 1:08:30
  Management still conflating the old stuff with the new stuff and
• 1:08:34
  it's it needs to stop. This question go ahead.
• 1:08:38
  James I I do have to issue a correction.
• 1:08:41
  My correction about the website was about the actual inner LCA
• 1:08:45
  app. It does not have Find my Stewart
• 1:08:48
  on the front page of the app. That is.
• 1:08:50
  That was my mistake. I want to correct that right
• 1:08:52
  now. Thank you for the correction.
• 1:08:55
  So all right, I'm going to jump to this next question and then
• 1:09:01
  come back to the other ones because this kind of goes into a
• 1:09:03
  little bit with the Rex, with all the mail that they throw at
• 1:09:06
  us on Monday, catalogs, magazines, letters that don't
• 1:09:10
  fit in the case. I bundle it up and say it's a
• 1:09:12
  parcel. They disagree.
• 1:09:14
  What is it? Discretion, well, it's carried
• 1:09:18
  discretion. I mean, is it going to fit in
• 1:09:19
  the mailbox when you get there? If you, if you're regular, you
• 1:09:23
  know the route, if you have an oversized mailbox, it's going to
• 1:09:26
  go in there, handle it. If you have a standard mailbox,
• 1:09:29
  might have to wiggle it in, but unless you dismount and take it
• 1:09:32
  to the garage or the front door, then it should not be qualified
• 1:09:36
  as a parcel for a record. Nobody, nobody across the United
• 1:09:42
  States of America, the plants that back off with the volume
• 1:09:48
  delivered to the offices on Monday, because the plants do
• 1:09:51
  not answer to district managers, their own hierarchy that says
• 1:09:56
  I'm getting as much as as possible out on Monday and then
• 1:09:59
  we can take it easy the rest of the week.
• 1:10:02
  Everybody's seen this across the country, so there's no
• 1:10:04
  deliberation about that. This happens.
• 1:10:08
  It's a fact of life. And you sit there on Tuesday and
• 1:10:11
  say, well, where did all the mail go?
• 1:10:13
  But you got it yesterday. Yep.
• 1:10:17
  Oh, you're over hours, you know, I'll be under hours.
• 1:10:20
  Tuesday, Wednesday. Thursday, Friday.
• 1:10:22
  Exactly. I work 11 hours on Monday and I
• 1:10:23
  work 5 1/2 on Tuesday. Evaluated system.
• 1:10:28
  Yes. So are we all in agreeance with
• 1:10:30
  that one and I can move on, correct?
• 1:10:33
  Well, I've I do have one, so I part I part I partially agree
• 1:10:40
  with Bill on that. However, as I have stated before
• 1:10:44
  and try to make clarification happen with a resolution before,
• 1:10:48
  our Director of Labor Relations, Bridget Boziak stepped up and
• 1:10:51
  said they were still in discussions over what an
• 1:10:55
  unscanned parcel was at the 2023 Michigan State Convention.
• 1:11:01
  My argument is if you have to handle it differently than you
• 1:11:06
  would your normal flats and letters, carrier discretion and
• 1:11:11
  unscanned parcel. Isn't that how I started my
• 1:11:14
  comment off? Yes, it's carrier discretion,
• 1:11:17
  but I was arguing if you handle it differently than you do your
• 1:11:20
  flags and letters. Next, you do if elected, to help
• 1:11:27
  recruit new members. Show up.
• 1:11:32
  Show up. So I mean, Texas, we have
• 1:11:37
  several, you know, locals as they call them, they're not done
• 1:11:42
  by counties, but they do combine counties, whatnot.
• 1:11:45
  Go to the meetings, meetings, figure out what's going on in
• 1:11:48
  those offices, see who needs the most help to those offices and
• 1:11:54
  ask around. You can even get on, use the
• 1:11:57
  Instagram, use the Facebook that we have that they don't know how
• 1:12:00
  to use and do. What do you want to see from the
• 1:12:04
  union? What do you want?
• 1:12:06
  What would make it valuable for you?
• 1:12:08
  Like I said earlier, show up you ask and you listen and you can
• 1:12:14
  start figuring out ways to recruit more people.
• 1:12:17
  You can figure out ways to basically, as dirty of his term
• 1:12:22
  this sounds, sell it to those that are not currently in the
• 1:12:26
  Union I. Agree, I mean I it to help get
• 1:12:30
  to help recruit new members. Definitely be king yourself more
• 1:12:38
  available to the craft in general.
