"seniority" among RCA's

[Cactus]

There is an RCA in the office that's been there several months less than me, and she was just trained to take over a route for a regular who is going to be gone during the entire week. I was never approached nor offered this. Is it because the supervisor's been an evil witch to me since the day I was hired, and can do whatever the hell she wants, or what's the deal? I thought something like that would be offered to me or anyone higher on the list, first. Unfortunately, most of the others already know several routes. I seem to be the only one getting screwed out of working more than one day a week. I left a note with the postmaster, who's never there when I am, and he in turn I guess handed the note off to her. Before she came back, the person acting as supervisor and the postmaster said I would soon be trained on another route. She comes back, and that all seems to have flown out the window. Also, can someone transfer to another post office if they're fairly new? I don't see any listings for any of the other area post offices, but I can certainly go in and talk to the postmasters of those facilities, if I need to. I don't know if the union handles stuff like this. I of course would wait a decent amount of time to see if anything changes before I'd do something that drastic. *And before anyone gets high and mighty and states that I'm not guaranteed more than one day a week, I'm well aware of that. What I'm not aware of is if seniority means anything other than who's next in line for a regular route. Because as I said, I can probably go somewhere else if they aren't going to use me.

 

[btdtret]

Cactus -- "There is an RCA in the office that's been there several months less than me, and she was just trained to take over a route for a regular who is going to be gone during the entire week. I was never approached nor offered this."

 Without knowing all the particulars:

--  While it would have been appropriate, seniority-wise, to have offered route training to you, manglement does not have to and they are covered by a Step 4 ( T-9.700):

a.  Management is not required to train and utilize a replacement employee on more than one route.

b.  Management cannot require a replacement employee to be trained and utilized on more than three regular routes.

c.  Management must train the replacement employee who has been trained on less than three routes before training and utilizing a replacement employee on more than three routes.

--  Unless all the other RCA's in the office are trained on 3 or more routes, you are out of luck.  ( of course that is also manglement's loss )

"can someone transfer to another post office if they're fairly new?"

-- depends on your definition of "fairly new".

--  Page 48 of the new contract.  Reassignment ( Transfer ) to Another Office.

A substitute, rural carrier associate, or rural carrier relief employee, who has completed the probationary period ( 90 work days, or 1-year ) and then submits a written request for reassignment, may be reassigned from one office to another, provided a vacancy exists in the leave replacement ranks in the office to which reassignment is requested.

--  Additional info in a Step 4:  If the gaining office accepts the employee's request for transfer, the losing office must release the RCA.  The transfer will be effective within 30 days of the notification to the losing office.

"What I'm not aware of is if seniority means anything other than who's next in line for a regular route."

--  Seniority does matter.

--  One can have seniority in an office, but if a mistake is made on the e-bidding process, the senior ( RCA ) may not get the route.

--  Seniority is utilized in filling the Matrix

--  RCA seniority means nothing if there is a PTF in the office.  The PTF will get the next vacant regular route as the PTF cannot decline conversion to a regular carrier.

--  Seniority will usually win out over "substantially better qualified".

--  Seniority is used to fill an Auxiliary route.

--  Seniority is used in breaking ties between / among RCA's.

 

[Kelp]

Actually, they are required to offer it to senior RCAs first. http://www.ruralinfo.net/kb/leavereplacementmatrixqa.pdf

Check question 15 as an example. 

Management has the discretion to train a newer RCA on a route before an older RCA, but if they are filling a vacancy they need to offer it to higher RCAs or at least make a public posting on a bulletin board or something so everyone has the opportunity to see it. 

 

There are lots of resources in the knowledge base about the matrix: http://knowledgebase.ruralinfo.net/knowledgebase-category/relief-carriers/