New England Telephone & Telegraph Co.Download PDFNational Labor Relations Board - Board DecisionsJun 5, 1979242 N.L.R.B. 793 (N.L.R.B. 1979) Copy Citation NEW ENGLAND TELEPHONE AND TELEGRAPH New England Telephone and Telegraph Company' and Communications Workers of America, AFL- CIO, Petitioner. Case - RC- 15897 June 5, 1979 DECISION ON REVIEW AND ORDER On October 4, 1978, the Regional Director for Re- gion I issued a Decision and Direction of Election in the above-entitled proceeding, an excerpt of which, containing his factual findings, is attached hereto as an Appendix [omitted from publication]. He found appropriate a unit of all employees employed by the Employer at its residence business office, phone cen- ter, and centralized cash unit located at 770 Elm Street, Manchester, New Hampshire, and at its busi- ness service center located at 207 Daniel Webster Highway, also in Manchester, New Hampshire, ex- cluding all professional employees, guards, and super- visors as defined in the Act.2 Thereafter, in accord- ance with Section 102.67 of the National Labor Relations Board Rules and Regulations, Series 8, as amended, the Employer and the Intervenor filed timely requests for review of the Regional Director's Decision together with supporting briefs asserting, in- ter alia, that the Regional Director's Decision de- parted from Board precedent which holds that com- panywide units are appropriate in the telephone industry. The Board, by telegraphic Order dated November 1, 1978, granted the request for review. The Board has considered the entire record in this case with respect to the issues under review and makes the following findings: The unit of commercial employees in Manchester sought by the Petitioner and found appropriate by the Regional Director totals approximately 74 em- ployees at two locations. The Employer and the Inter- venor contend that the only appropriate unit is a sys- temwide unit of all commercial department employees throughout the five-state area serviced by the Employer in Massachusetts, Maine, New Hamp- shire, Vermont, and Rhode Island for a total of ap- proximately 2,900 employees. The Regional Director found that, like most public utilities, the Employer maintains a highly integrated and centrally controlled operation, inasmuch as it I The name of the Employer appears as amended at the hearing. 2 International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, AFL-CIO, hereinafter referred to as the Intervenor, was permitted to intervene on the basis of a showing of interest. On December 12, 1978, the Intervenor filed a motion to withdraw brief it previously filed in this case on grounds that it no longer wished to adhere to the position it set forth in such brief that only an em- ployerwide unit is appropriate. In view of our dismissal of the petition herein, we shall deny the Intervenor's motion to withdraw its brief but with- out prejudice to its amicus curiae brief being considered in the cases later filed by locals of the Intervenor, to which cases it is addressed. centrally determines labor relations policies, wage rates and progression, fringe benefits, hiring and training procedures, and other working conditions. Requisitions for additional staffing are submitted by commercial managers subject to approval of the dis- trict and division managers and are returned to the Manchester employment office where a determina- tion is made as to whether a current employee or a new hire will fill the staff vacancy. Notwithstanding this hiring policy and his finding that all commercial department employees are subject to common em- ployment policies and practices throughout the five- state area, the Regional Director found that the unit, as petitioned for, is appropriate. The Regional Direc- tor noted that the Board has held that a commercial office in a telephone utility, engaged as it is in solicit- ing and servicing telephone subscriptions in a well defined geographical area, may be compared with an outlet or territory in a selling operation, citing Michi- gan Bell Telephone Company.) The Employer and the Intervenor contend that the Regional Director's reli- ance on Michigan Bell is misplaced. We find merit in that contention. In the earlier Michigan Bell case,4 the Board noted that although it had long held that because of the highly integrated nature and centralized control of public utility operations the optimum unit for collec- tive bargaining is systemwide in scope, the Board has also recognized that the optimum unit is not necessar- ily the only grouping of employees which may be ap- propriate for bargaining purposes. In addition, the Board stated that it "determines whether or not the record facts in a case before it support a finding that the employees sought to be represented share a suffi- ciently distinct community of interest to warrant their establishment as a separate bargaining unit apart from other employees .... " In finding appropriate a unit of commercial office employees at Michigan Bell's Battle Creek, Michigan, office, the Board relied on the fact that the Battle Creek office provided services for a clearly defined geographical area encompassing six towns, no other commercial office serviced the area, the requested em- ployees worked together at one location with no con- tact with commercial employees at other locations, there was no interchange between offices, and a work stoppage at the Battle Creek commercial office would not impair the operations of other commercial offices of the employer. It also noted the lack of any history of bargaining for commercial department employees in the last 20 years and the fact that no labor organ- ization was seeking to represent a broader unit. 192 NLRB 1212 (1971), involving Battle Creek, and 217 NLRB 424 (1975), involving Jackson. ' 192 NLRB at 1212. 242 NLRB No. 120 793 DECISIONS OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD We find, contrary to the Regional Director, that the facts of this case are not governed by the Michi- gan Bell cases. Unlike the situations in those cases, the petitioned-for unit herein is not a "self-contained economic unit" having one manager with substantial autonomy in controlling day-to-day employee activi- ties. The record shows overlap of office and peti- tioned-for unit employee functions since the Man- chester centralized cash unit, which is located in the southern district, is concerned with customer pay- ments throughout the State of New Hampshire, in- cluding the Employer's northern New Hampshire dis- trict; the Manchester business service center services the geographical area covered by Manchester, as well as Nashua and Dover which are not here sought by Petitioner; and employees are interchanged among New Hampshire offices, usually on a voluntary basis. Thus, evidence is lacking that the requested employ- ees share a separate community of interest sufficient to warrant a separate unit for bargaining, and the petitioned-for unit does not conform to any adminis- trative district of the Employer which, at a minimum, would have to include the offices in Nashua and Do- ver, New Hampshire, in addition to the offices at Manchester.5 While the record makes only limited reference to the Nashua and Dover offices, it is clear that, in addition to being located in the same south- ern district with Manchester, both cities adjoin the Manchester area, and that the Manchester business service center also services both the Nashua and Do- ver geographical area. Accordingly, we find that the petitioned-for unit is inappropriate and shall dismiss the petition. ORDER It is hereby ordered that the petition filed herein be, and it hereby is, dismissed. CHAIRMAN FANNING and MEMBER TRUESDALE, dis- senting: For the reasons stated by the Regional Director, we would direct an election in the unit sought at Manchester. 'Although Petitioner has subsequently filed separate petitions for the Nashua and Dover commercial offices, it has not sought to enlarge its unit request in this case. 794 Copy with citationCopy as parenthetical citation