DATE: Friday, September 5, 1997             TAG: 9709050659

SECTION: BUSINESS                PAGE: D1   EDITION: FINAL 

SOURCE: BY MICHAEL CLARK, STAFF WRITER 

                                            LENGTH:  102 lines

UPS TENSIONS LINGER HERE DRIVERS SAY LAYOFFS ARE CAUSING DELAYS; FIRM BLAMES BACKLOG

The Teamsters strike against United Parcel Service ended Aug. 19, but the world's largest package delivery company is still far from business as usual.

Nationally, UPS formally protested a decision by a court-appointed officer to defer, until after the strike had ended, revoking the 1996 election of Teamsters president Ron Carey.

Locally, the mood in UPS' three facilities is tense, said David Vinson, president of Teamsters Local 822 in Norfolk.

``It ain't a pretty picture,'' he said.

More important to UPS customers is the company's post-strike performance. Are packages being delivered on time?

Barbara Claytor, owner of the Village Mailbox in Portsmouth, said she's seen improvement since the strike ended.

``After the first week (back), everything's been great,'' she said, ``though I have had a few customers switch to Federal Express.''

Dina Spiva, manager of Postal Express in Chesapeake, has not had the same results.

``The most important thing is that even today, UPS is experiencing delays,'' she said.

``I know of one woman who sent a package last week to her son at Virginia Tech, normally a two-day service,'' Spiva said. By Thursday, the package still had not arrived.

Vinson, who worked for UPS for 17 years before becoming local union president in 1994, accused the company of ordering drivers to end delivery runs at 6:30 p.m. each day, whether or not they were finished.

``Some drivers had 10 to 30 stops left,'' he said. ``Customers' packages are just sitting there. It used to be you got in trouble if you brought a package back.''

Randy Lint, UPS Tidewater Division manager, attributed drivers' early return to the remaining backlog of packages from the strike.

``There's a backlog because shippers held packages, so there's an inflated volume at this point,'' he said.

Outbound UPS tractor-trailers have to leave at a certain time, he said. ``So we have to have the drivers back.''

Management allowed drivers to stay out later before the strike, Lint said. Since union members have been back on the job, the brown trucks have started their runs later each day.

Lint said he's heard complaints of delayed deliveries, but again blamed the problem on the last days of clearing out the strike-caused backlog.

``It's something we deal with every day,'' he said. ``Locally, pick-up levels have gone back to normal. Next week, we should have the system clear.''

Vinson said the delays are caused by layoffs, which he claims are vindictive.

``I've never had people laid off at this time of year,'' he said. UPS employs 1,000 people in Hampton Roads, about 700 of whom are Teamsters.

There's no reasonable answer to the question of why UPS is laying off employees, ``except they're bent on punishing the workers,'' Vinson said.

Lint did not have exact numbers of employees laid off from the three local facilities but said the number of layoffs is decreasing.

``We have people available to cover vacations,'' he said. ``After Labor Day, we have fewer vacations,'' and more employees available.

``Every day, as the volume comes in, we put more drivers on the road,'' Lint said.

Vinson believes otherwise. His charges of vindictive layoffs point to other concerns in the post-strike era: relations between labor and management, and between union members and employees who crossed picket lines.

Most of the tension at local UPS facilities, he added, is between management and employees.

``It's aimed personally at employees who had the audacity to do what they did,'' Vinson said. ``It's the UPS way. They don't like it if you challenge them.''

Management's attitude toward employees is ``cold but professional,'' said part-time UPS employee Kenny Rivers.

``You can tell they have a little bit of anger toward employees,'' he said. ``Normally, when we do a job, we get a comment of `good job,' but not lately.''

While there have been a few incidents between union faithful and employees who crossed, Vinson said, there has been no violence.

He called it a ``spirit of ignoring.''

Rivers agreed.

``We've just had a couple of words exchanged,'' he said.

Lint said the situation isn't unusual at the UPS location on Air Rail Avenue in Virginia Beach, the company's largest in Hampton Roads.

``There might be some cold shoulders between the people who crossed the picket line and others, but that's only natural,'' he said.

There is no inordinate tension between management and employees, though, Lint said. ``I walk around this building every day and I'm not aware of it.''

UPS' national protest results from an admission by election officer Barbara Zack Quindel. She said that she had decided to overturn Carey's victory shortly after the strike began Aug. 4, but that she delayed action to avoid playing a role in the standoff.

In a letter to U.S. District Judge David N. Edelstein, the company called the decision ``an arrogation of power with sweeping implications particularly inappropriate to a judicial officer.''

The letter was made public Wednesday.

UPS sought no remedy from Edelstein, who helps oversee the union's cleanup under a 1988 consent decree with the Justice Department.

Quindel announced Aug. 22, three days after the strike ended, that a ``complex network of schemes'' to funnel union treasury funds and employer donations to Carey's 1996 re-election campaign warranted a rerun election against challenger James P. Hoffa. MEMO: The Associated Press contributed to this report.

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