Pacific Northwest Bell Telephone Co.

National Labor Relations Board - Board Decisions

Jun 25, 1974

211 N.L.R.B. 1021 (N.L.R.B. 1974)

PACIFIC NORTHWEST BELL TELEPHONE CO.
Pacific Northwest Bell Telephone Company,' Employ-
er-Petitioner and Communications Workers of
America, AFL-C102 and Order of Repeatermen
and Toll Testboardmen, Local Union 1011 , affiliat-
ed with International Brotherhood of Electrical
Workers, AFL-CIO.3 Case 19-UC-110
June 25, 1974
DECISION AND ORDER
BY CHAIRMAN MILLER AND MEMBERS JENKINS
AND KENNEDY
Upon a petition duly filed under Section 9(b) of the
National Labor Relations Act, as amended, on
September 6, 1973, a hearing was held before
Hearing Officer Zane Lumbley on December 10 and
11, 1973, and February 6, 1974, for the purpose of
taking testimony with respect to the issues raised by
the petition. On February 13, 1974, the Regional
Director for Region 19 transferred this case to the
National Labor Relations Board. Thereafter, all
parties filed briefs.
Pursuant to the provisions of Section 3(b) of the
National Labor Relations Act, as amended, the
National Labor Relations Board has delegated its
authority in this proceeding to a three-member panel.
The Board has considered the Hearing Officer's
rulings made at the hearing and finds that no
prejudicial error was committed. The rulings are
hereby affirmed.
Upon the entire record in this case, the Board
finds:
The Employer seeks to clarify the craft unit for
which ORTT is certified to include only employees
who regularly spend more than 51 percent of their
time establishing, maintaining, and testing some or
all of the following equipment and services: all radio
systems used for long-distance lines ; telephone and
telegraph/teletypewriter private line test board and
associated central office equipment and services;
ship-to-shore radio equipment; central office pro-
gram and video service and equipment; mobile radio
service control terminals; intertoll circuits and
associated miscellaneous toll terminal equipment; L
carrier; N carrier; 0 carrier; ON carrier; PBX
repairmen (principally engaged in work on telety-
pewriter equipment)--Oregon area; PBX repairmen
(principally engaged in work on teletypewriter
equipment in Seattle)-Washington-Idaho area;
work in the circuit layout bureau as noted by the
Board in Pacific Northwest Bell Telephone Company,
178 NLRB 726, but excluding work on the T carrier.
CWA urges the Board to clarify the unit as requested
I Herein called the Employer.
z Herein called CWA.
1021
by the Employer. ORTT contends, however, inter
alia, that the unit clarification procedure is not the
proper one for making substantive modifications in
the scope of the existing certifications, and moves,
therefore, that the petition be dismissed. For the
reasons stated infra, the motion to dismiss is granted.
The Employer is a public utility engaged in the
business of furnishing telephone, teletypewriter,
telegraph, radio, television, and other communica-
tion services. For administrative purposes, the
Employer is divided into two areas: one known as
the Oregon area, comprising that State, and the other
known as the Washington and Idaho area, compris-
ing Washington and Northern Idaho.
Bargaining History
In 1944, the Board found that toll maintenance
employees of the Washington-Idaho area could
bargain either as a separate bargaining group or
might remain part of the departmental group with
which they were then associated, dependent on the
desires of the employees involved .4 The Board
described the functions and characteristics of the toll
maintenance employees as follow (58 NLRB at
1046):
Toll maintenance employees, including telegraph
repeatermen, testboard men, transmission men,
and toll central office repairmen, test, repair, and
maintain equipment used for long distance
transmission. More specifically, they set up
telegraph and teletypewriter circuits and test and
adjust repeater equipment, they deal with custom-
ers who purchase teletypewriter and telegraph
service from their employer, and they use the
Morse telegraph code for communication be-
tween toll offices. Their work requires constant
communication with toll employees in other areas
and outside their employer's territorial bounda-
ries. They make transmission tests, test and
monitor radio program circuits and equipment,
and locate and clear trouble on such circuits and
equipment. Toll maintenance employees operate
mobile emergency radio equipment, make neces-
sary patches or switches at the line and amplifier
panels, and perform routine maintenance work
on toll office equipment. They keep records
associated- with their work. Toll maintenance
employees in the three districts work under
district toll superintendents, who do not have
jurisdiction over station and central office work.
