Allied Product Workers

National Labor Relations Board - Board Decisions

Apr 28, 2000

331 N.L.R.B. 1 (N.L.R.B. 2000)

ALLIED PRODUCTION WORKERS LOCAL 12 (NORTHERN ENGRAVING CORP.) 1
Allied Production Workers Union Local 12 (Northern
Engraving Corporation) and Sherry Prichard.
Case 18–CB–3913
April 28, 2000
DECISION AND ORDER
BY MEMBERS FOX, LIEBMAN, AND HURTGEN
Upon charges filed by Sherry Prichard on April 19 and
June 21, 1999, against Allied Production Workers Union
Local 12 (the Respondent or the Union), the General
Counsel of the National Labor Relations Board issued a
complaint and notice of hearing on June 23, 1999. The
complaint alleges that the Respondent violated Section
8(b)(1)(A) and (2) of the Act by continuing to enforce a
checkoff authorization signed by Prichard and other em-
ployees despite their attempted revocation of those au-
thorizations on January 30, 1998.
On September 23, 1999, the General Counsel, the Re-
spondent, and the Charging Party filed with the Board a
joint motion to transfer this proceeding to the Board and
for approval of the parties’ stipulation of facts. The parties
agreed that the stipulation of facts and attached exhibits
constituted the entire record in this case, that no oral testi-
mony was necessary or desired by any of the parties, and
that they waived a hearing and decision by an administra-
tive law judge. On November 10, 1999, the Board ap-
proved the stipulation and transferred the proceeding to the
Board for issuance of a Decision and Order. Thereafter,
the General Counsel and the Respondent filed briefs.
The National Labor Relations Board has delegated its
authority in this proceeding to a three-member panel.
On the entire record and the briefs, the Board makes
the following
FINDINGS OF FACT
I. JURISDICTION
At all material times, Northern Engraving Corporation
(Northern Engraving), a Wisconsin corporation with a
principal office in Sparta, Wisconsin, has been engaged in
the manufacture and distribution of appliance nameplates
at its facility in Lansing, Iowa. During the calendar year
ending December 31, 1998, Northern Engraving sold
goods and services valued in excess of $50,000 directly to
customers located outside of the State of Iowa and pur-
chased and received at its Lansing facility goods valued in
excess of $50,000 from points outside the State.
We find that Northern Engraving is an employer en-
gaged in commerce within the meaning of Section 2(2),
(6), and (7) of the Act, and that the Respondent Union is
a labor organization within the meaning of Section 2(5)
of the Act.
II. ALLEGED UNFAIR LABOR PRACTICES
A. Facts
The stipulated record reflects that at all material times the
Respondent has been the exclusive collective-bargaining
representative of the employees in the following unit:
All production and maintenance employees at the plant
located at Industrial Park West, Lansing, Iowa; exclud-
ing all salaried, office, clerical employees, designers,
artists, graphic arts personnel, tool and die makers,
laboratory technicians, plant protection employees, and
technical, professional and supervisory employees as
defined under the National Labor Relations Act of
1947 as amended.
The parties’ collective-bargaining agreement covering the
unit contained a dues-checkoff provision1 which required
Northern Engraving to deduct and remit dues and service
fees monthly to the Respondent pursuant to a lawfully exe-
cuted authorization signed by the employee.2
On June 19, 1993, Sherry Prichard executed a check-
off or service charge authorization form that stated, in
relevant part:
I hereby authorize and direct my employer to deduct
from my wages a service charge equal in amount to
the dues which members are obligated to pay this Un-
ion, and to pay the same to this Union or its designee
pursuant to the provisions of any current or future col-
lective bargaining agreement. I also authorize and di-
rect my employer to deduct from my wages any
amount that is or shall become due from me for health
and welfare coverage under the Central States Joint
Board Health and Welfare Fund. Said deduction shall
be monthly in the first week of each month. This au-
thorization and direction shall be irrevocable for the
period of one year from the date hereof, or until the
termination of the contract between the Company and
the Union, whichever occurs first.
This authorization and direction shall automatically re-
new itself for successive yearly or applicable contract

