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CHAPTER 13 - WORKPLACE RULES AND PRACTICES The employer may impose and enforce a variety of workplace rules and regulations, ranging from dress codes to job procedures, as long as the union has notice and the opportunity to bargain. 1 Only material changes (not merely procedural ones) require notice and bargaining. 2 For example, a claim that a town changed its policy regarding lockers at the police station was dismissed when the Hearing Officer found that the new rule was simply a rewording of the existing practice. 3 § 1 HOURS The hours that an employee is required to work is, of course, a mandatory subject of bargaining. 4 However, more particularized issues relating to hours often present special difficulties for a public employer. For example, the LRC has held that unilaterally eliminating the grace period for tardy employees 5 , changing lunch hours 6 , eliminating flex-time 7 , and changing the time when officers were required to report to court 8 , all constituted prohibited practices given the lack of notice and opportunity to bargain. Similarly, if the employer enters into an agreement with the union regarding hours--for example, allowing employees to swap shifts--it may not renege on the agreement. 9 However, unless it is incorporated into the collective bargaining agreement, an employer may make a change after providing the union with the required notice and opportunity to bargain. An employer must also bargain prior to changing the length of the work day 10 or week. 11 On the other hand, the installation of a time clock to record hours of work and break or meal periods is a management right which requires no bargaining so long as there will be no change in related practices, e.g., docking for tardiness stays the same. 12 Similarly, using video surveilance to record employees’ departure times, after learning that some custodians were leaving work early and falsifying their time cards, was not a prohibited practice. 13 PRACTICE POINTERS In the absence of any requirements in the collective bargaining agreement, an employer is free to set hours for work so long as overtime is paid in conformity with the terms of the contract and the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA). (The Massachusetts statutes regarding overtime are not applicable to municipal employees.) There is no requirement that employees be assigned a fixed schedule with regular starting and quitting time, for Commonwealth of Massachusetts
Workplace Rules and Practices 13-2 example. Changing hours of work to avoid overtime is not only lawful, traditionally it was expected of private industry managers. All this is far removed from the practice in most municipalities today. Most contracts require overtime for all work in excess of eight hours per day and forty in a week. (The FLSA requires overtime in police cases after 43 -- with a 7 day work cycle -- and increasing proportionately to 171 hours if up to a 28 day cycle is used. For firefighters the thresholds are ______ and ________.) Typically contracts give employees credit for paid days off (sick, injured, holiday, vacation, personal or bereavement days) when counting towards the overtime threshold. None of these need be counted for FLSA purposes. When a contract is silent on any aspect of the topic of hours of work, an employer may be able to propose a change in a practice or rule during the life of the agreement and, if the union so requests, bargain to agreement or impasse as a precondition to making the change. The listing of shift or tours of duty in a contract should be avoided. The more detailed the contract becomes in this area, the less flexibility a chief will have to respond to changing needs. When the times for shifts are included, the employer should insist that some adjective such as current, usual, customary or typical is used. This implies to arbitrators that there is room for some variation when conditions so warrant. § 2 OVERTIME AND PAID DETAILS Overtime, often implicating other issues such as minimum manning, paid details, and past practices, is a frequent area of dispute between employers and employees. Unless overtime is regularly scheduled, overtime remains a non-mandatory subject of bargaining. 14 However, reducing the number of firefighters assigned to each engine and ladder, thereby impacting the employees’ regular overtime, without providing the union with notice and opportunity to bargain, was held to be an unlawful unilateral change. 15 In a case dealing with both scheduled and unscheduled overtime, the LRC held that unilaterally eliminating the scheduled overtime violated the law, but dismissed the charge that the employer unlawfully reduced unscheduled overtime. 16 Note that when an employer offers an option to employees to receive overtime pay or alternatively to receive time off for working extra hours, the employer cannot unilaterally eliminate the time off option without bargaining. 17 Paid details may be assigned on an informal or formal (i.e., contractual) basis. Any change in a formal, contractual assignment system is a mandatory subject of bargaining, but informal systems of assigning paid Commonwealth of Massachusetts