• 1:12:41
  I really think being seen more more.
• 1:12:48
  And yes, I understand the, the, the, the busy, busy, busy
• 1:12:52
  schedule. I understand that.
• 1:12:55
  But being able to, even if it's replying to an e-mail or
• 1:13:01
  returning a phone call later in the evening or on a weekend, you
• 1:13:08
  know, making at least showing the effort that you are there
• 1:13:13
  for the craft and, and the craft members to see that you are
• 1:13:20
  there and you are listening and you are concerned and you know,
• 1:13:24
  you're doing what you can to help and try to make it better.
• 1:13:30
  I think that would be one way to do it.
• 1:13:32
  Is is the reach out with with the craft in general bill names?
• 1:13:40
  This one's a conundrum for me because of the fact this this
• 1:13:44
  would involve you, Kristen, under the Academy trainers,
• 1:13:47
  because what I'd like is the Academy trainers go up with the
• 1:13:52
  new hires first month for, you know, assignments, you know,
• 1:13:56
  through their first two paid periods.
• 1:13:59
  And some do, some do, but not all of them.
• 1:14:02
  Yeah, not all, but make it mandatory, OK, it is, yeah.
• 1:14:06
  And Tosi's right, you have to sell the benefit.
• 1:14:10
  But the thing of it is that with with the present national board
• 1:14:14
  has confidence in them, really trust them.
• 1:14:17
  You know, you're selling horseshit to, you know, a
• 1:14:20
  cesspool. So you're not going to get much
• 1:14:23
  return on that. Have to we have to change the
• 1:14:26
  board and then we have to invoke policies and regulations and and
• 1:14:32
  you know, leadership that will inspire people to join to make
• 1:14:36
  them say, OK, there is value. Biggest thing of it is like with
• 1:14:40
  the Rex program for five years before Rex actually came on on
• 1:14:46
  board preaching Rex, Rex, Rex and and union and non union
• 1:14:51
  members were, you know, got the benefit because you know, you
• 1:14:54
  can't turn around and have a meeting with just select people
• 1:14:57
  in the break room. Leave the non union members out,
• 1:15:00
  you know, so I addressed everybody because if a non union
• 1:15:04
  member doesn't get the information, retires and a union
• 1:15:09
  member bids on it, the next thing you know he's sitting
• 1:15:12
  there going, well, hold it. I'm doing a lot more work than
• 1:15:14
  what this routes evaluation is because the other individual
• 1:15:18
  didn't have access to the information.
• 1:15:20
  Like I said, there are plenty of sites outside of the NRLCA
• 1:15:25
  provide you with that information.
• 1:15:27
  You need to take advantage of it because it's your paycheck.
• 1:15:31
  Want the other benefits of being in the union and having the
• 1:15:35
  right to vote? To having a voice that must be
• 1:15:39
  heard at your locals, at your boosters, at your state
• 1:15:42
  conventions, the National Convention?
• 1:15:45
  If you want the right to vote for your leadership, you have to
• 1:15:49
  be a union member, have to prove that there is a value to that.
• 1:15:54
  The hardest thing that we're going to have to overcome
• 1:15:57
  because they've seen 15 years of life fair.
• 1:16:02
  I don't care. Say lovely, it's on you.
• 1:16:05
  I got my money because that entire national board is up
• 1:16:10
  there for one reason, money. And that's it.
• 1:16:14
  He believes that they truly gives a rat's ass about 140,000
• 1:16:20
  people in the craft. You're feeling yourself.
• 1:16:25
  It's a nail on the head there, Bill.
• 1:16:27
  You know they want full dues from PTFS instead of RCA's
• 1:16:32
  covering every route. If they really cared about the
• 1:16:35
  craft, they'd have been fighting tooth and nail with management
• 1:16:37
  on the hiring practices that they were doing.
• 1:16:40
  But instead they want PTFS. They want to move your relief
• 1:16:44
  days because the PTFS pay full dues.