The job categories under toll and central office
employees indicate, respectively, different craft
Herein called ORTT.
Pacific Telephone and Telegraph Company, 58 NLRB 1042.
3
4
211 NLRB No. 145
1022 DECISIONS OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD
skills . Without special training, central office
employees cannot perform toll maintenance
work, and vice versa. Toll employees regularly
perform work in more than one toll maintenance
category and a similar situation exists among
central office employees. Some employees, espe-
cially those assigned to localities where the toll
and central office work is light, are combination
men and work on both toll and central office
facilities . The practice of the Company is to
classify its employees as "toll" or "central office"
employees, depending upon the type of equip-
ment on which each craftsman regularly spends
51 percent or more of his time.5
Following an election, the Board found that a
separate unit of toll maintenance employees in the
Washington-Idaho area, including PBX teletypewri-
ter repairmen under toll supervision, constituted an
appropriate unit and certified ORTT as the bargain-
ing representative of such employees. In 1949, the
Board found appropriate a similar unit of toll
maintenance employees in the Oregon area.6 The
Board again referred to the employer practice, which
it endorsed, of classifying employees as "toll" or
"central office" employees, depending upon the type
of equipment on which each craftsman regularly
spent 51 percent or more of his time. ORTT was
selected as the bargaining representative of the
employees in this unit and was certified as the
bargaining representative. In 1954, ORTT filed a
petition seeking to consolidate, in one unit, the three
separate units of toll maintenance employees for
which it was then the certified representative. The
Board denied the request.? In the following year, the
Board reaffirmed the appropriateness of the separate
toll maintenance units for which ORTT had been
certified.8 In 1969, the Employer, as successor in
interest to Pacific Telephone & Telegraph Company,
filed a motion seeking clarification of the toll
maintenance units represented by ORTT and the
residual plant department units represented by
CWA. The Employer contended that ORTT was
claiming to represent certain employees currently
represented by CWA, and that the latter was
claiming to represent other employees then consid-
ered to be in the ORTT units. In granting the
Employer's request the Board stated: 9
In deciding that toll maintenance employees
constituted an appropriate unit in 58 NLRB 1042,
the Board described the duties of these employees
in detail. Basically, it found that they tested,
s This is the source of the so-called 51-percent rule.
s Pacific Telephone and Telegraph Company, 85 NLRB 713.
The Pacific Telephone and Telegraph Company, 107 NLRB 1615, 108
NLRB 862.
repaired, and maintained equipment used for
long distance transmissions , physically set up
telegraph and teletypewriter circuits, dealt with
customers who purchased teletypewriter and
telegraph service from the employer, made
transmission tests, operated mobile emergency
radio equipment, and kept records associated
with their work. The Board found that the
practice of the employer was to classify its
employees as "toll" or "central office" depending
upon the type of equipment on which each
employee regularly spent 51 percent or more of
his time. The Board considered as "toll mainte-
nance" only those employees classified by the
employer as such, and specifically excluded those
employees whose combination work did not
entitle them to the classification of "toll mainte-
nance" by their employer.
The record indicates that toll maintenance
employees perform the same duties now as in
1944 with a few minor exceptions. There has been
no showing that the test used for determining
which employees should be included in the toll
maintenance unit in 1944 is no longer valid.
In the most recent case involving these parties,io
the Board declined to accrete by way of a motion for
clarification certain new operations to the existing
units for which ORTT and CWA are currently the
bargaining representatives. The Board in its decision
implicitly recognized the continuing viability of the
51-percent rule.
At the present time, ORTT has a collective-
bargaining contract with the Employer which will
expire on July 21, 1974, covering "toll maintenance
employees in the Plant Departments in the Oregon
area and in the Washington-Idaho Area . . . . CWA
presently is party to a collective-bargaining contract
with the Employer which will terminate on July 17,
1974, and which covers a multidepartment unit
which includes both craft and noncraft classifica-
tions.
