On the Road to Workers' Rights at T-Mobile USA

Below: Lothar Schröder of ver.di leaflets in Nashville.

With the help of ver.di leaders Lothar Schröder and Constantin Greve, CWAers are reaching out to T-Mobile USA workers across the country in an organizing blitz.

ver.di is the German union representing more than 2 million workers, including workers at Deutsche Telekom and T-Mobile. In Germany, Deutsche Telekom brags about its social compact and support for workers' rights, but it has allowed T-Mobile USA management to wage a campaign of fear and intimidation against workers who want a union voice. Schröder and Greve are spending their personal vacation time in this campaign to help T-Mobile USA workers get their union.

Arriving in Washington in late June, Schröder and Greve met with U.S. Senator Al Franken (D-Minn.), and did several media interviews. In New York, they met with T-Mobile USA retail store workers.

First stop this week was Nashville, where the temperature hit 100 degrees. Organizers covered the three entrances to the call center and provided leaflets and answers to workers going to the T-Mobile USA call center.

In meetings and home visits, T-Mobile USA activists from Nashville told of workers being humiliated by supervisors, fired for trivial reasons and dealing with stress caused by management intimidation. T-Mobile USA customer service representatives must fix a customer's problem within 477 seconds, that's less than eight minutes, or face disciplinary action. But as more calls are sent overseas to calls centers in the Philippines and Central America, where workers follow simple scripts and can't resolve any customer complaints, it becomes that much harder for U.S. workers to resolve the often lengthy and difficult concerns a customer raises.

Today, Schröder is in Hartford, Conn., joining the TU-CWA bargaining team. Bargaining for the unit of 16 technicians has dragged on for more than 10 months, with T-Mobile USA management determined to stall negotiations. Schröder noted that "It had not been possible to reach an agreement regarding even the simplest things such as the installation of a bulletin board for union information or the provision of the technicians with the tools necessary for their work. The expensive attorney (management has hired) likely had cost Deutsche Telekom more money than all the demands CWA has been bargaining for. This borders on the absurd," he said.

Schröder says he is shocked by during the first few days of his visit. "There is a climate of fear because of totally insecure working conditions, constant fear to be dismissed without any reason, lack of employment contracts and lack of collective agreements. Workers need help and they need support, they need a voice at the workplace and a strong union to protect and represent them." Schröder is appealing to the Deutsche Telekom Executive Management Board to abandon immediately the politics of fear and infringement of workers' rights. "We expect better," is his demand to the Group CEO René Obermann.

Next stops: Wichita, Albuquerque and New Orleans.