NATIONAL ATTENDANCE AGREEMENT DOCS

[POSTMAN]

No. 854/12
Ref: PTC/RE/srh/015
Date: 16 November 2012

As reported in LTB849/12, negotiations have now concluded on a new Royal Mail Group National Attendance Agreement and associated policy and guides. A Branch Briefing will take place at 11.00am concluding by 2.30pm on Wednesday, 21 November at the Friends House, Euston, prior to a Branch ballot.

Please find attached the following documents:


Draft National Attendance Agreement.
Attendance Policy and Guides
Attendance Policy
Absence Notification and Maintaining Contact
Welcome Back Meetings
Managing Short Term Absence and Informal Review Discussions
Attendance Review Meetings
Attendance Consideration of Dismissal
Managing Long Term Absence
Work following Health Problems
Managing Absence and Disability
How to Treat Absences due to Accidents at Work
Referral to Occupational Health Services
Employees who are Unable or Refuse to Attend Absence Related Meetings

Overview

In the Business Transformation Agreement Royal Mail and CWU undertook to review HR Procedures as part of a commitment to improve employee relations. The attached agreement and supporting documentation are the result of lengthy discussions over a period of more than two years.

The new agreement and the associated guides – which will replace the various unagreed national, regional and local policies for attendance management which have multiplied over recent years – represent a substantial improvement in content and tone and if deployed effectively, will result in fairer treatment and a more sensible approach to absence management.

Many of the policy objectives of the Union have been achieved, including notification and contact policies which will replace the various un-agreed contact strategies currently in place, a more systematic and supportive approach to long term absence and protections for those members with underlying health issues and the cessation of stoppage of sick pay without good reason and appropriate notification. It was not possible to achieve all of the Union’s policy objectives – for example we could not secure an appeal process at stages 1 and 2 of the procedure, but steps such as the introduction of an informal review normally be expected to take place before any formal action under the procedure represent a significant improvement.


THE AGREEMENT

The agreement is constructed in a logical sequence, beginning with:

Notifying Absence and Maintaining Contact

The relevant guide is Absence Notification and Maintaining Contact.

A major Union objective was replacement of unagreed management contact standards and an end to random stoppages of pay during absence. The negotiators believe the responsibilities of employees and managers are clearly outlined in the agreement and guide in a way which should ensure members are treated with dignity and fairness when off sick.

Welcome Back Meetings

The relevant guide is Welcome Back Meetings.

The purpose of the meeting is clearly defined. The focus is on informal discussion of the key return to work issues in contrast to the current “box ticking” approach. The Welcome Back Meeting is separate from any informal review and the formal procedure.

Informal Review Discussion

The relevant guide is Managing Short Term Absence and Informal Review Meetings

In the event that the manager has any concerns about the number or pattern of absences (or if the employee has any concerns) these should be discussed at an informal review discussion. This is a key addition to the procedure, based on the principle that in normal circumstances it is expected that perceived problems about attendance should be dealt with in an informal and supportive way, before the application of the formal procedure. Whilst there will be occasions when it is not possible or appropriate to hold an informal review meeting before a first stage review meeting, the clear expectation in the agreement and guide is that it will be the norm to do so.

Attendance Standards - Short Term

A fixed six months period in which to meet the standards after a Stage 1 and Stage 2 review replaces the current rolling period. A member who has received a Stage 1 review will come off the procedure after six months if the standards are met. A member on a Stage 2 review will come off the procedure if they have no more than one absence of 4 days or less in six months or revert to Stage 1 if the standards are met but the level of absence is greater than one absence of four days.

Attendance Review Meetings

The relevant guide is Attendance Review Meetings.

The agreement and guide are clear that:

The normal expectation is that a formal attendance review meeting at Stage 1 will only take place if there has been no improvement after an informal review.

Where standards are not met a formal attendance review is not automatic.

The purpose of the review is to explore reasons for absences, identify any help which can be given to improve attendance and take account of mitigating circumstances, in light of the employee’s previous record.

Consideration of Dismissal/Appeal

The relevant guide is Attendance – Consideration of Dismissal

The second line manager must consider their decision in the light of mitigating factors and the employees’ overall record. If a manager decides to dismiss there is a right of appeal to an independent appeal manager from HR Services.

Long Term Absence

The relevant guides are Managing Long Term Absence and Work following Health Problems.

Long term absence is a particular problem in Royal Mail. The agreement and associated guides provide for a more systematic approach to managing long term absence and also applies when repeated absence is due to a significant underlying health issue.

The role of the CWU Representative is emphasised, both in maintaining contact and in involvement in regular review meetings.