• 1:16:47
  Concern the dues head of asking the carriers who pulled their
• 1:16:54
  dues why they pulled their dues. Put it out there that they're
• 1:16:58
  freeloaders and scabs because they pulled their dues, because
• 1:17:03
  they weren't getting any help their steward system from their
• 1:17:08
  national leaders. They weren't getting the answers
• 1:17:11
  they needed. They were getting grievances
• 1:17:14
  settled for language. I talked to a carrier who had 40
• 1:17:20
  grievances, six EE OS. Does that happen?
• 1:17:26
  Have things in place to prevent that ship right now in the union
• 1:17:33
  only cares about money. I wanted to bring these people
• 1:17:37
  back in. I'm sure know that those people
• 1:17:40
  that pulled their dues would join back up if we actually were
• 1:17:43
  listening to them, paying attention to them.
• 1:17:46
  Some of them even put their dues back in just because of this
• 1:17:49
  podcast. Listening to people is what gets
• 1:17:55
  them into the dues paying status.
• 1:17:59
  One of your points is that you know they're not getting answers
• 1:18:02
  from their leadership Pay for those answers because they're
• 1:18:07
  paying those leaders to provide answers.
• 1:18:10
  So you blame them when they, when they want to pull their
• 1:18:12
  dues. No, tell you something that'll
• 1:18:15
  change you put us in office and I'll guarantee you anybody
• 1:18:20
  doesn't answer your phone within 48 hours, I'll be asking them
• 1:18:25
  what is your major malfunction. Hi guys, why are district
• 1:18:32
  representatives on? All.
• 1:18:33
  Management conference calls. Seems that's their only job
• 1:18:38
  question mark. The reason I want them on those
• 1:18:44
  calls is because I want them to know what management is doing.
• 1:18:50
  They should know what's coming down the pipeline from
• 1:18:53
  management before even the carriers on the street now eyes
• 1:18:57
  and ears in that management meeting reporting that stuff
• 1:19:00
  back to national leadership. And that should be researched by
• 1:19:04
  national leadership to ensure that our carrier carriers are
• 1:19:08
  not only treated with dignity, fairness and respect, but that
• 1:19:12
  management is following all postal regulations, manuals,
• 1:19:17
  contracts, etcetera. It's not the only thing that DRS
• 1:19:22
  do are responsible for dealing with your grievances, district
• 1:19:27
  management and your grievances. Now with Rex, they're dealing
• 1:19:30
  with your disputes with district management, Although some can
• 1:19:34
  argue that district management, it's digging their heels in on
• 1:19:38
  doing disputes in many areas. So that way, by the time the
• 1:19:42
  dispute's resolved, the next evaluation comes out and they
• 1:19:44
  think they can get away with not back paying the carriers for it
• 1:19:47
  because Oh well, it's already into the next evaluation and it
• 1:19:50
  looks like it fixed itself there.
• 1:19:52
  So, but I want them in there listening to management.
• 1:19:57
  I want them in there hearing, oh, we're going to have them all
• 1:20:00
  be on two hour office times out the doors.
• 1:20:03
  We want them. You want to be monitoring their
• 1:20:05
  stationary events on the computer, things like that.
• 1:20:09
  So I want that information. You want that information too.
• 1:20:14
  Yep. Yes, in Westchester.
• 1:20:17
  Damn right, Skippy. You know, I have no issues with
• 1:20:23
  district reps being on management conference calls.
• 1:20:26
  I think it could be, you know, if done properly could be a good
• 1:20:29
  thing because they could also interrupt that district manager
• 1:20:35
  or that boom and be like, yet no, that goes against contract
• 1:20:40
  like they're taking notes, they're reporting back to higher
• 1:20:43
  up. So if it's something that's
• 1:20:44
  coming up even from higher than district that it can get
• 1:20:48
  rectified at the source, you know in that, yeah, that's far
• 1:20:53
  from their only job. I am well aware of that.
• 1:20:56
  They do have a lot on their plate for sure.
• 1:21:00
  Anybody else on that one? Pretty well.
• 1:21:03
  OK, every office so different if we fall under one contract, how
• 1:21:10
  do you fix that? Because the the.
• 1:21:18
  The the same reason we have so many, you know, personalities,
• 1:21:22
  how many difference in the opinions people who interpret
• 1:21:26
  the contract instead of reading it for the black and white that
• 1:21:29
  it is. St. managers pooms there.
• 1:21:34
  There's there's so many personalities involved with
• 1:21:37
  their own agendas at it's it's like gossip.
