Prime Time slots.

[GMX]

We're only going to have something like 275 slots for 2020 and are unable to assign 1 per every day of the year. Looking for some ideas of how best to allocate them for bidding. Assign 1 per day from April 1 - Dec 31? Assign 2 per day for July/August & end of December, then try to spread the rest out over the other months as best as possible?

I feel thin, sort of stretched, like butter scraped over too much bread. Any ideas or specific examples of what to do with these kinds of numbers are welcome. Thanks!

 

[Cpc123]

With so few slots to allocate, I would consult with the membership to best determine the distribution.

 

[FightingIrish2012]

Don’t consult with the membership, just do it strategically, add more slots in the summer and around holidays you know you will need.

I made the mistake of consulting with the membership in this same scenario once and told them if there were any off season leave requests they know they needed let me know and I would assure there would be a slot.

People started giving me full week requests at ridiculous times like the third week of February, or a married couple who wanted double slots for a week in early April. I tried to explain to these people “nobody has ever requested this weeks off in X number of years, why not just let it ride until post prime time bidding and I can 99.99% assure there will be a couple spot leave slots a day available”. But everyone was too paranoid and selfish, wouldn’t back off their day, and I didn’t want to say screw you since I semi committed I would accommodate all those requests.

So I let them have it even though as I said they were the only people to ever ask for those time and could have got the days off if they waiting to request it until after the schedule was posted for those weeks, and summer and holiday slots suffered for it.

So it was a lessons learned in schedule negotiations locally, but yeah, don’t open it up to the people as that same thing will happen to you. Stack the slots on common sense days and people who want weird days off will get it anyway.

 

[Mike Kilo]

Just look at the last couple years prime time bid and assign accordingly. You can’t please everyone as the guy above said.

 

[Electricfence]

How many slots do you earn all together? Do you earn 275 prime time, plus you get leave beyond the first round, or just the 275? That’s a pretty small facility if that’s the case.

 

[GMX]

The 275 are our cumulative slots for all rounds of prime time. We will still be able to get spot leave on non slot days. We were part of an 804 so we lost half of our staffing and 2/3 of people left are only earning 4 or 6 hrs of annual leave per pay period. This will be the first year with so few slots available to spread out.

Thanks for the input all.

 

[Electricfence]

Prime time is only the first two weeks of leave bid. Then there are 5 additional rounds contractually guaranteed, I believe for people to exhaust any available leave they will earn that year which is non prime time . Anything after bidding isnt guaranteed which is considered spot leave. Which I’m sure you already know. First define the prime time period. You mentioned doing that that specific times April to September and December. I suggest with so few slots define the prime time period as Jan 1-jan1 or whatever the actually days ares, 1 per day. Since the agency has to provide you with 40 percent extra of your prime time during defined prime time period for the first round, add that number to the 275 and there you will have what I assume equals close to 365. After the first round or at the end of bidding, reduce the number of guaranteed slots to 275, and people are given the opportunity to have their say without the headache of predetermining the prime time period. If you define a smaller prime time period they agency only has to provide the 40 percent extra during those period, and not outside of them. This will reduce staffing during those periods and will allow for less guarenteed leave elsewhere. If you are at a facility that loosely approves spot leave great, otherwise it’s not worth it to limit yourselves to leave only during certain times of the year.

 

[GMX]

You're right about PTL and NPTL...I sometimes just call all the bid leave as PT, but I get the distinction.

I think I understand what you mean about making the PT period the whole year, then after that round is done we remove enough slots so that subsequent rounds will only allow us to bid the remaining balance of the full 275 days/slots that everyone will earn that year. Do I have that correct?

I was going over Article 24 though and I can't find where it says the agency has to allow 40% for the distribution of slots. That'd give us 385 and allow the first round to cover the whole years and a couple extra on important days like Christmas, etc. then go back to 275 and distribute the remaining elsewhere. Can you explain more on the 40% thing, please?

 

[Electricfence]

Article 24 section 6 states you shall be able to select 2 weeks. Section 8 defines a week as 7 consecutive days. You don’t work 7 days in a row therefore 2 weeks of work is 10 working days plus the rdos in the middle and the single rdo on either side, 4 days. 4 additional days of 10 is 40 percent.

It’s not 40 percent of entire amount of leave earned it’s only 40 percent of prime time, those first two weeks. So however many employees you have, let’s say 10, that means they are able to select 100 prime time slot plus the agency has to provide an additional 40 to cover the workforce’s ability to take a full 7 days. Make sense so far?

I would negotiate the work force is able to bid 1 person per day all year during round 1. It will most likely be more than the 275 plus 40 percent of prime time. The 1 per day will give the atm and you the ability to say that the work force is driving which specific days they want rather than pre determining which random days are guarneteed. Let’s assume it’s 275 and your 40 percent above, that’s only 315 days. So if you offer two slots on some days like for cfs, natca in Washington, the convention, Christmas, you’ll now go down to les than 315 days where there won’t be a guaranteed slot. The atm will probably then want to reduce to 275 after round one. There is nothing that specifies that they have to reduce after that round. They just have to give you the opportunity to bid the 275. It makes sense to reduce after that round because then they don’t have to make sure everyone in every round someone isn’t selecting over their earned leave. However if you don’t reduce after round 1 then either you have to ensure no one is bidding more than they will earn or management will. There is a bit of good faith in that negotiation and the atm will have to trust you will manage leave bid during the bidding process. But as long as you don’t go over the 275 guaranteed it doesn’t matter unless they need to ensure staffing for specific things on specific days.

If you have a smaller defined prime time period, the 40 percent only goes in that specific defined prime time period. That’s why at small facilities in my
Opinion it’s best to get the longest defined period possible.

 

[GMX]

Yes that makes sense. Getting the ATM to understand that interpretation of Section 8 could take some work but I totally get it. I think the important part is to make them understand that ultimately when all rounds are finished, that we all still will only have bid 275 days total!

Thanks a lot for the information and insight!