The Present Dispute
In the present petition, the Employer seeks to
restructure the historical certification of the "toll
maintenance" unit so as to define the unit in terms of
particular types of equipment operated rather than in
the traditional distinction recognized in the previous
certifications between long distance and local com-
munication services. The present petition owes its
9 The Pacific Telephone and Telegraph Company, 113 NLRB 478.
9 Pacific Northwest Bell Telephone Company, 178 NLRB 726, 727.
10 Pacific Northwest Bell Telephone Company, 207 NLRB No. 9.
PACIFIC NORTHWEST BELL TELEPHONE CO. 1023
origin to a dispute as to who shall operate the T
carrier.
A "carrier" is defined as "an arrangement whereby
additional talking paths can be derived from a single
physical circuit or pair of physical circuits through
the introduction of higher frequencies and electronic
components." In other words, a carrier is the
equipment which permits several messages to be
transmitted simultaneously through the same wire,
cable, or radio facility. The Employer has been using
different types of carriers for many years. As these
were incorporated into the system, it was customary
to designate them by capital letters assigned seriatim.
Where a carrier was used for toll circuitry it was
maintained by employees in the ORTT; where used
for making local calls, employees represented by
CWA maintained them. The T carrier is a compara-
tively new carrier which uses the most advanced
techniques of solid state technology. T carriers were
initially used for local trunk calls and were main-
tained solely by CWA members. Development of T
carrier design, however, has increased its scope of
application to include trunks and circuits up to 50
miles in length, and it is presently in use on some of
the shorter toll routes. According to an employer
witness, the T carrier "has been extended into other
toll-connecting and probably inter toll applications."
A more advanced type of T carrier has been
perfected by Bell Laboratories for use up to 500
miles . This is not yet in use, however. The record
shows that members of CWA have been assigned to
work on about 95 percent of the T carriers, with the
remaining 5 percent assigned to ORTT members,
depending on the application of the 51-percent rule.
Conclusion
In its petition for clarification , the Employer-
Petitioner seeks to have the Board determine, inter
alia, that all work on T carriers belongs to employees
who are represented by CWA. Thus, it is clear that
the Employer-Petitioner is asking the Board to assign
certain work to employees in the CWA-represented
unit rather than to employees in the ORTT unit who
11 The Gas Service Company, 140 NLRB 445, 447. Accord: Ingersoll
Products Division (Chicago Workers) of the Borg-Warner Corporation, 150
NLRB 912.
12 See Monongahela Power Company, 198 NLRB No. 177.
13 Chairman Miller is of the view that the facts show a recent history of
considerable confusion as to the feasibility of applying the 51 -percent test to
are presently doing some of the work and who may
be expected to do more such work if, as is
anticipated, the T carrier is used more extensively for
toll transmission. However, work assignment dis-
putes are not properly matters for consideration and
resolution in unit clarification procedures. In the Gas
Service Company case,11 the Board said:
Work assignment disputes are not properly
matters for consideration and resolution in a
representation proceeding. As the Board has said,
its sole function in representation proceedings is
to ascertain and certify the name of the bargain-
ing representative, if any, that has been designat-
ed by the employees in the appropriate unit. It is
not the Board's responsibility in representation
proceedings to decide whether employees in the
bargaining unit are entitled to do any particular
work or whether an employer has properly
reassigned work from employees in the bargain-
ing unit to other employees.
Moreover, under the guise of clarification the
Employer seeks not the resolution of an ambiguity in
the existing certified and contract bargaining unit
which has been in existence for more than 30 years,
but a radical change in that unit so as in effect to
eliminate the 51-percent rule which during all that
time has been the dividing line between the ORTT
and CWA bargaining units. That is not an appropri-
ate subject for a motion for clarification. Finally if
the Board were to grant the Employer's request, it
would be sanctioning an important modification of
an existing contract provision during the life of that
contract, thus disrupting an established bargaining
relationship. 12
For all the above reasons, we find that a question
of representation does not exist and we shall
therefore dismiss the petition.13
ORDER
It is hereby ordered that the petition for clarifica-
tion filed herein be, and it hereby is, dismissed.
the T carrier . In his view , there is sufficient lack of clarity of the certification
in view of new technology that the Board should not dismiss this petition
and instead should attempt to clarify its certification . Because his colleagues
have declined to do so herein, the Chairman sees no point in expressing his
views on the merits, but merely notes his dissent from the dismissal.