• 1:21:41
  Yeah, you, you start telling the story at one part of the post
• 1:21:44
  office. The time he goes around the post
• 1:21:46
  office comes back to you. Somebody's a mass murderer.
• 1:21:49
  You know, it's just you can't help it because of the number of
• 1:21:55
  people that are involved. The problem of it is, is like
• 1:21:59
  she said, you have to follow the contract.
• 1:22:02
  You have to file grievances. You have to make them conform.
• 1:22:06
  There's 100 kingdoms in Italy. But the thing of it is that
• 1:22:10
  there's only one way to perform the job.
• 1:22:13
  That's according to the contract. 6O3 We are scam now,
• 1:22:18
  but nobody should be interpreting anything.
• 1:22:22
  It's in black and white. A lot of that can be discussed,
• 1:22:25
  but when it comes down to it, it's in paper.
• 1:22:28
  On paper what's signed and agreed to in the contract,
• 1:22:31
  that's what you go by. Room for interpretation.
• 1:22:39
  Me as just too many chefs in the kitchen and they're all trying
• 1:22:43
  to make, you know, the same order and some of them are
• 1:22:45
  trying to make a different order and whatnot without and that us
• 1:22:51
  the carriers as the servers trying to take out these messed
• 1:22:54
  up dishes. Like no, y'all need to agree on
• 1:22:57
  a menu, which is agree to the contract, which is what we have
• 1:23:01
  and then from there, you know, follow it.
• 1:23:04
  But you have so many different management styles.
• 1:23:06
  You have so many different, you know, local stewards, some that
• 1:23:10
  are cozy with management and just want to settle everything
• 1:23:12
  for language. And then there's us that want to
• 1:23:15
  you adhere to the contract and this is the way it's going to
• 1:23:18
  be. If you don't follow the
• 1:23:19
  contract, then here's the penalty for or here's your
• 1:23:22
  incentive to make sure you follow it.
• 1:23:25
  It's really of carriers educating themselves and
• 1:23:29
  standing up for themselves against management.
• 1:23:31
  I mean, it's really the only way you're going to fix it.
• 1:23:34
  Again, it's too many chiefs, not enough Indians and their pool.
• 1:23:42
  It's like the old telephone game back in kindergarten where you
• 1:23:44
  sit down in a circle and the teacher tell whispers in one
• 1:23:48
  ear, and it whispers all the way around and everybody's ear
• 1:23:51
  around the circle until it gets back to the very last person.
• 1:23:54
  And it's something completely different than what it was
• 1:23:57
  before. And that's really how the chain
• 1:24:00
  is, where it starts at the top and works its way down and
• 1:24:03
  everybody adds their own little spin on it and interprets that
• 1:24:07
  e-mail differently or whatnot. And so yeah, it's really comes
• 1:24:13
  down to enforcing contract and manuals.
• 1:24:18
  Yeah, you said, Kristen, you said too many chiefs, not enough
• 1:24:24
  Indians. The old saying is if no
• 1:24:27
  management in the office, rural carriers will still get the job
• 1:24:29
  done. But if there are no rural
• 1:24:31
  carriers in the office, management can't get the job
• 1:24:34
  done. Mm.
• 1:24:34
  Hmm. If we had half as many managers
• 1:24:38
  covering the rural craft as we do today, the rural craft would
• 1:24:41
  run more efficiently than it does now.
• 1:24:45
  If we had less micromanaging on the rural craft, we were
• 1:24:50
  efficient carriers. If carriers are treated with
• 1:24:52
  dignity, fairness and respect, we'd have more efficient
• 1:24:56
  carriers. You know, honestly that
• 1:24:57
  micromanaging not just the rural craft, it goes across all
• 1:25:00
  crafts. Yeah.
• 1:25:02
  You know, in in general, you know it's I.
• 1:25:07
  Managers that have too much time on their hands is what it is
• 1:25:12
  that comes with having too many managers running the post
• 1:25:15
  office. Point, James, when you
• 1:25:18
  micromanage, you're actually slowing the process down because
• 1:25:22
  you're interrupting the flow of mail of carriers.
• 1:25:26
  Or you're interrupting the clerks that are sorting the mail
• 1:25:30
  and throwing packages. So you're, you're the the, the
• 1:25:34
  fly in the ointment there because of the fact that you are
• 1:25:37
  interrupting the natural flow of the office aging.
