June marks nine full months of bargaining for our first contract. While we’ve made quite a bit of progress in that time, we feel like we should be much further along by this time, especially considering the five months lost while the company refused to recognize and bargain with us.

We’ve continued to see regular delays, lack of responses on many items, and sessions with very little time for direct negotiations at the table as a result of the company’s behavior. There is still room for improvement in the number and frequency of sessions each month, despite the company’s attitude that we should be content with bargaining extending to the 14 month average for other first contracts.

We’ve seen the best responses from management shortly after we’ve engaged in collective action on and off the floor, and we know that more consistent action will be necessary as we get into the more difficult economic items.

For a full list of bargaining reports, visit the website: https://tcgunion.org/bargaining/first-contract

Tentative Agreements

The table below includes a list of all 23 tentative agreements reached thus far, in the order in which the agreements were made. In addition to the 23 contract articles below, one Memorandum of Understanding has been reached for one-time 2023 eIP bonus payments on January 9, 2024.

Pending Proposals

Owed by CWA

The nine items below are those for which we owe responses to the company, four of which were discussed at the most recent sessions. Of the items, Layoff & Recall and Seniority have had the most activity with multiple proposals from each side. The remaining seven proposals have all been brought to the table once by each side in past sessions.

The oldest items above have each hit hurdles which we feel need to be addressed before agreement can be reached.

• Layoff & Recall: The standout issue blocking Layoff & Recall relates to the application of seniority as an objective factor to determine who is affected by layoffs and recall procedures.
• Seniority: This item details more general aspects such as the basis of calculation and the conditions which lead to loss of seniority status, rather than the specific application of seniority as a factor in events such as layoffs. Discussions and a round of counters from each side on March 5 found some good middle ground, bringing this item closer to agreement.
• No Strike/No Lockout: Our concerns with the company’s proposals for No Strike/No Lockout are due to the extensive restrictions they have sought to place on reasonable concerted activity beyond strike actions and work stoppages. Their proposals have continued to prohibit a wide range of actions which would not impact operations, including informational picketing and handbilling/leafleting.
• Gender Equity: In this recent proposal we sought to outline not only measures to make TCGplayer a more inclusive and supportive workplace for women, trans and non-binary coworkers, but also more substantial and material commitments necessary to provide equitable benefits and opportunities where workers might otherwise often face systemic failures. While the company did end up providing a response to this proposal after initially meeting it with utter silence, their response severely softened our initial intent to be only superficially recognizable.
• We will be preparing responses to the items discussed in April and May. All of these items will benefit from continued discussion at the table as we work to identify common ground and work through sticking points.

Owed by eBay/TCGplayer

Management owes responses to 26 items as of our most recent sessions at the end of May. Of these, they have only responded to four at least once in the past: Progressive Discipline, Policies & Procedures, Management Rights, and Overtime. In addition to the 26 contract items, we have proposed two Memoranda of Understanding which management has not wanted to engage on: COVID-19 guideline changes, which the company brought to the table without formalizing agreement; and an immediate wage increase to account for the rising cost of living, raises to minimum wage, and the reality that AC workers have seen no increase to base pay since 2021.

The items awaiting response from the company date back as far as the very first bargaining session in September of last year. We find this unacceptable, as it seems as though management is unwilling to engage on issues as fundamental to union contracts as grievance procedures, Union membership, and rights to representation.

Many of the most recent items have been new proposals with some economic components. The company has typically refused to engage on these items on the basis that we agreed to work through non-economic items first. We are concerned that the company’s delays and lack of engagement on remaining non-economic items puts us in a position of ultimately rushing through important economic proposals which will define the material well-being of our coworkers.

Several of the oldest items above could have and should have been resolved a long time ago, yet we have heard no response from management. A number of the other pending non-economic items highlight where we remain furthest from common ground on basic principles for our first contract.

• Grievance Procedure: This outlines the process to address and resolve issues related to contract violations or disagreements. This is an absolutely fundamental component of any union contract, and we have received no response from the company since our proposal at the first bargaining session.
• Union Rights & Responsibilities: Our original proposal outlines the circumstances and events in which members of the bargaining unit would be able to request representation, going beyond Weingarten rights to representation in investigatory meetings. Several items in our original proposal have been split out to separate proposals: Orientation, Bulletin Boards, and Successorship. While Bulletin Boards and Successorship have each had some progress, with a TA on Bulletin Boards, the remaining pieces of this proposal have not been addressed by the company for eight months.
• Union Membership: This item defines expectations for bargaining unit members to sign up as a Union member or otherwise elect to be an agency fee payer. The overwhelming majority of our coworkers have already voluntarily signed their membership cards and would already satisfy this requirement. We have been waiting for seven months for a first response.
• Orientation: Originally part of our Union Rights & Responsibilities proposal, this straightforward article defines the right of our Union to meet with new hires as a part of the orientation process to provide information, answer questions, and supply a copy of the contract. We’ve been waiting for a response for four months since we first proposed this item.
• Progressive Discipline: The company continues to refuse the standard of just cause for discipline and termination, as well as proportionate and progressive escalations, instead seeking to retain managerial discretion in the application of discipline in all circumstances.
• Policies & Procedures: Our disagreement on this item demonstrates the difference in our overarching goals in establishing our relationship with management: the company’s proposals would leave them with full unilateral control over implementing all policies and procedures, limiting our involvement to the ability to grieve over anything we disagree with. Our proposals have recognized that the company has a right to initiate policy changes, but would require more proactive collaboration by bringing such changes for review by the joint labor/management committee and providing our Union with an opportunity to bargain before anything goes into effect.

• Management Rights: This item originally contained an exhaustive list of management rights, going well beyond similar clauses typically found in other Union contracts. Since the first version of this proposal was brought by management, it has remained far too expansive in its scope and definition, largely negating the benefits provided by a union contract.

  Management has sought to retain exclusive unilateral control over many mandatory subjects of bargaining such as shifts and schedules, automation of work, surveillance, job duties, and productivity standards. Beyond that, their proposals have also restricted the grievance process from addressing such issues, and would set aside these rights of management as evergreen beyond the expiration of the contract.

  We have worked to outline much more reasonable terms which are sufficient to enable the company to operate its business and its needs without sacrificing the protections of a Union we have fought long and hard for.

• Overtime: Our primary concern with the overtime proposals made by management have been with the inclusion of mandatory overtime. We have attempted to stave off any allowance for mandating work beyond an employees normal weekly schedule, but recently conceded slightly on this matter to allow mandated overtime on the condition that it is paid at two-times normal hourly rates, and that sufficient measures are in place to allow employees the flexibility to have their overtime shift covered by a coworker.
• The Weekend: Although we only recently proposed this standalone article, the core demand of providing for two consecutive days off was previously a sticking point as part of Hours of Work, Schedules & Breaks. We separated this proposal out to allow the remainder of the other proposal to move forward, and to focus more on resolving the challenges in front of this item. Management has claimed that providing this benefit would create difficulties in scheduling. We firmly believe that having two consecutive days off each week, unless an employee desires otherwise, would be a significant quality of life improvement for many working in the AC, and very much worth working through those difficulties.