1 Art. IX of the parties’ collective-bargaining agreement, effective
July 27, 1995, through September 29, 1998, provides:
Section 9.1. Checkoff. Upon receipt of a lawfully executed written
authorization from an employee, the Company agrees to deduct
the regular Union membership dues of such employee from the
employee’s pay monthly and to remit such deduction by the
tenth (10th) day of the month following deduction to the offi-
cial designated by the Union in writing to receive such deduc-
tions. The Union will notify the Company in writing of the ex-
act amount of such regular membership dues to be deducted.
The Union will refund to the Company or the employee any
dues which may erroneously be deducted or any moneys which
may erroneously be remitted to the Union. The successor
agreement, effective from March 30, 1999 through March 29,
2002, contained the same language with the words “or service
fees” inserted in the first sentence after the phrase “regular Un-
ion membership dues.”
2 Neither collective-bargaining agreement referenced in fn. 1, above,
contains a union-security clause.
331 NLRB No. 2
DECISIONS OF THE NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD 2
periods thereafter, whichever occurs first, unless I give
written notice to the Company and the Union at least
sixty days, and not more than seventy-five days, before
any annual renewal date of this authorization and direc-
tion of my desire to revoke same. My Employer is fur-
ther authorized and directed to turn over the said mon-
ies as they become due to the proper officer of the Lo-
cal Union.

On January 30, 1998, Prichard, and other employees
who had signed identical authorizations,3 sent a hand-
written letter to Northern Engraving which read:

As of January 30, 1998, we have chosen to quit
the AFL–CIO Local 12 Union.
Please stop taking union dues out as of this date
Jan. 30, 1998.

The Union’s local president, Edmee Lopez, responded
by letter dated February 19, 1998, in which she acknowl-
edged the resignations from the Union but continued:

[W]e must inform you that as a non-member, you are
still obligated to pay a service fee in the amount of
$14.77 per month. [Emphasis in original.]
Under the check-off authorization that you signed, you
authorized the Company to deduct a service fee in an
amount equal to Union dues. The service fee for Local
#10 [sic] is currently $14.77 per month. [Emphasis in
original.] The service fee will continue until your
check-off is properly revoked.

Thereafter, the Respondent continued to receive service fees
withheld from the employees’ wages pursuant to their
checkoff authorizations. The record does not contain any
other correspondence between the employees and the Re-
spondent after February 19, 1998.
B. The Pleadings
On April 19, 1999, Prichard filed a charge in this case
on behalf of herself and others alleging that the Union
violated Section 8(b)(1)(A) by improperly receiving ser-
vice fees after the employees resigned their union mem-
berships. Thereafter, on June 21, 1999, Prichard
amended her charge to allege that the Respondent has
violated Section 8(b)(2) by causing Northern Engraving
to continue to withhold service fees pursuant to the
checkoff authorizations after the employees had resigned
from the Union. The General Counsel issued a complaint
on these charges on June 23, 1999.
The complaint alleges that, during the 6 months pre-
ceding the filing of the charge, the Respondent has re-
fused to give effect to the resignations of Prichard and
the other employees by continuing to receive, accept, and
retain moneys withheld from their wages pursuant to
their authorizations, in violation of Section 8(b)(1)(A).