• 1:25:42
  Absolutely. Good.
• 1:25:45
  All right, two more. Questions.
• 1:25:46
  So let's get through these. How come?
• 1:25:51
  How come each? Of you were never in area or ADR
• 1:25:54
  or district reps or did you attempt or apply for that in the
• 1:25:58
  past? It was going to apply Korea.
• 1:26:05
  Unfortunately, I was decertified as a local prior to being able
• 1:26:10
  to apply prior to getting my application in.
• 1:26:16
  I actually never got the opportunity to apply because of
• 1:26:19
  the fact that were there assigned positions, the
• 1:26:24
  recommendation to the NSS and the Dr. didn't like me because I
• 1:26:29
  processed too many grievances on the local level.
• 1:26:34
  I tried to go for it because I had asked if I could help out in
• 1:26:39
  other offices, become an area steward by talking with my Dr.
• 1:26:43
  and stuff and it never manifested.
• 1:26:46
  And then I got on this podcast and was able to help way more
• 1:26:50
  carriers than I ever could have as an ADR or ADR or an area
• 1:26:56
  steward. I have helped way more carriers
• 1:27:00
  through this podcast than any other form of service with the
• 1:27:04
  union other than being the director of steward operations.
• 1:27:09
  And that's the reason I'm running for the position.
• 1:27:12
  But the reason I'm running for this position is because I've
• 1:27:16
  seen how the carriers are treated across this country.
• 1:27:20
  I've heard from carriers across this country what's going on,
• 1:27:24
  how their stewards are, which stewards are good, which
• 1:27:27
  stewards are not doing their job.
• 1:27:29
  I've seen full forms of stewards that are just amazing at their
• 1:27:36
  jobs. But at the same end, on the
• 1:27:39
  other end of the spectrum, you've got stewards that are so
• 1:27:42
  in bed with management that they literally throw out the
• 1:27:45
  grievance, basically with very limited language that they
• 1:27:50
  settle it for to stop. Our steward system needs a lot
• 1:27:56
  stronger than it is, and it's time for it to be the steward
• 1:28:00
  system that every other craft wishes their steward system was.
• 1:28:07
  Forget we also had people step up and become stewards because
• 1:28:11
  of this podcast. Correct, that's true.
• 1:28:16
  And, and and several of them were ready to pull their dues
• 1:28:20
  and change their minds due to this podcast.
• 1:28:23
  Instead of pulling their dues, they decided to step up and
• 1:28:29
  fight. Then we'll be delegates at
• 1:28:32
  National Convention, yeah. All right.
• 1:28:36
  And for for me, it was just because I've always gotten
• 1:28:40
  either outvoted or one was disqualified from being even a
• 1:28:45
  local Stewart. So.
• 1:28:48
  Last question of the evening, guys, and we're going to wrap
• 1:28:51
  this up for tonight. What about the hiring process?
• 1:28:54
  Can this be, can this change shorten the process somehow,
• 1:28:58
  maybe give it back to the office?
• 1:29:02
  I would definitely be, yes. I would definitely want to talk
• 1:29:07
  to headquarters about this. I would love to see at least
• 1:29:12
  interviews come back into the office prior to hiring
• 1:29:16
  selection. Number one reason we still have
• 1:29:19
  POV routes. Any people who apply get hired
• 1:29:24
  in don't even meet a postmaster or manager or anybody until
• 1:29:30
  they're shadow day and discover because they didn't read the
• 1:29:34
  posting or didn't think they would need a vehicle for a
• 1:29:39
  particular route they may be getting assigned to and and oh,
• 1:29:43
  you have to have a car for this route.
• 1:29:47
  Those that you know, I, I. It I.
• 1:29:50
  Believe that needs to be brought back to the office in some sort
• 1:29:54
  of way prior to that offer letter going out.
• 1:29:58
  It needs it, it you, you need to screen people in the office
• 1:30:02
  prior to you do because they're not going to know the full gist
• 1:30:06
  of what they're trying to get into.
• 1:30:09
  Proffer letter coming without coming into the office and
• 1:30:12
  meeting with management. And honestly, I think a local
• 1:30:16
  steward or a senior carrier should be present.
