Bulletin
ICBC – 2018 Vacation Scheduling Process
October 2, 2017
To: MoveUP members at Customer Contact Representatives II DL at DLCCCV
2018 Vacation Scheduling Process Pilot Program
It’s that time again, time to start bidding for next year’s vacation.
The Background:
The language in our collective agreement at Article 15 is no longer adequate for the way ICBC currently schedules and distributes vacation. Article 15, allows for only one deadline for vacation submissions. By the straight reading of the language, all employees have to submit their vacation selections to the manager by November 20th. The manager then had until December 10 to publish the vacation schedule. The flaw in that system, especially with large work groups, is that members could take until the deadline to submit their selections which stalled the process and didn’t allow junior members an opportunity to select their vacation. The old system of selecting vacation on a sheet of paper just doesn’t work anymore for the way ICBC is doing business and so we have been working to find a more efficient process for affected members in large vacation selection departments.
For this reason, your union and employer have negotiated a revised ‘Provincial Vacation Schedule’ system in 2015, 2016 and in 2017. In each iteration of the LOU the parties tried to improve the process based on feedback from affected members. This year there are approximately 1100 members in who are covered by the current version of the LOU. As a part of this process we have agreed to a pilot project for your group, the approximately 66 Customer Contact Representative II’s at DLCCCV.
The Pilot
The parties replaced the single deadline requirement with a four deadline process. Members reported that this kept the process moving along; they could see the results after each bid, and this allowed them to make informed choices for their next vacation selection. So that part seems to have been successful.
Consistently, the biggest complaint from members had been that they couldn’t see what senior people had bid and therefore they felt they were ‘bidding blind.’ At every meeting with the employer we have told them that we must find a way to resolve this fundamental problem with the system.
For this reason the pilot includes a radically different system to ICBC, one where each person has an assigned time in each round to bid their vacation. Each bid time will last 15 minutes and at the appointed moment, WorkForce will phone the person whose turn it is to bid on their vacation.
Real Time Vacation Calendar
The employer will provide a real time vacation selection calendar on Empower which will allow affected members to see what selections have already been made by co-workers who have already bid. This will allow a bidding member to have an informed bid ready prior to their phone call.
New hires, newly transferred employees
One of the problems we had to resolve was what do we do if new members join your department once the bid process starts. It was agreed that on the last day of each round of bidding, and prior to the next round of bidding starting, new employees to the department would be assigned bid times and would have an opportunity to bid for their vacation too.
WorkForce phone call times
Calls will take place between 8:00 AM and 6:00 PM Monday to Friday. Workforce will call your work phone number first. However since it is possible that members could be on days off, different hours of work or out of the office or away from their phone for any number of reasons, each person will need to provide WorkForce with an alternate number so they can be reached and the process does not get stalled. If Workforce can’t reach you or your designate they will email you to let you know when they called and the phone numbers they called.
If they reach you, they will be able to let you know what is available so please be ready with other options. You won’t have time to call your spouse or check with others on what to choose next.
DLCCV employees will have the full duration of their bidding window to call back – Workforce will send an email and leave a voicemail if they were unable to reach you with direction on how to contact Workforce. If they do not call back within their bidding window, Workforce will move on to the next person as scheduled. If they do call back after their bidding window, they will be given a timeslot at the end of the round, as the bidding windows are scheduled back to back and they cannot take time from another employee’s window.
Workforce staff will provide each member in your department with their assigned time in advance of the bid process. If you are going to be away or have questions, I recommend you discuss this with your manager to be sure you do not miss out on your right to bid your vacation.
Final Results
Because we want to be sure as many people as possible get their vacation scheduled, we have agreed that the vacation scheduling process must be completed no later than December 22, 2017 instead of December 10.
Two Job Stewards working with Workforce
We will have two of your job stewards working alongside Workforce staff, helping with the call back process. This will help ensure the agreement we have reached is followed, to trouble shoot any unforeseen consequences and problems that may arise and most importantly to ensure transparency for the membership.
I hope this pilot will help to meet the members’ needs around bidding vacation. We will be seeking your feedback on this process once the bids are completed. In the meantime, if you have any questions please feel free to contact me at atoth@moveuptogether.ca.
In solidarity,
Annette Toth
Vice-President