UPS Contract Wins Local Union Approval, Ratification Vote Remains
Local Teamsters branches took another step toward making its new tentative contract agreement with UPS official.
On Monday, Teamsters locals voted an overwhelming 161-1 to endorse the tentative agreement reached with the America’s biggest package carrier on July 25 and recommend its passage by the full membership.
More from Sourcing Journal
With the locals giving a nearly unanimous endorsement, all UPS Teamsters members will have the chance to vote on ratification from Aug. 3-22.
The tentative agreement, which the union says includes $30 billion in new money over the five-year deal, will give both existing full- and part-time UPS Teamsters an hourly wage bump of $2.75 in 2023, and $7.50 over the length of the contract. Part-time workers got a boost in starting pay at $21 per hour, with part-timers seeing an average 48 percent increase in wage by 2028.
The deal also includes the creation of 7,500 new full-time union jobs and 22,500 more open positions, and eliminates forced overtime for delivery drivers.
“The entire UPS Teamsters National Negotiating Committee stands behind this historic contract and our UPS local unions have resoundingly voted to endorse it,” said Sean O’Brien, general president of the Teamsters, in a statement. “Our tentative agreement is richer, stronger and more far-reaching than any settlement ever negotiated in the history of American organized labor. The Teamsters are immensely proud of reaching agreement with UPS to improve the lives of our members, their families and working people across the country.”
Of the 176 local unions with UPS members, 14 affiliates failed to show up to the Washington, D.C. meeting to review the tentative agreement.
TForce Freight ratifies five-year deal
The Teamsters have been fighting labor battles on numerous fronts for their representatives at major logistics players, including TForce Freight, Amazon, DHL and Yellow among others.
On Monday, TForce Freight union employees ratified a new national contract with 81 percent voting in support of the deal.
The five-year master agreement, which was tentatively reached on July 14, provides roughly 7,800 members with improvements to wages and benefits, and is designed to implement safeguards against subcontracting.
Drivers would be protected against subcontracting, with the union winning back 140 jobs that had been cut, as well as nearly 300 new driver jobs. While the maximum subcontracted miles driven by truckers is expected to be 45.8 percent by Jan. 31, 2024, that number will dwindle to 39.5 percent by July 31, 2028, at the end of the contract.
Like the UPS deal, the TForce Freight contract saw the elimination of a two-tier wage scale, the addition of Martin Luther King day as a holiday and the mandate to install air conditioning in newly purchased vehicles.
The Teamsters say the wage increases are the highest in the history of the national contract, with full-time local cartage and clerks seeing increases of $4.50 per hour over the life of the agreement. Road drivers will receive increases to their current mileage rate over the length of the deal, starting at $0.7557 per mile this month and increasing to $0.8257 per mile by January 2028.
The contract further separates work between TForce’s truck drivers and dockworkers. Road drivers will only perform road work and cannot work the docks, except at the LTL company’s mini-hubs. TForce must have the Teamsters’ approval for any other expansion of mini-hub operations.
Additionally, the new deal prevents the company from using the outward-looking cameras in its vehicle fleet for disciplinary reasons. It also seeks to put employees at ease over automation concerns, prohibiting the use of robots, driverless vehicles, drones or other technology to move freight or replace drivers, clerks or dockworkers.
“Our members at TForce have spoken loud and clear, and they overwhelmingly agree this new contract will deliver massive economic gains and non-economic improvements,” said John A. Murphy, Teamsters national freight director and co-chair of the Teamsters National Freight Industry Negotiating Committee (TNFINC).
Former Amazon contractors represented by the Teamsters have extended their picketing to a 10th warehouse, this time in Newark, Calif., the union said. Eighty-four workers employed by Battle-Tested Strategies, a former Amazon delivery partner that the e-commerce giant cut ties with because of alleged poor performance, continue to hold the demonstrations and demand that it protects employees from extreme temperatures.
The union also played a role in the recent collapse of Yellow, initially threatening a strike of 22,000 workers due to missed pension payments, and likely spooking retailers into diverting freight elsewhere. After Yellow committed to making the payment at a later date, the Teamsters called off the threatened strike.
Yellow blames the union for preventing it from making the restructuring moves necessary to modernize its business.