• 1:30:19
  So an interview as well. Who has first hand on knowledge
• 1:30:25
  to be able to sit down and explain the duties of this job
• 1:30:29
  prior to an offer going out? I had AI, had a carrier in my I
• 1:30:36
  had a carrier in my office that came to my office.
• 1:30:40
  I had to drive an hour and a half to my office because when
• 1:30:45
  they applied, they saw the name but they didn't notice it wasn't
• 1:30:51
  the park, but the Township. The park is an hour, hour and a
• 1:30:56
  half drive away. So they got screwed big time on
• 1:31:01
  that. They showed up in our office and
• 1:31:04
  we're like, you're driving from there to here every day.
• 1:31:09
  It's like the posting that I got and this is where they put me
• 1:31:13
  like the biggest issues. You, you hit the nail on the
• 1:31:17
  head with that. Again, Kristen, the drive
• 1:31:20
  distance for these offices that they apply to that they don't
• 1:31:22
  even know that they're lying to the wrong office.
• 1:31:26
  If they were doing it in the office with the postmaster,
• 1:31:29
  which is actually how I started out was I went into the
• 1:31:32
  postmaster's office. You know, I met my postmaster
• 1:31:37
  the first time was I was applied as an ARC at the Waterford Annex
• 1:31:42
  and I did not mesh with that manager at all.
• 1:31:46
  And then the one I'm in now, that postmaster has retired
• 1:31:51
  since then, but my office is pretty much a retirement office
• 1:31:55
  for postmasters because it's so well run that they can just do
• 1:31:59
  their job without having to really interfere with the
• 1:32:01
  carriers because we're an all rural office.
• 1:32:04
  When I hired him, I went in and interviewed with the postmaster
• 1:32:08
  and the supervisor and my, my, my initial first postmaster had
• 1:32:14
  been a rural carrier for 20 years before he went into
• 1:32:17
  management. And you know, they were very
• 1:32:21
  sticklers on, you know, you have to have a car or a vehicle you
• 1:32:24
  can deliver out of. The route that I initially was
• 1:32:27
  going to be hired for was 112 mile route.
• 1:32:31
  They ended up switching that prior during my orientation
• 1:32:34
  because like I said, it was in one of those RMPOS with the J
• 1:32:37
  routes at the time and brought me it back in.
• 1:32:40
  But, you know, it was making sure that I had a vehicle that
• 1:32:42
  I'd be able to deliver out of and the clear cut of what the
• 1:32:47
  job description was and what it was expected of me, right down
• 1:32:53
  to code and shoes prior to even getting an offer letter.
• 1:33:00
  So yeah, I really do believe there needs to be a step prior
• 1:33:03
  to offer that brings those potential carriers into the
• 1:33:07
  office. I really do.
• 1:33:10
  My one of my first, because I interviewed at three different
• 1:33:16
  post offices. One was about, I mean, they're
• 1:33:18
  all about 20 minutes, thirty minutes away from my house.
• 1:33:21
  But the first one, he says, hey, I need to see you deliver out of
• 1:33:25
  the vehicle that you have. And of course I had a 2004 CRV.
• 1:33:29
  So I used that and showed him like, hey, I can touch the
• 1:33:32
  mailbox from here. I can left hand, left foot.
• 1:33:34
  He said good. And he let me know like, hey,
• 1:33:37
  here's the process and whatnot. And then I drove out two days
• 1:33:41
  later to the office I'm at now and same thing.
• 1:33:44
  He's like, hey, do you, you know, have a vehicle you can
• 1:33:46
  deliver out of? I need to see.
• 1:33:47
  I was like, well, the other postmaster did it at the other
• 1:33:50
  office. And he's like, OK, well, I know
• 1:33:53
  him. I'll go ahead and trust that he
• 1:33:54
  did that with you. And he went over everything with
• 1:33:57
  me and sat me down. And actually it was the
• 1:33:59
  supervisor at the time that was acting as postmaster while the
• 1:34:02
  postmaster was out. But it was, again, that clear
• 1:34:06
  cut. Hey, here's what's going to
• 1:34:07
  happen. Here's how you know you need to
• 1:34:09
  show up at this time, even let me know which route I was going
• 1:34:13
  to be on. Met the carrier real quick and
• 1:34:16
  then from there, you know, I went ahead and accepted that
• 1:34:18
  offer and it's been 8 years now. Bill.