The emphasis is on facilitating an early return to normal duties, on a phased basis where appropriate, or if this is not possible to consider permanent job modifications or redeployment. Where none of these options are possible ill health retirement will be considered under the terms of the current IHR Agreement.

OTHER GUIDES

In addition to those guides referred to above under the relevant section of the National Agreement there are detailed guides on Referral to Occupational Health Service, How to Treat Absence due to Accidents at Work, Managing Absence and Disability and Employees who are unable or refuse to attend Absence Related Meetings. These, in common with the other guides, are all the result of lengthy negotiation and form business policy which cannot be changed below national level. Any proposed changes to the guides will be the subject of national discussion on the basis of seeking consensus for any change.

TRANSITIONAL ARRANGEMENTS

This will be straight forward for most parts of Royal Mail Group. No one will be disadvantaged in comparison to what would have happened had they stayed on the current procedure. Where the new arrangements are of benefit by coming off the procedure more quickly, this will be implemented from the date of introduction.

DEPLOYMENT ARRANGEMENTS

A joint launch has been agreed, in the form of an initial meeting for senior representatives and senior managers, followed by a cascade process using a single agreed set of slides and leaflets for managers and representatives to ensure consistency.

In order to ensure that there is sufficient time to complete this process the launch date is likely to be 1st April 2013.

REVIEW

A series of reviews will take place at Head Office level after initial deployment and at six and twelve months after deployment.

TRIALLING FURTHER ARRANGEMENTS

It has been agreed to jointly identify ten trial offices, nominated equally by Royal Mail and the CWU, with the objective of developing further measures to benefit employee relations and control absence.

Joint review teams will be established in each office, supported and overseen by the National Review Team.

SUMMARY

The mistreatment of members incurring sick leave has been a continuous problem for over a decade. The harsh approach to absence management prevalent in much of Royal Mail Group has been amongst the biggest source of grievance to our members and representatives. The negotiators believe that the Draft National Agreement and associated policy and guides provide the opportunity to establish an approach to absence management which is centrally controlled in line with a new and improved National Agreement supported by detailed guides which are designed to send the right messages to line managers and employees. If deployed effectively, this should be a major contribution to improving employee relations.

Branch Ballot

Arrangements for a Branch ballot, to commence after the Briefing, are currently in hand and will be communicated to Branches separately.

Any enquiries should be addressed to Ray Ellis’s department, quoting reference PTC/RE/srh/015.
Email address: rellis@cwu.org

Yours sincerely



Ray Ellis
Assistant Secretary

12LTB854.doc

National Attendance Agreements.zip

[Pinky 1]

My copy didn't even come with attachments

[POSTMAN]

Got the zip open and now added.

[Jynxx]

So anyone on a stage 1 warning will come off it after six months if standards are met? Instead of the 12 months it is now? Are the standards the ones set out in the stage 1 meeting like only one absence in the period of no more than 10 days etc? (just asking what are the standards) thanks. =]

[General Mannerheim]

So now they can try and get rid of you after 22 weeks instead of 9 months on the IHR bolloxs....way to go ,which idiot agreed to that?

[Danelectro]

well the 6 months and your off the procedure is definitely an improvement on the previous model.
Dont see why we have to use discredited ,shady money grabbing fuckshites like ATOS though.

Accident at work should not be counted-what constitutes an accident at work?-ie if you pull a calf muscle etc while delivery mail is that an accident? previously in my office thats not been counted if it has resulted in an absence but not in all cases

[POSTMAN]

22 November 2012
LTB 875/12 - New Attendance Procedure

No. 875/2012
Ref: PTC/MA/dj/402
Date: 22 November 2012







TO ALL BRANCHES WITH POSTAL MEMBERS


Dear Colleague

RE: New Attendance Procedure


Following yesterday's National Briefing on the new national Attendance Procedure and in light of requests from a number of delegates to the briefing for an extension of the proposed timetable we can confirm that the revised timetable for the branch ballot will be as follows:


Opens: Wednesday, 28th November 2012


Closes: Friday, 18th January 2013


When branches, divisions or regional committees arrange meetings and would like a presence from CWU headquarters please contact my department and we will endeavour to attend as many as possible. Also, it has been agreed to set up a separate email address for branches to raise questions. The email address will be attendanceprocedure@cwu.org. Frequently asked Q&As will be updated on the website for branches to monitor, it will also be our intention to update the department Facebook page with the Q&As.


Any enquiries should be addressed to Ray Ellis's department, quoting reference PTC/RE/dj/402.
Email address: rellis@cwu.org

Yours sincerely

Ray Ellis
Assistant Secretary

[POSTMAN]

Special email address.

