American Automobile Association

National Labor Relations Board - Board Decisions

Jun 5, 1970

183 N.L.R.B. 48 (N.L.R.B. 1970)

48 DECISIONS OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD
American Automobile Association , Wisconsin Divi-
sion and Office & Professional Employees Interna-
tional Union , Local No. 9, AFL-CIO, Petitioner.
Case 30-RC-1197.
June 5, 1970
DECISION AND DIRECTION OF ELECTION
By MEMBERS FANNING, MCCULLOCH, AND JENKINS
Upon a petition duly filed under Section 9(c) of
the National Labor Relations Act, as amended, a
hearing was held before Hearing Officer Michael O.
Miller of the National Labor Relations Board. Pur-
suant to Section 102.67 of the National Labor
Relations Board Rules and Regulations and State-
ments of Procedure, Series 8, as amended, this case
was transferred to the Board for decision.
Thereafter, the Employer and the Petitioner filed
briefs with the Board.
Pursuant to the provisions of Section 3(b) of the
Act, the Board has delegated its powers in connec-
tion with this case to a three-member panel.
The Board has reviewed the Hearing Officer's
rulings made at the hearing and finds that they are
free from prejudicial error. They are hereby af-
firmed.
Upon the entire record in this case, the Board
finds:
1. The Employer is engaged in commerce within
the meaning of the Act and it will effectuate the
purposes of the Act to assert jurisdiction herein.'
2. The labor organization involved claims to
represent certain employees of the Employer.
3. A question affecting commerce exists con-
cerning the representation of certain employees of
the Employer within the meaning of Section
9(a)(1) and Section 2(6) and (7) of the Act.
4. The Petitioner seeks to represent a unit com-
posed of district sales representatives working out
of the Employer's two offices in Milwaukee,
Wisconsin, the Northside of Fond du Lac office and
the Southside office.' The Employer contends that
the smallest appropriate unit would include the
sales representatives in the Employer's southeast
area , which includes the two offices in Milwaukee,
and offices in Racine , Kenosha, and Waukesha,
Wisconsin. The Employer would also include two
' The Employer contends that it would not effectuate the purposes of the
Act to assert jurisdiction over its operations since it is a nonprofit organiza-
tion whose only activities of a commerical nature have, as their sole aim,
the furthering of educational, charitable, and humanitarian objectives We
do not agree One of the primary duties of the salesmen and underwriters
involved herein is the sale and servicing of automobile insurance policies,
an activity clearly commercial in nature That profit from this activity may
other groups of employees in the appropriate unit,
floor salesmen or underwriters and sales secreta-
ries, whose work is related to that of the sales
representatives.
In a prior proceeding 3 the Board found that a
unit of district sales representatives and floor
salesmen employed in the Employer's Northside, or
Fond du Lac, office in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, con-
stituted an appropriate unit. All other employees,
including sales secretaries, were excluded from the
unit. In an election held pursuant to the decision in
that proceeding the union did not receive a majori-
ty of the votes, and therefore no bargaining
representative was selected.
Sometime before the election in the prior
proceeding the Employer opened the Southside of-
fice, but the office was not staffed with sales
representatives until after the election had been
held. The Southside office was subsequently
staffed, principally by the transfer of sales repre-
sentatives from the Northside office, and the geo-
graphical area formerly serviced by the Northside
office was divided between it and the Southside of-
fice. The Employer contends that changes made in
its operations since the prior proceeding render a
unit of the sales representatives in the two offices
located in Milwaukee inappropriate and, as noted
above, require a finding that the smallest ap-
propriate unit consists of the five offices in the Em-
ployer's southeast area.
We have carefully examined the record with
respect to the changes made in the Employer's
operations since our prior decision and find them
insubstantial. The district managers in the Milwau-
kee offices are now under the direct control of the
sales supervisors of the southeast area; but the
other district offices in the southeast area remain
under district managers who have retained their
authority to veto the hiring of applicants for em-
ployment, to approve vacations, and to settle
disputes among the sales representatives. The two
offices service the same geographical area as the
single office had serviced before the prior proceed-
ing, and the Southside office has been staffed large-
ly by transfers from the Northside office. The sales
representatives of the two Milwaukee offices share
a common insurance "pot," with each of the other
three offices in the southeast area having its own in-
be used in educational and humanitarian undertakings does not change the
essential nature of the activity Labor Relations Commission of the Com-
monwealth of Massachusetts, 138 NLRB 1329, 1331
S A third office in Milwaukee serves primarily as a travel office and has
no sales representatives
' American Automobile Association , Wisconsin Division, 172 NLRB No
131
183 NLRB No. 8
AMERICAN AUTOMOBILE
surance "pot" for its own sales representatives.4
And as we found in our prior decision there is little
transfer of agents between offices.
It is thus evident that the two offices in Milwau-
kee have continued to function as a single adminis-
trative unit with respect to the sales representatives
involved herein in the same manner as when it had
been a single office covering the same geographical
area. We therefore find that a unit consisting of the
sales representatives in the two Milwaukee offices
is appropriate.
In the prior decision the Board found that "floor
salesmen " sometimes called "underwriters" should
be included in the unit and that sales secretaries
should be excluded. No reason appears for reaching
a different result here. In this connection we shall
' An insurance " pot" is money placed in a fund each month from a per-
centage of the money received from renewal of policies sold in previous
years The sales representatives share in this pot in a proportion dependent
upon the amount of new insurance each sales representative sells in that
month
' In order to assure that all eligible voters may have the opportunity to be
informed of the issues in the exercise of their statutory right to vote, all
parties to the election should have access to a list of voters and their ad-
dresses which may be used to communicate with them Excelsior Un-
ASSN., WISCONSIN DIV. 49
include Leonard Plourde in the unit as a floor
salesman since the record shows that he is perform-
ing the same duties as the employees placed in that
category in the prior decision.
Accordingly, we find the following unit ap-
propriate within Section 9(b) of the Act:
All sales representatives and floor salesmen
("underwriters") employed by the Employer in
its Northside and Southside offices in Milwau-
kee, Wisconsin, but excluding all office clerical
employees, district managers, travel coun-
selors, sales secretaries, guards and supervisors
as defined in the Act.
[Direction of Election5 omitted from publica-
tion. ]
der%ear Inc , 156 NLRB 1236, N L R B v Wyman-Gordon Co , 394 U S
759 Accordingly, it is hereby directed that an election eligibility list, con-
taining the names and addresses of all the eligible voters, must be filed by
the Employer with the Regional Director for Region 30 within 7 days of the
date of this Decision and Direction of Election The Regional Director shall
make the list available to all parties to the election No extension of time to
file this list shall be granted by the Regional Director except in extraordina-
ry circumstances Failure to comply with this requirement shall be grounds
for setting aside the election whenever proper objections are filed