Teamster loaders, drivers, dispatchers and aircraft mechanics for now.
However support from any labor organization is welcome!
As the IPA has shown its support in the past for the International
Brotherhood of Teamsters in 1997 during the truckers strike and
again in 2004 in the Teamsters Canada Strike, this Friday night-IBT
Local 89 will firm up its support for the pilots. IPA crewmembers
are encouraged to attend Local 89's General Quarterly Membership
Meeting as the union passes a resolution in support of the IPA
and its continuing negotiations with UPS.
http://www.teamster.org/divisions/parcel/parcel.asp (Loaders/Drivers)
http://www.twu545.org/ (Dispatchers)
http://www.local2727.org/ (Aircraft Mechanics)
Tuesday, June 7, 2005
UPS talks hang on pension plan
Pilots' union, company cost estimates differ
By Wayne Tompkins
[email protected]
The Courier-Journal
United Parcel Service and its pilots' union are disputing how much it will cost to continue funding the pilots' pension plan -- a new complication in the two sides' 32-month quest for a new contract.
Independent Pilots Association President Tom Nicholson, in a letter published yesterday in the 2,500-member union's newsletter, said UPS' disclosure of its much higher estimates "stunned" union representatives.
"There were substantial differences of opinion between UPS and IPA actuaries regarding the pension-cost models," UPS spokesman Mark Giuffre said. "However, we owe it to our crew members to … have accurate pension numbers that will affect other parts of the overall compensation package."
Contract talks between UPS and its pilots began in October 2002. The National Mediation Board has overseen the talks since August. They are scheduled to resume Monday in Washington, D.C.
Mediators instructed actuarial firms for the two sides to work together to discover why their pension-cost models differ. Neither side would disclose how far apart their pension numbers are.
In May, pilots voted overwhelmingly to give union leaders authority to call a strike if no agreement is reached. A strike is not imminent because the existing contract comes under a federal law requiring a 30-day cooling off period if mediators declare the two sides are at an impasse.
Skittish customers are a greater concern. Even the whiff of a strike could cause UPS clients, as a precaution, to begin signing up with competitors.
During 2002 negotiations with the Teamsters union, UPS' business dropped 4 percent even though a contract was reached without a strike. Although much of that business returned within three months, UPS said some might have been permanently lost.
Nicholson charged in his letter that UPS is telling customers the talks with its pilots can go on forever without resolution, but said "the customers are learning better."
Except for the rift over pension-cost estimates, both sides said there were signs of progress from the bargaining table. Nicholson wrote that issues such as scheduling, health care and vacation have been closed out, but called the pension issue a UPS "stall and delay" tactic.
Nicholson, who did not return calls seeking further comment, said in the letter that the union has spent nearly $1 million working with an independent actuarial firm and a pension attorney "with extensive pilot pension collective-bargaining experience" to produce pension-cost models.
Nicholson said UPS had declined over the past two years to hire its own experts, saying it would duplicate effort and be too costly.
He said the union repeatedly asked UPS to do its own analysis to give UPS confidence in the pension plan's final costs.
"We agreed that we would use their models as part of the exchange of proposals, but we always retained the right (to) have our own actuaries check all the numbers," Giuffre said. "We were surprised by the discrepancies in the numbers."
Giuffre said UPS was ready to move ahead with talks as long as its pension-cost figures were used as the basis for negotiations.
Nicholson wrote that the union rejected that demand.