[Midge]

The New Attendance Procedure:

Why Your Branch Should Vote ‘NO’


National Briefings: What Is Going On?

CWU activists should note with alarm the fact that the recent National Briefing on the proposed new Attendance Procedure was called at such short notice. After two years of negotiations on the new agreement, full-time senior Reps due to attend the Briefing were given two working days from a Friday afternoon “eleventh hour” Letter To Branches to prepare for a National Briefing the next Wednesday. Just two days to read and digest a new agreement and 12 additional documents that come with it. This is simply unacceptable.

National Briefings were promoted as an extension of decision-making and democracy between Conferences. If so, they must do more than pay lip-service to involvement. They must allow and encourage fully informed debate and proper consideration of the issues. They should not just be a “rubber-stamping” exercise for new agreements. Annual Conference has limited time to discuss and debate, but National Briefings at short notice give us even less.

A number of reps and Branches at the National Briefing called for more time to understand and debate what was to be voted on, so the Postal Executive has now extended the deadline from their original plan of 19th December to 18th January. But the original intention seems clear: rush it through over Christmas when everyone is too busy to look too closely at the details.

Only through the active involvement and input of reps that experience life on the front line in the workplace can we ensure national agreements are fit for purpose. Branches should arrange meetings to consult with their unit reps and activist members on the proposed new agreement and involve them in deciding how the Branch will vote in the Branch Ballot.

The Agreement: Who needs “Guides”?

LTB 854 says “the new agreement and the associated guides…represent a substantial improvement” on the old Attendance Procedure and management’s unagreed rogue policies.

At the National Briefing Ray Ellis, the National Officer who negotiated the proposed agreement, made it expressly clear that Branches will be voting to accept not just the new agreement itself, but also the 12 other more detailed Guides, together as one package deal.

Most of these Guides actually contain these words:

“In the case of any inconsistency between this supporting guide and the Attendance Agreement the terms of the Agreement must take precedence.”

But according to the LTB these Guides are meant to be “supporting documentation”. They will be presented to managers and our Reps as telling them what the Agreement means in practise.

If they are meant to support the correct implementation of the new Agreement, then how could they ever be allowed to be “inconsistent” with that Agreement? The fact is that if we agree the content of these Guides we are also agreeing that there are no inconsistencies between them and the Agreement.

We don’t need an Agreement that has list of twelve separate Guides that put a spin on it, or reinterpret the words actually in the Agreement. What we need is a comprehensive Agreement in the first place!

Stoppage of Sick Pay ended?
Pull the other one!

The LTB makes a lot of “the cessation of stoppage of sick pay without good reason and appropriate notification”. It claims that the Agreement will bring “an end to random stoppages of pay during absence”. Sounds great, doesn’t it? But what the actual words of the new Agreement do say are:

“Employees will receive sick pay in line with the provisions set out in the Sick Pay policy”
(Page 1 of the proposed Agreement, bullet point 8)

If you look for a copy of this Sick Pay Policy in the list of Guides attached to the LTB, you won’t find it. It is the only one that is specifically referred to as being agreed as part of the new Agreement, and it isn’t even added as a supplement. It is exactly this self-same Sick Pay Policy that Royal Mail has been using to justify the stoppage of sick pay! In the current version of this policy it states:

• “The business must be satisfied that an employee’s absence is necessary and due to genuine illness

• The business reserves the right to refuse sick pay if an absence is due to, or is aggravated by, causes within the employee’s control, or if the employee has neglected instructions given by a Doctor

• An absent employee shall remain at their normal home address (other than to receive in-patient treatment) unless they have consent of their line or local personnel manager

• Employees who are sick immediately before they are due to go on holiday must confirm to their Line Manager that they are going on holiday on the due date (unless sick absence continues and the employee remains at home)”

(Sick Pay & Conditions Policy, 29 March 2012)

And we are expected to accept that this previously unagreed policy is now part and parcel of a new agreed national Attendance Agreement! No thank you!

All that the CWU negotiators have done is agree when Royal Mail can claim they have “good reason” to justify the stoppage of pay. And in future now we wouldn’t be able to challenge it: we will have agreed to it! In future it wouldn’t be “random”, but under the specific terms of this agreement. Sick Pay should not be stopped at all, whether on a “random” basis or on a basis that is planned and has been agreed with the CWU!

Plus, now you will have to stay at home if you are sick, even if you have booked and paid for a holiday with the family and are fit enough to travel but not go to work. This has never been agreed before, but it would be under this new agreement.
Still No Appeal at Stage 1 or 2!

