GPS Tracking Systems a Hard Sell with Unions
Vehicle tracking of municipal and business vehicles is a legitimate way to eliminate inefficiencies and keep track of scheduled maintenance.
But since GPS tracking was first introduced as a high-tech management tool for a mobile workforce, it has been received with much suspicion by employees, and unions – the organizations meant to protect them.
Vehicle tracking systems use satellite radio signals to calculate an object’s location, anywhere on earth. Data is gathered at regular intervals, every few seconds or minutes. That string of vehicle tracking data can show where a car or truck has been, what direction it’s heading and how fast it’s going.
When the data stream is transmitted to a server to be remotely viewed by computer on the Internet, the vehicle tracking system is known as active or “real time.” When the data is recorded or logged on the device’s memory for reading later, the vehicle tracking system is called passive.
Regardless of which type of vehicle tracking system is used, many employees resist them. Workers don’t like the idea of being “watched” every minute. And not only being watched, their every movement would be reported and recorded with precise detail.
Garbage Trucks and Street Sweepers
In Sydney, Australia, unions balked when the council put GPS tracking systems in garbage trucks and street sweepers.
Municipal officials claimed vehicle tracking was a management tool, to set route goals and tighten up schedules. The GPS tracking data would help the cities respond more efficiently when constituents complain that their street hadn’t been swept. In the event there is was an accident or a claim that a city vehicle damaged personal property, a vehicle tracking system could establish where that vehicle was.
The union said, simply, vehicle tracking is spying. GPS tracking allows management to get lazy and micromanage drivers who are fully capable of reporting their own whereabouts, said one dissatisfied union member. “If there are inefficiencies in the system, ask your workforce to help identify them,” he suggested. “Vehicle tracking is the expensive way to do something that is so easy.”
Worse, drivers feel managers would use a vehicle tracking system to target a whistle-blower or any employee they wish to fire, to “get the goods” on him or her. The vehicle tracking reports would reveal where an assigned driver was every second, where they stopped to gas up, snack or go to the bathroom, and where and how much the driver was speeding.
Cabbies Get Fed Up
In September, 2007 in New York, the city council’s decision to mandate vehicle tracking devices on all the city’s yellow cabs led to a well-publicized two-day strike of taxi drivers with the New York Taxi Workers’ Alliance (NYTWA).
The union’s executive director said the vehicle tracking project trampled on drivers’ privacy and treated them like second-class citizens. The union threat inconvenienced about 800,000 riders a day.
New York cab drivers are not employees: neither of the city nor the cab company. Drivers are independent contractors that lease the cab from the cab company every day. They pay for their own fuel and when they have bad fares, they have to take the loss.
After the city council vehicle tracking measure passed, taxi brokers raised the price of leasing a cab and drivers claimed the company managers were passing the cost of installing the required GPS tracking equipment onto the drivers.
“We have way too many controls in this country and GPS tracking shouldn’t be another one of them,” said one miffed driver. “The city is stealing food from my family’s plate.”
Bus Drivers Resisted GPS Tracking
In 2004, school bus drivers in Boston, MA opposed the notion of using GPS tracking on buses. The school board said vehicle tracking would ensure that dispatchers knew the buses were where they were supposed to be, and would help them quickly track down children when their parents inquire.
The school bus drivers’ union insisted on a workforce vote. They didn’t want any little misstep along the route recorded by a vehicle tracking device for all eternity.
The Boston Herald followed drivers around for a few days, to enlighten readers about the two sides of the issue. Reporters documented drivers parking their buses for hours, talking in parking lots, going shopping, taking naps or just driving around aimlessly. Readers were outraged.
“Unions fear accountability,” said one reader. “These drivers opposing vehicle tracking operate under the same delusion of many municipal unions: that they own the business and need to be consulted on everything. They don’t own the busses, and have (to me) absolutely no standing to decide if Boston should manage their infrastructure assets by vehicle tracking.”
Modesto, CA Union Leader Wins Case
Not all labor disputes about GPS tracking fall in favor of the employer. In Modesto, Calif., the city was found at fault when a union leader and wastewater collections system operator felt he was singled out with a vehicle tracking device. The city unfairly retaliated against Tom McCarthy, president of the Modesto City Employees Association when he was engaging in legitimate union activities, according to the state labor board.
The board didn’t rule directly on the legality of the vehicle tracking device. But it did find McCarthy’s supervisors wrong for threatening to suspend him for failing to tell them when he had union meetings. The bosses also said McCarthy couldn’t take any notes about union activities during work time. The board found that wrong also.
The city did not fight the board’s decision and instead said that it learned from the experience.
The claims, including the vehicle tracking incident, were from three years ago, noted the human resources director. “We look forward to the future and appreciate and value our relationship with the union. They are a valuable asset.”
McCarthy, who admitted the city has the legal right to use vehicle tracking to increase efficiency and try to avoid vehicle theft, said the situation with the city has changed drastically.
Luckily, as years have passed since vehicle tracking was first introduced for consumer distribution, workers have become more aware of their rights. Courts and attorneys have worked through some of the debatable issues about GPS tracking. Finally, human resource departments and fleet managers are demonstrating more responsibility with vehicle tracking systems, using them more but using them more wisely – and saving money as a result.
Sources: AFL-CIO, CounterPunch, The Modesto Bee, news.com.au
Tags: GPS Tracking, Modesto, Union, vehicle tracking device, Wastewater, Worker
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