Customer Service Members Confer and Strategize

More than 200 service reps, operators and retail workers from throughout CWA came together in Houston this week for CWA's 2006 Customer Service Conference, both to build solidarity across bargaining units in their industry and to stand with their brothers and sisters of the Texas State Employees Union-CWA Local 6186, who staged a rally against Gov. Rick Perry's scheme to privatize their work.

Throughout the conference, April 20-22, members from telecom, wireless, airlines, publishing, public services and other industries shared their experiences in dealing with workplace issues such as scheduling, call monitoring and sales quotas. And, they strategized on how to compete in a global economy where call center outsourcing is a threat to both quality jobs and quality service.

"For many of our employers, customer service is the only way to differentiate one competitor from another," said CWA President Larry Cohen, urging the participants to build a strong network of union customer service leaders and to make a difference on the job. "CWA continues to promote the high road — customer service based on solving problems, not reading scripts: quality service and quality union jobs."

Cohen urged the participants to seize on this theme and work to build CWA in call center environments. He pointed to Cingular as a prime example of how a company's commitment to allowing workers to choose union representation and workers' commitment to quality service ultimately pay off for both the company and the union.

Welcomed by District 6 Vice President Andy Milburn, Houston Local 6222 President Claude Cummings, Mayor Bill White and Rep. Gene Green (D-Texas), conferees participated in workshops on the Family and Medical Leave Act, Ready for the Future, Sales Quotas and Union Representation and Union Approaches to Attendance. They also began preparations for their participation in Customer Service Week in October, when telecom unions around the world, coordinated by Union Network International, will conduct various workplace activities to promote the strong correlation between quality service and quality jobs to their employers.

A high point of the conference came on opening day, when participants turned out for a rally at a welfare office to support TSEU-CWA members whose jobs are threatened across the state. Those workers determine applicants' eligibility for food stamps, children's Medicaid, Temporary Assistance to Needy Families and other benefits.

They urged Gov. Perry (R) to stop the rollout of privatized call centers for state human services. As part of the governor's privatization scheme, numerous Local 6186 members received layoff notices last year. A bipartisan group of six state legislators wrote to the governor that, "Thousands of HHSC eligibility staff are leaving the agency to take any job available because they have been told that their jobs at HHSC will be eliminated within a few months."

The call centers, designed to replace local offices, have caused many delays and other problems in the pilot region of Central Texas, and on April 5 the state Health and Human Service Commission announced the problems were so severe that it would stop the expansion of that call center model to other parts of the state for at least 30 days.

Local 6186 is asking the governor to address the crisis by stopping the rollout of privatized call centers until at least the end of the year and to rescind the layoff notices.