Despite it being a long-standing CWU Conference policy, there is still no appeal against the issuing of a Stage 1 or a Stage 2 Warning in the proposed new Agreement. Why is this? Ray Ellis simply tells us that “Royal Mail won’t agree to it”. So, that’s it then, is it? We just forget about it?

No! That’s just not good enough. We should not be agreeing a new Attendance Procedure that doesn’t include appeals at Stage 1 and Stage 2. Full stop.

Accidents on Duty are Discounted?
Not any more they aren’t…

The words in the proposed new Agreement are the same as the old one: “Absences which result from accidents on duty will normally be discounted”.

But the supposedly “supporting” Guide ‘How to treat absences due to accidents at work’ that is to be agreed as well goes on to concentrate in great detail on how management can actually justify including these absences!

This includes “where the accident has been caused by the employee’s own negligence or if the number of accidents have reached an unacceptable level”, or if “the length of an absence related to an accident at work is deemed to be unreasonable”.

Exactly who is to decide whether the employee has been negligent and caused their accident? Who is to decide how many accidents someone has to have before this number is unacceptable? Who is to deem the length of an absence to be unreasonable? Their line manager.

What if the employee disputes the allegation that they are to blame for their own accident? How do they challenge the accident being included when the nationally agreed “Guidance” document specifically gives their manager the green light to do so? The words of the new Agreement are not supported by this “Guidance”, they are undermined by it!

Oh, and by the way: this is the only “Guide” that doesn’t actually include anywhere the words “in the case of any inconsistency between this supporting guide and the Attendance Agreement the terms of the Agreement must take precedence.” The words of this “Guide” are gospel.

The “Guide” actually re-writes the vague terms of the national Agreement to say what Royal Mail has wanted it to say all along. It actually spells out how to include accidents on duty, and this time with the CWU’s blessing!

(Oh, and by the way, there’s still no appeal against the issuing of a Stage 1 or Stage 2 warning…)

Disability-Related Absences: Still Discounted?

The words in the proposed new Agreement state “Absences arising from disability will normally be discounted”. Why this has been changed from “absences related to disability will normally be discounted” which is what the current agreement says is not explained. Let us assume there is no difference between the two. But what does the ‘supporting' Guide on this subject add to the new Agreement?

“Having sought advice from Occupational Health Service reports and HR Advice Centre and where it is justified to do so e.g. an employee’s disability related absences reach an unacceptable level, the manager should advise them in writing that any future absences may be counted.”

So, the manager making the decision has to ask ATOS, and another manager in Human Resources to check if they agree that including disability-related absences is “justified”. Again, what has been agreed in the Guide that elaborates on the words in the Agreement simply gives in to what Royal Mail has been trying to get all along.

(Oh, and remember there’s still no appeal against the issuing of a Stage 1 or Stage 2 Warning…)

But isn’t the new Agreement much improved? What about the shorter Stage Warnings?

In the proposed new Agreement, the trigger points for Stage 1 remain as 4 absences or 14 days in 12 months, but the trigger points for Stage 2 and Stage 3 have moved. The proposed new trigger points for Stage 2 and Stage 3 are “2 absences or 10 days in the next 6 month period”, rather than “2 absences within 6 months of each other or a total of 10 days in the next 12 months”.

This is undoubtedly better, but it has come at the high price of giving in to Royal Mail on other important issues. These improvements on how long Stage Warnings would last, come at the price of making it easier for Royal Mail to give you a Stage Warning in the first place.

The Devil is in the detail

Truly, the phrase “the Devil is in the detail” has never been more appropriate for a proposed new National Agreement. But this time the devilish detail isn’t actually in the Agreement! It is all left to the supposedly “supporting documentation”!

Space does not allow everything to be put into this leaflet. Take a long hard, proper look at the full detail of this Agreement and all the additional “Guides” before you decide whether to support it or not.

What is the Alternative?

At the National Briefing, Ray Ellis told those who criticised the proposed new National Agreement, that it might not be perfect, but it is the best they can negotiate. He also asked ‘What is the Alternative?’

Well, Ray, the alternative is to stick with the current Attendance Procedure and keep challenging and fighting all of Royal Mail’s attempts to change it, water it down, misinterpret and abuse it. We do already have any Attendance Procedure agreement. We don’t need to agree a new one right now ‘at all costs’. Better still, involve our members at the sharp end in a fight to get a new National Attendance Agreement is fit for purpose; that it fully defends our members’ job security. That it is better all round, not just better in some parts, worse in others.

Vote ‘NO’ to the new Attendance Procedure package deal!

Download and print this leaflet for your reps and activists to read:

CWU_AttendanceAgreement_VoteNo_V2.pdf

CWU_AttendanceAgreement_VoteNo_V2.doc