AT&T Legacy T Bargaining Report #44

At the table today the Company rejected our proposals to improve the termination pay Articles 39, 43, 44 and 45.  Although they had agreed to keep the termination pay the same for those covered under Article 25, we continue to push for improvement for those with different termination schedules.  They also rejected our demand to give the “expense allowance” to those employees currently not covered in Article 36 and proposed to carry forward that Article with no changes.  They also resubmitted their proposal on Holidays and Part Time employees.

An improvement was presented by the Company for those under Article 45 which, under the previous Contract, only got ECO but no other ATTOP options.  They will now get all of ATTOP –like the Special Leave Plan (SLP), Optional Term Pay (OTP) and Transitional Leave of Absence (TLA).  Finally, they made some movement on Article 43.  Under the current call-in language, employees only get time spent traveling TO the work location.  The Company agreed to our demand to pay for the time to AND FROM the work location.

Though these improvements are a step forward, we are still so far away on every important issue there is no way we can say we are any closer to an agreement.  Health care, job security, improving pensions, getting some gains for our lowest paid members – those are the issues we need to see some clear movement on.

Keep mobilizing.  Vice President Maly will be holding a call with the Local Presidents later in the week to go over plans to increase pressure on the Company.