Clerks in Small Offices to Receive Payout

By: Steve Lord

Back in December of 2014 a settlement was reached between the APWU and the USPS regarding Postmasters doing bargaining unit work in small offices. The settlement had two parts.

The first part dealt with Postmasters doing bargaining unit work in small offices from December 5, 2014 forward. Postmasters in Level 18 offices are now required to report their bargaining unit hours worked on an electronic 1260 form. Many clerks from Level 18 offices began receiving payouts this summer due to their Postmasters doing more than the allowed 15 hours of bargaining unit work.

The APWU at a national level gets the 1260 reports and disseminates them to the state and local organization so that they can contact the designated management person to begin the process of payment to the appropriate clerks. To date over $200,000 of payments have been scheduled in Wisconsin alone. If you work in a Level 18 office and think your Postmaster is doing more than 15 hours of bargaining unit work per week you should be getting a payout from the settlement. If you have not gotten a settlement payout you should contact the appropriate APWU representative.

The second part of the aforementioned settlement deals with the time before December 5, 2014. An award of 56 million dollars was achieved for that time period. The award time period goes from May 7, 2011 through December 5, 2014. If you were a PTF or NTFT employee at a small office (Level 18 and below) you should be in line for a payout. The payout works like this. The time period mentioned consists of 187 weeks. Each week that a NTFT or PTF employee worked will entitle that employee to one share which is worth $26.23. If an employee worked the entire time period it would amount to approximately $4900.

To those APWU members in these offices, thank you for being a member. You have contributed union dues which has helped the union financially and enabled the APWU to continue these long dragged out and expensive struggles. If you are a non-member reading this an 1187 form will be sent to you asking you to help contribute to these struggles. If you know a non-member encourage them to join. The APWU will continue to fight for the small office employee, but it is not cheap.