we won

[tiger]

hey to all. we won our grievance that i filed sept. 24 01. i was the first to file so everything went under my name as a blanket grievance and i was the one to testify at the hearing we just had last week. i and several others, rn and lpn and cna, were called off unjustly, out of rotation by union rules. the deal was that our manager quit and administration got one charge rn, who sucks up to admin. to agree to do charge and some admin. duties. we were told that this charge rn would not be called off in the rotation list because she was needed for "managerial duties". note, none of this was mentioned until she refused to be called off. what a crock of sh*t. what happened was. the night shift charge nurse called her off, she refused , saying she needed to be there for conferences. LIE! so then the night shift charge called me, being next on the list and said she was sorry but since the charge had refused to be called off it was my turn. bull sh*t. I came in anyway and the charge who should gave been called off told me she knew it was her turn and would take her turn the next day. i told her that was not the way it worked.by the way she never took her turn until the grievance was in full force. she said we would speak to the admin. person in charge then. i said fine. she must have then called the admin. person and put me on the phone. i was not allowed to speak. told to go home. which i did. after that many people were called off out of rotation because this charge was supposed to be excluded from the rotation list due to her administrative duties, which clearly violates union rules. anyway, we had the hearing and admin. tried to twist the facts and say i was called off because i was an lpn. ok, then what about all the rns that were called off out of rotation. thankfully the hearing officer saw through thier bullsh*t and now we all have to be paid back. yippee, and thank goodness for unions. otherwise we would have been screwed. thanks for listening. j

[-jt]

CONGRATULATIONS!!!

Next contract, get rid of "call offs".

Never even heard of such a thing until recently cause we dont have them in our contracts. You get hired for a certain number of hours a day. You get there on time, you have lived up to your end of the deal. How can they then tell you to go home? Its not your fault if theres no pts there. Unless you are working per diem, there should be no such thing as "call offs" for f/t or p/t staff. Let them give you continuing ed, JCAHO mandatories or something else that day instead or let them give you a choice of either going home using a vacation day for the pay or floating to another unit you are familiar with & that needs help that day.

Anyway, congratulations on standing your ground!

[jayna, RN]

Congrats Tiger

[nightingale, RN]

Congratulations!

B.

[Tookie]

When unions have the strength of numbers and the guts to do something they can be a powerful and good force

Congrats - hang in there - remind others of your win always.

Tookie

[Zee_RN, BSN, RN]

Good Job! Who represents you? SEIU? Teachers? Teamsters? Just curious ... we've had several failed union drives and I'm interested in knowing who your union is. (Our last attempt was with the Teamsters.)

[SmilingBluEyes]

WOOHOOO good for you tiger. I wish we could GET RID OF CALL-OFF's where I work....they are ruining our paychecks. I have actually interviewed for another job because of this. Anyhow, congratulations on your diligence and hard work; they paid off!

[kewlnurse]

Good for you, our greivences never get settled, just a waste of paper. BTW how can you be management and a union employee? Can't have both.

[fedupnurse]

Great Job!!!!! Keep protecting your contract! Our suits keep trying to chip away at ours and it is people like myself that don't let them get away with it.

There are hospitals around here that force people to take vacation time during low census. No union=no choice. Shortage or not, they will fire you if you say no. Glad I am Union!!!

Keep up the good work Tiger!!!!

[tiger]

thanks everyone for the congrats and input. zee--it is seiu. i've just recently been appointed as a steward as well. kewl- i'm told that if they are just "acting manager" they can still be union. they later did place her as acting manager for a few months til we got a boss. they could have done that in the first place and saved all this hassle and hard feelings. you should have heard the guy from human resources during the hearing trying to twist the facts. and the admin. boss sitting next to him knowing they were lying. they couldn't shut me up though. he told my union rep "can you please tell her to answer the question yes or no." then he'd tell me "your not answering the question." i told him "yes i am but you just don't like the answer." i could see the veins bulging in his head.i was told prior to the hearing that he would try to intimidate me---NOT!

[-jt]

to Jayna - just wanted to say that is a very lovely picture.

[Jenny P]

I've never heard of "call offs" til I saw the term here on the BB. We have "staffing LOA's" which people can sign up for-- we write our names in a book and say we WANT the shift off, but we are still credited with seniority for our shift (and we CAN take it as vacation pay if we wish. This is how we handle low census days. If your unit has a low census, you may be pulled to a similar unit (I work CV-ICU, so in theory I could be pulled to either CCU or MS-ICU or tele - ONLY!) If you come in to work and then are offered a SLOA, you get paid for 4 hours of work; and NO HASSLES either!

And since when (in this day and age of nursing shortages) are there so many call offs? Can't the hospitals staff so that the patients get good care at least every once in a while? I think we should be demanding more staff, especially so that we all can remember what it feels like to have just the right number of patients-- no more than 4 or 5 (on a med surg floor).