• 1:34:24
  I interviewed with my first postmaster and I'll tell you
• 1:34:29
  what, I I never met a nicer person than Ben Franklin.
• 1:34:32
  And the, the thing of it was that having that local contact,
• 1:34:39
  you know, made you feel at ease. I was all PO VS at the time that
• 1:34:44
  I joined the the problem of it was as they started to introduce
• 1:34:48
  the LL VS the FF VS into the rule craft of the the routes
• 1:34:54
  still had PO VS and we had a postmaster hire 3 RC as who
• 1:35:01
  didn't have vehicles suitable for delivering mail out of never
• 1:35:04
  explained it to him, never had anybody in the office with him
• 1:35:07
  so that they could clarify that situation.
• 1:35:10
  So when they got hired and then they were scheduled on Apov
• 1:35:13
  route, all hell broke loose because we didn't have any spare
• 1:35:18
  vehicles. And yeah, we, we weren't
• 1:35:21
  splitting up routes and all at that time.
• 1:35:23
  So two of them ended up quitting.
• 1:35:26
  One of them how finagle is way into I'll just in later and take
• 1:35:30
  the first LLB that comes back that that grievance got filed,
• 1:35:34
  you know, within two days after that because of the fact that
• 1:35:37
  you're showing the favoritism disparity disparity of
• 1:35:40
  treatment. We could at the other two.
• 1:35:42
  If yeah, you're going to make that exception for the people
• 1:35:45
  who didn't have suitable PO VS you need that local touch and
• 1:35:50
  knowledge and you need like Kristen said, you need an
• 1:35:53
  experienced carrier in there with them.
• 1:35:55
  Make sure they understand all the details of the job, all the
• 1:36:00
  routes is you know for you know the the long and short of it.
• 1:36:05
  If the local person postmaster doesn't have you know isn't
• 1:36:09
  involved in the hiring process or more money as you go through
• 1:36:14
  the Academy, go through your shadow day and everything else.
• 1:36:17
  You spend all the money on training and then you turn
• 1:36:19
  around and lose them in the first couple weeks it's
• 1:36:22
  shortchanged. Save the post office some money
• 1:36:25
  and let local you know start the hiring process.
• 1:36:29
  That wrapped up that round of questions.
• 1:36:32
  I am going to redo the forms and repost them or also put it out
• 1:36:38
  there that if any other candidates that are going to be
• 1:36:41
  running for office would like to hop in on a candidate Q&A in the
• 1:36:46
  future, you're more than welcome to reach out to us either via
• 1:36:50
  the Facebook or e-mail United. We scan podcast@gmail.com.
• 1:36:55
  We would be more than happy to allow you to come on and answer
• 1:36:58
  some of these candidate Q&A S or if you want to come on and talk
• 1:37:02
  about yourself running for candidate, you're more than
• 1:37:05
  welcome to reach out to us and let us know.
• 1:37:07
  We'll definitely put that out to anybody that is willing to come
• 1:37:11
  on and wants to get their name out there.
• 1:37:15
  We know you're listening. Even goes for the incumbent
• 1:37:18
  positions. Yeah.
• 1:37:21
  We, we would like to keep it open for everybody.
• 1:37:25
  No, guys. Do we have anything else we want
• 1:37:27
  to add on touch on tonight before we go.
• 1:37:31
  The chat did say POV for Bill meant he had to bring his own
• 1:37:35
  horse. Yes, I did see that.
• 1:37:37
  And I see a lot of things that people have not been mapped
• 1:37:40
  since the first time around yet definitely start falling on
• 1:37:43
  those grievances on those. Definitely it needs to be done
• 1:37:46
  every month and it is important. It is one of the biggest factors
• 1:37:51
  in your route evaluation is that mapping.
• 1:37:54
  I just when I was facilitating Thursday, it's been a while
• 1:37:58
  since I've hadn't been able to facilitate with all the routes
• 1:38:01
  in my office. And there are some that, you
• 1:38:03
  know, I, I offered with the supervisor to sit down and fix
• 1:38:09
  because some of the boxes were not in order.
• 1:38:11
  And you don't notice it until you get into the line of travel
• 1:38:14
  until the when you're running the LTM.
