Options after the mail count

The USPS achieved a slam dunk in this mail count. As a result, this will leave regular carriers having to take the high option just to keep their salary. It will also leave many of our leave replacements losing work hours.

This page is intended to show you some of the options you have and can take advantage of after this massacre of a mail count. If you have any other suggestions on how rural carriers can maximize any benefit that might be available to them after this count, please submit your suggestion in the comment form on the right side of this page.

The new evaluations will take effect on Saturday April 26th, 2008

First of all, lets cover what each route designation means:

K Route: A regular route on which the salary is based on 5 days each week. One relief day is authorized each week.

J Route: A regular route on which the salary is based on 5 days one week and 6 days the other week for a total of 11 days per pay period.

H Route: A regular route on which the salary is based on 12 days per pay period.

L route: Any route which has a box density of at least 12 per mile at the time of a count; also called high-density route.

Disagreements

First of all, here is the procedure on mail count disagreements and what the USPS has to do when you disagree

NRLCA procedure on mail count disagreements

Formal DPS Review

If the USPS maximized the mail run through DPS during the mail count, they are obligated to keep up the same percentage all through the year.

Here are the steps to take to ask for a formal DPS review if your DPS percentages fall after mail count.

Formal DPS Review

Article from GRLCA State Steward

DPS Review Tracking Form

DPS Rebuild

If you were counted under DPS for the first time, you are entitled to a rebuild in certain circumstances to the

evaluation before the mail count.

Click here for several documents

DPS Rebuild Form

High/Low Option

If you have been a regular carrier for 3 years and you earn 20 days of annual leave per year, you are eligible to choose the high option provided your route falls in the category for an option. When the route falls into two possible classifications, the carrier may choose the classification with the higher-hour evaluation, provided the carrier meets certain criteria. (The higher-hour category means more work hours per pay period, higher pay, fewer relief days)

High/Low Option explained

If you have already chosen the LOW option, you can change to the HIGH option if eligible (At the time of a National Count, Special Count or Interim Adjustment – Most PS4003 change actions that effectively place an eligible carrier in an option category. This will include Adjustments, Extensions, Remeasurements, addition or subtraction of a Locked Pouch allowance, Consolidations, Detours, Seasonal, and Hardship deliveries. The EXCEPTIONS are - 4003’s to establish New Routes, Changes in Collection Compartments, Parcel Lockers or Vehicle Data and Convert-to-Regular actions.

Free Saturdays

Also, if your came back as an H or J route, or you are taking the high option, you can take advantage of the "Free Saturday" Provision. Here are a couple of links to help with that.

http://www.mdrlca.org/J%20Routes.htm

http://docs.google.com/View?docid=dzdzj27_13d8tw2c

http://docs.google.com/Doc?id=dfb8g5q4_53fk28wxhz

LWOP

Article 10.4.B of the national contract states:

B. Upon request, a rural carrier shall be granted annual
leave or leave without pay on Saturday, at the carrier’s
option, provided a leave replacement is available.

So, a carrier could take the HIGH option and then use LWOP

on the remaining Saturday. But, LWOP does have an

effect on your saved leave and your FERS retirement.

Effect of LWOP

NRLCA Efforts to contest 2008 Mail Count Require Documentation

Re: National Step 4 grievance on 2008 Mail Count. The language of the Step 4 appeal is artfully crafted but it is basically standard boiler plate language designed to cover all possible situations. By including all of the possibilities in the language of the appeal, it leaves the door open to negotiate the issues of the grievance without narrowing those issues at the start and also keeps open potential remedies without precluding any of those resolutions which may become more important once the entire case is assembled.

It is the opening point of negotiations. The National officers will now negotiate the issues of the grievance with USPS Labor Relations including USPS labor lawyers who evaluate and must sign off on any potential resolution. If as a result of the Step 4 discussions, USPS denies the grievance at step 4, the NRLCA can either appeal to National Arbitration or not appeal and let the grievance lapse at which time, the issues would be moot.

One reason for making the appeal in the broadest possible language is to facilitate the gathering of evidence and/or documentation while the issue is waiting to be discussed or is in progress of negotiation. Many will assume that since the NRLCA filed a step 4 grievance, that everyone can relax and let National handle it. WRONG! WRONG! WRONG! Now is the time when everyone needs to dig deep and support the handling of this grievance by getting copies of count disputes, locally filed grievances, statements, volume reports, documentation of count disputes and irregularities through the steward system. ALL available evidence must be sent to state stewards now or as soon as possible. Now that National is involved; it is important to be a team player to give them the best possible chance of winning this grievance or the subsequent arbitration.

I regularly included language in grievance appeals asking for interest paid at the Federal judgment rate and when the steward training courses were first created I wrote that into the curriculum as standard procedure. Only one time did I ever get interest in all of the hundreds of cases I processed and appealed. It could, however, be important if the NRLCA case is perfectly presented and an arbitrator decides that USPS actions were in fact a gross violation of a fair mail count and deserving of extraordinary sanctions.

It is critically important to the successful handling of this grievance and the issues of USPS “fraud” in conducting the 2008 National Mail, that all parties affected cooperate in documenting the misconduct, the irregularities or even the dramatic changes in work hours (delivery and processing), volumes of each category of mail (letter size, DPS, flats, parcels, boxholders, accountable, etc.) and anything else that demonstrates a difference in the periods before and after the mail count from the period of the actual mail count.

John Amtsfield, March 22, 2008