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PREFACE Municipal officials and dep
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INTRODUCTION Public safety unions h
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Table of Contents ii § 2 Entry-Lev
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Table of Contents iv § 8 Other Ben
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Management Rights 1-2 management ri
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Management Rights 1-4 organized pub
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Management Rights 1-6 arbitrate a d
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CHAPTER 2 - SCOPE OF ARBITRATION Mu
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Scope of Arbitration 2-3 There are
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Scope of Arbitration 2-5 Northborou
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Scope of Arbitration 2-7 DiSciulo
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Scope of Arbitration 2-9 leniency o
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Scope of Arbitration 2-11 20 Masach
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Subjects of Bargaining 3-2 When a p
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Subjects of Bargaining 3-4 § 2 NON
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Subjects of Bargaining 3-6 each new
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Subjects of Bargaining 3-8 47 Whitm
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CHAPTER 4 - “GOOD FAITH” Both t
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Good Faith 4-3 A. REFUSAL TO NEGOTI
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Good Faith 4-5 When a contract is i
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Good Faith 4-7 assignments an inher
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Good Faith 4-9 A union's obligation
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Good Faith 4-11 employees' terms an
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Good Faith 4-13 3) Contractual Waiv
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Good Faith 4-15 impasse is reached
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Good Faith 4-17 1 Harwich School Co
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Good Faith 4-19 59 Commonwealth of
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Assignment 5-2 Despite the fact tha
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Assignment 5-4 condition of re-issu
Page 60 and 61: CHAPTER 6 - PROMOTIONS The promotio
Page 62 and 63: Promotions 6-3 list is due to expir
Page 64 and 65: CHAPTER 7 - APPOINTMENTS The appoin
Page 66 and 67: Appointments 7-3 providing the unio
Page 68 and 69: Appointments 7-5 entry-level wage o
Page 70 and 71: Appointments 7-7 union requests bar
Page 72 and 73: CHAPTER 8 - BARGAINING UNIT WORK A
Page 74 and 75: Bargaining Unit Work 8-3 private se
Page 76 and 77: Bargaining Unit Work 8-5 § 1 REMED
Page 78 and 79: Bargaining Unit Work 8-7 2) Absence
Page 80 and 81: Bargaining Unit Work 8-9 33 Safeway
Page 82 and 83: Reorganization 9-2 the work is supe
Page 84 and 85: Reorganization 9-4 bargaining unit
Page 86 and 87: Reorganization 9-6 If the union dem
Page 88 and 89: Reorganization 9-8 41 See Commonwea
Page 90 and 91: Sick and Injury Leave Rules 10-2 Wh
Page 92 and 93: Sick and Injury Leave Rules 10-4 §
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Page 96 and 97: Sick and Injury Leave Rules 10-8 Up
Page 98 and 99: Sick and Injury Leave Rules 10-10 P
Page 100 and 101: Sick and Injury Leave Rules 10-12 1
Page 102 and 103: Light Duty 11-2 leave if they are c
Page 104 and 105: Light Duty 11-4 § 2 INJURED ON DUT
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Page 134 and 135: Changing Schedules 14-2 § 1 CONTRA
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Page 138 and 139: CHAPTER 15 - MINIMUM STAFFING The n
Page 140 and 141: Minimum Staffing 15-3 that “a min
Page 142 and 143: Minimum Staffing 15-5 1 Chapter 594
Page 144 and 145: Benefits, Compensation and Leaves 1
Page 158 and 159: Employee Performance 17-2 The emplo
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Employee Performance 17-4 compellin
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Employee Performance 17-6 37 See se
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APPENDIX A-2 SAMPLE NOTICE FORM (OP
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APPENDIX A-4 SAMPLE NOTICE FORM (OP
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APPENDIX A-6 SAMPLE FORM 5 SAMPLE D
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APPENDIX A-8 6. The employee to be
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APPENDIX A-10 CONSENT I agree that
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APPENDIX A-12 to maintai
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