• 1:38:16
  And if you run the whole LTM, you'll see where they're out of
• 1:38:19
  order because it looks like you're reversing to go back to a
• 1:38:22
  box. And those things need to be
• 1:38:25
  fixed. And yeah, definitely get on them
• 1:38:30
  about that. If I'm wrong, I I thought I saw
• 1:38:33
  somewhere in the National magazine where it says mapping
• 1:38:37
  is the most important aspect of Rex.
• 1:38:41
  Can I see that? Yeah, has been.
• 1:38:45
  Falsifying that the mapping has been done because they are
• 1:38:48
  actually metric on that and I've actually seen it from the a
• 1:38:54
  distance the supervisor's computer, the metrics that they
• 1:38:57
  have to follow and one of the big ones that they have to also
• 1:39:00
  follow is not editing your clock rings on the scanner.
• 1:39:06
  They are not following putting in your 40 to 40 times into the
• 1:39:11
  computer. Have a metric on there that says
• 1:39:14
  that they accepted all times, all digital time clocks.
• 1:39:21
  They're violating that as well, which is part of our actual
• 1:39:24
  contract. Yeah, 4040 is still the official
• 1:39:27
  time keeping device at this current time.
• 1:39:31
  Those as of now are not going to go anywhere and they really,
• 1:39:36
  they honestly can't because like, I mean, how else would you
• 1:39:39
  record second trips? How else would you record if you
• 1:39:42
  had a, you know, apov breakdown? You write it in, you know, 20
• 1:39:46
  minute breakdown. How else are you going to notate
• 1:39:50
  those other circumstances? 27 time.
• 1:39:53
  Yes, 8127 time. You know you have to. 1767 file
• 1:40:00
  like for safety you. Know yeah like or you know even
• 1:40:04
  if I have a longer than average end of shift duties for instance
• 1:40:08
  I'm doing my mapping that day or I'm doing my edit book or I'm
• 1:40:12
  doing case maintenance or doing new labels I note they that on
• 1:40:17
  the 4240 in case any questions get asked so why I have a 2 hour
• 1:40:21
  end of shift duty that day you know those little things so no
• 1:40:26
  you know 42 forties are not going to go anywhere you know I
• 1:40:29
  had an RCA in my office that forgot his badge at home and
• 1:40:33
  couldn't clock in on the scanner and I was.
• 1:40:35
  Like do I? Have to run home and get it.
• 1:40:36
  He moved and lives, you know, 12 miles out of town now.
• 1:40:39
  And I was like, you have a picture on your phone?
• 1:40:42
  He's like, no, but I could text my girlfriend and have her text
• 1:40:46
  it to me. I said, all right.
• 1:40:47
  And I said mark your time in on the 4240, notated that you
• 1:40:51
  forgot your badge. And then I noticed when he got
• 1:40:54
  it, I said, you get clocked in. He goes.
• 1:40:56
  I did. I said, OK, so yeah, you know,
• 1:40:59
  that is still for time keeping. Is the 4240.
• 1:41:06
  All right, guys. Anything else?
• 1:41:10
  I think we covered pretty much everything.
• 1:41:11
  We're already at two hours almost.
• 1:41:13
  Yeah, we are. So anybody final words tonight
• 1:41:17
  or are we just going to go ahead and wrap this up for this week
• 1:41:20
  you. Just sign off.
• 1:41:23
  All. Right, All righty, we are to
• 1:41:27
  call that a good one for this week.
• 1:41:29
  It is a little bit longer episode, but we had many good
• 1:41:32
  things to talk about. Plus those Q&A questions are
• 1:41:35
  always helpful for you guys to know where we sit on running for
• 1:41:39
  our respective positions. And on that note, guys, stay
• 1:41:43
  safe this week. Stay hydrated if you're
• 1:41:45
  experiencing the hot heat in quite a few areas.
• 1:41:48
  I know my my temperatures have been up and down this past week
• 1:41:52
  between the 80s and the 60s. So please take care.
• 1:41:56
  Please be safe. Make sure you get home to your
• 1:41:59
  loved ones and remember that we're all in this together and
• 1:42:02
  together we can be the change. And we will be back next week.
• 1:42:19
  On the road again. Bill's on the road again.
• 1:42:24
  Add a new microphone. Eddie sounds real good.
• 1:42:27
  The separate wing, he sings. Yeah, it just cut out for a
• 1:42:31
  second too.