PhilMcDonnell.com

I have been asked, “What happened to you? Where have you been? Why aren’t you posting anymore?”

Well to sum up my answer to all those questions, I have been very busy with life around me as well as the strike across the street from my house. If you don’t know what I am talking about you can read all about it here: www.fipna.org , to sum it up there is a nursing home across the street from my house that forced its employees to strike for the last six months. Victory for the workers finally came on August 21, 2008 when all the workers returned to work under an injunction that the union won to allow them to return.

As you can see I have been plenty busy with just the strike alone, not to mention worrying about a strike of my own at my company, which did not happen as we agreed to a contract one week after deadline.

So my plans for the future here are to return to blogging at least once a week if not more, and to add more tech to the blog. Many people have asked for me to add more simplified tech posts like the anti-virus, domain scammers, etc to the blog. So since you all asked, you will receive.

I will be back soon with my first post about internet faxing, everyone associated eFax to faxing over the internet, but are they the best? Are they the only game in town? Stay tuned and find out what my thoughts are.

I also plan to add an “Ask Phil” section where you can post your question and it will be answered here live on the blog.

I also really need to update Wordpress, the underlying software that runs this blog. So please come back soon…

~Phil

Since last week Verizon workers have been working without a contract, the union and the company have both been at the bargaining table and stopped the clock on the contract expiration date.

Well today (Sunday) according to our local website www.cwa1101.org, Verizon and CWA have reached an agreement. If you look back at my post from last weeks deadline you will see that my prediction was pretty close, all except for the 5 year agreement, Verizon only agreed on a 3 year contract.

From CWA’s website:

Following is a summary of the tentative agreement.

Wages
a. Effective 8/3/2008 3.25 %
b. Effective 8/2/2009 3.5 %
c. Effective 8/1/2010 3.75 %
COLA
a. Effective 8/1/2010
b. One half of the increase in the CPI-W in excess of 3.75% between May ‘09 and May ‘10
Corporate Profit Sharing
a. $700 minimum distribution
b. Paid in March of 2009, 2010, 2011
Pension Band Increases
a. Effective 10/1/2008 3.25%
b. Effective 10/1/2009 3.5 %
c. Effective 10/1/2010 3.75%
Pension Lump Sum Cash-Out
a. Pension Distribution Options remains in contract with no change in the language by which the amount is calculated
b. Available at any time, for the length of the contract
VZ Business
a. 445 Field Techs in plant contract with carveouts
b. 145 Inside Techs in plant contract with carve outs
c. Guarantee small and medium business exclusively for represented commercial
d. Bring new VZ-B work to CWA represented locations 100 at end of 2009 and 100 at end of 2010
Video Head End – Video Work. Approx. 75 in plant contracts with carve outs
Temps and terms to Perms (Approx 1,200)
Three times a year discussion on union jobs and efficiency/growth with top management
Active Health Care: Maintained full employer paid coverage with limited plan design changes
Retiree Health Benefits
a. Fully paid, no retiree pays during life of agreement
b. Any changes in future health benefit plans for retirees will be negotiated with the Union in the same manner as that for actives and for future retirees.
c. No current retiree will pay for health coverage through the end of 2011.
d. No active employee who retires during the term of this agreement will pay or health coverage through the end of 2011.
e. Caps on the Company’s contribution to the cost of retiree health coverage in 2012 and after have been raised as follows:
i. Prior to Age 65 and Medicare Eligibility
1. Retiree Only: $12,580
2. Retiree + 1 25,160
3. Retiree + Family 31,450
ii. Age 65 and after and Medicate Eligible
1. Retiree Only: $ 6,330
2. Retiree + 1 12,660
3. Retiree + Family 18,990
f. Employees hired after August 2, 2008 will be covered under a new retiree health program.
i. Once they retire (under the same eligibility requirements as currently required), they will receive an annual payment equal to $430 times years of service (to a maximum of 30 years).
ii. The parties will negotiate this amount in future years to reflect changes in the cost of health coverage.
Agreement to work for National Health Care Reform and provide $2 million a year during term of contract.
New Dispute Resolution for Faster resolution of grievances
Savings and Security Plan
a. Add a Roth option to the 401(k) plan
b. Allows investment of post tax dollars with no taxes applied to investment returns when assets are later distributed.
Retiree Life Insurance
a. Company-paid retiree life insurance benefits will be frozen at one-times the wage level attained on 8/2/2008.
b. The minimum amount to be paid to beneficiaries of retirees who retiree after 8/2/2008 will be $20,000, even after age 65.
Retirees who were hired after 8/2/2008 will be eligible for the minimum $20,000
Increase supplemental insurance with ability to purchase 5 times salary
Commercial Issues
a. Collection
b. Jt Marketing Letter
c. Local Presence Centers
d. NJ collection office issues
Extend all existing District and Local Agreements and adjust all dates.
CWA-NETT will discuss how to publicize
Unique Regional Items
a. Scope agreement CWA D2
b. Contract Initiative Letter fixed
c. Job Share Language (North)
d. ACFC will outstanding pay current bills $486K
e. Increase ACFC wage rate top wage rate in contract
f. Supplemental Retiree Life Insurance: five times implemented as soon as possible

Not too bad of a deal considering the economy and political climate we are currently in. I am thankful that we do not have to walk the picket line and we can return to work on Monday as usual.

In Solidarity,
~Phil

As I suspected there is no strike as of yet against Verizon. If you have followed my blog you know I work for Verizon and our contract expired August 2, 2008. Everyone at work said that we were going on strike and it could be a long one, etc. I was the only one who kept saying that it would seem unlikely that Verizon would want to put us on the street.

At the last minute the union and Verizon decided to stay at the bargaining table and continue working towards a new contract. Us employees were told to continue working as normal and all existing contract provisions should be followed. It is only a matter of time before a contract will be signed, at least in my opinion.

Recently Verizon won the concession to supply video to the five boro’s here in New York, how would it look to the investors that the workers were now on strike? Not to mention the quarterly results for the last quarter came in above expectations. In this time of a down economy for a company to be profiting and yet not wanting to benefit their own employees that make that profit for the company would seem absurd.  So this was my main reason for saying we will not be walking the picket line, at least not this year.

My prediction is that Verizon will extend or agree to a 5 year contract with all the same provisions we already have and give us a 3% increase annually for the term of the new contract. This will allow Verizon to use us to get all the FIOS installed over the next several years, at that time there will be a need for a much smaller labor force since fiber does not require the maintenance that copper does. After the FIOS is rolled out and functional I would then be worried about the status of the next contract that will be offered, by that time (5 years) I assume Verizon will offer several buy outs to get rid of alot of employees through attrition.

Everyone knows that I am a big supporter of technology advancement, however this is one time that it affects me directly. The more advanced technology gets within Verizon the less they will require my services. In the end it will make a better company that should be very profitable for it’s shareholders, however it’s employees may be out in the cold.