Heavy Check Arbitration
As you all know, on August 26th, 2020 the last heavy check performed at the San Francisco Maintenance Center was released from Dock 6. At that time the Union filed grievance accusing the company of violating both Article1 (Scope) and LOA #3 (Heavy Checks) of the Collective Bargaining Agreement (CBA) by discontinuing heavy checks at SFO.
March 31st, 2022
Re: Heavy Check Arbitration
All SFO IBT Members,
As you all know, on August 26th, 2020 the last heavy check performed at the San Francisco Maintenance Center was released from Dock 6.
At that time the Union filed grievance accusing the company of violating both Article1 (Scope) and LOA #3 (Heavy Checks) of the Collective Bargaining Agreement (CBA) by discontinuing heavy checks at SFO.
We are now in receipt of the arbitration decision regarding that grievance.
With respect to Article 1, the arbitrator ruled that the Company was not in violation of the CBA because 'force majeure' was in effect due to COVID-19 pandemic.
Regarding LOA #3, the decision was a bit more nuanced. The arbitrator decided that the "trip wires were indeed activated" by the COVID-19 pandemic allowing the company to discontinue Heavy Check work at SFO, but that the Company also violated LOA #3 by not providing replacement work at SFO.
But he also ruled that the decision only applied to Dock 6 Heavy Check and not the Dock 3 Heavy Check. That's because of the company claim, which the union vehemently disputed, that the closing of Dock 3 heavy check was not related to the pandemic at all and that they had informed the Union sometime in 2019 that they were going to discontinue the Dock 3 heavy check in 2020! In other words, the pandemic grounding the entire fleet in March was just a coincidence!
This aspect of the arbitration decision was extremely disappointing but in the grand scheme of things really did not mean much because the arbitrator further mitigated the company responsibility for this violation by concluding that replacement work for the Dock 6 heavy check was only required between August 26th, 2020, when the last Dock 6 heavy check was released, and October 1st 2020, when the CARES act expired, which we still cannot understand despite repeated reviews of the decision.
Finally, the arbitrator remanded the issue of remedy for the replacement work violation back to both parties for discussion for 60 days. If no agreement is reached, then the arbitrator will review and decide the appropriate remedy.
The bottom line is that the Company will not be compelled to bring back heavy checks to San Francisco maintenance base, except if it agreed to in the upcoming negotiations. Period.
We will continue to update you on any further developments going forward.
Mark DesAngles - IBT Local 986
Javier Lectora - IBT Local 856
Teamsters Airline Division - SFO Point