3 The record shows that Dave Prichard signed an authorization on
June 19, 1993, and that Roy McKee signed on June 6, 1994.
The complaint further alleges that, during the 6 months
preceding the filing of the charge, the Respondent has
caused Northern Engraving to discriminate against
Prichard and the other employees by withholding service
charges from the employees’ wages after they had re-
signed from the Union, in violation of Section 8(b)(2).
The complaint makes no reference to misconduct follow-
ing the date of the charge.
The Respondent admits it continued to accept withheld
service fees from the employees but denies that its ac-
tions violated the Act. In addition, the Respondent inter-
poses an affirmative defense that the Charging Party’s
charges are untimely under Section 10(b).4 We find merit
in the Respondent’s affirmative defense.
III. DISCUSSION
Section 10(b) of the Act precludes the issuance of a
complaint “based on any unfair labor practice occurring
more than six months prior to the filing of the charge
with the Board and the service of a copy thereof upon”
the charged party.5 Although the General Counsel may
rely on evidence outside the 10(b) period as “back-
ground,” he is barred from bringing any complaint in
which the operative events establishing the violation oc-
curred more than 6 months before the unfair labor prac-
tice charge has been filed and served.6
As the Supreme Court stated in Machinists Local 1424
(Bryan Mfg. Co.) v. NLRB, 362 U.S. 411, 419 (1960), the
fundamental policies underlying Section 10(b) “are to
bar litigation over ‘past events after records have been
destroyed, witnesses have gone elsewhere, and recollec-
tions of the events in question have become dim and con-
fused,’ H.R. Rep. No. 245, 80th Cong., 1st Sess., p. 40,
and of course to stabilize existing bargaining relation-
ships.” (Footnote omitted.) The Board has stated that the
Court’s decision and the legislative history it cited re-
quire “strict adherence” to the 10(b) limitations period.
See A&L Underground, 302 NLRB 467, 468 (1991); and
Chambersburg County Market, 293 NLRB 654 (1989).
The 10(b) period commences, however, only when a
party has clear and unequivocal notice of a violation of
the Act. See Desks, Inc., 295 NLRB 1 (1989); and Team-
sters Local 43 v. NLRB, 825 F.2d 608, 616 (1st Cir.
1997); ACF Industries, 234 NLRB 1063 (1978), enfd. as
modified 596 F.2d 1334, 1351–1352 (8th Cir. 1979).
The burden of showing that a charging party was on clear
and unequivocal notice of the violation rests with the
respondent. A&L Underground, supra at 469.
In the instant case, Prichard notified Northern Engrav-
ing of her resignation from the Union and attempted to
revoke her checkoff authorization on January 30, 1998.
4 The General Counsel did not present any arguments in its brief
challenging the Respondent’s affirmative defense.
5 29 U.S.C. 160(b).
6 See Chemung Contracting Corp., 291 NLRB 773, 774 (1988); and
American Commercial Lines, 291 NLRB 1066, 1081 (1988).
ALLIED PRODUCTION WORKERS UNION LOCAL 12 (NORTHERN ENGRAVING CORP.) 3
Within a month, on February 19, 1998, Prichard received
a letter from the Union that clearly and unequivocally
informed her that the Union intended to continue to en-
force the authorization and collect the service fees unless
and until she submitted a “proper” revocation.7 As ob-
served above, the record discloses no further
communication between the Charging Party and the
Union.
On Prichard’s receipt of the Respondent’s February
1998 letter, the dispute was clearly drawn.8 Nevertheless,

7 Presumably a “proper” revocation, according to the Union, would
be one that was given to the Company and Union in writing “at least
sixty days, and not more than seventy-five days” before the annual
renewal date of the authorization. The record does not indicate that any
of the employees requested revocation of their dues-checkoff authoriza-
tion during the 60–75 day period prior to the expiration of the 1995–
1998 collective-bargaining agreement.
8 There can be no dispute that the Union’s February 19, 1998 letter
clearly and unequivocally rejected Prichard’s attempted revocation.
Prichard did not file her original charge in this case until
14 months later, April 19, 1999, well outside the 10(b)
limitations period. The record does not contain any other
request for revocation of checkoff within the 10(b) pe-
riod.9 Under these circumstances, we find that Prichard’s
charge was untimely, and we shall dismiss the complaint.
ORDER
The complaint is dismissed.

Indeed, even if an ambiguity can be read into the letter, the fact that
Northern Engraving continued to withhold, and the Union continued to
receive, service fees from Prichard’s wages for each of 14 months
thereafter necessarily would serve to dispel any uncertainty as to the
Union’s intentions.
9 In the absence of any complaint allegation of misconduct involving
the period following the filing of the charges, we need not address the
Respondent’s rights and obligations during that ensuing time period.