Trimet's dirty litle secret

Dear Brothers and Sisters,

I am writing this with a preface of hoping that I am wrong, but I have checked with a number of members on the Company’s “dirty little secret,” theft of money from bus operators.  In the first installment of HOS part one; the question was concerning the money lost from the “log-in and the log-out” not being recorded for operators to get the correct pay that you are owed, regardless of a time-slip or not.

The question now is “how are we being paid?”  when I stated, we were not trained properly concerning how we get paid, we were taught, one:  you fill out your “trip-sheet” at the beginning of your shift, two: you login on the BDS/Init, and if you have overtime, three:  fill out a “time-slip.”  Another question is, “what about road reliefs?”  We were never taught that the overtime that you deserve needs to be put on the “trip-sheet” (or time-slip) or you will not get that overtime that you deserve.  A lot of us thought that the BDS/Init was a “clock-in and a clock-out” but, according to another member, that was never the case.  Neither BDS/Init was ever used for pay-roll purposes; therefore “Houston, we have a problem on our hands.”

For those Brothers and Sister who diligently keep records of your work, have you found discrepancies?  What was the cause of the discrepancies? My thoughts were they may have been road relief overtime that was not put on a trip-sheet (or time-slip) and you just logged-out, thinking it was a clock-out.  Since the Init is not for “clocking-in or clocking-out, just what is it used for?  Well I’ll tell you that it is being used to double check for HOS violations for operators; my question is if they do find a violation, are they paying employees what they owe?

Back before the HOS was shoved down our throats (I have yet to find anyone member who thinks this was a bright idea), we got used to putting in extra hours that the company needed to fill, we got complacent on what the company actually owes us.  Now with the HOS shoved down our throats members need to protect themselves from the “now” constant stealing from members (rather it is pensions/retirement or real-time pay); as members can tell by the lawsuit that is out there concerning “road reliefs” going forward despite the company trying to block it, now this.  Maybe this should be added to the suit as well.

My warning to all Brothers and Sisters, “if you are on a road relief and you are dropping a bus off late,” make sure you are writing the “actual time that you get off (on the trip-sheet)” otherwise the company is stealing that time from you and playing ignorance after the fact (which was not part of your training), which is against federal law (see attached).  Even if it violates the HOS (which “we” never agreed to) you must get paid for what you do.