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NTEU efforts to fight for the workplace rights of TSOs nationwide have yielded positive results, helping dozens of employees fight back against management’s repeated efforts to mete out unmerited discipline, including untimely suspensions, unfair scheduling and job duty reassignments, and outright dismissals.

The union also has successfully reinstated numerous TSOs who have been fired for failing the required passenger screening exams. Trained, experienced NTEU staff attorneys have repeatedly gone before TSA’s internal personnel board to argue that the agency did not follow its own directives requiring all cross-trained employees who fail testing in their new positions to be moved back to their former positions before initiating any dismissal action.

Following are real-life examples of how NTEU is making a big difference in the TSA workplace:

NTEU helped a TSA member at Tampa International Airport whose job was threatened by management in a dispute over
paperwork for a performance award. NTEU staff attorneys pointed out the employee’s exemplary performance record to
airport management and successfully urged them to reinstate the employee.

El Paso International Airport

NTEU saved the jobs of two members at Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport after they were threatened with termination following an alleged security breach. NTEU staff attorneys helped the employees prove that management’s evidence in the case was inconclusive and biased, and as a result, management revoked the employees’ letters of termination.

At El Paso International Airport, NTEU got a member returned to work after management had placed the TSO on mandatory leave and refused all requests for reinstatement. The member even had proper medical clearance to return to work and perform regular duties. As soon as NTEU filed a grievance on the employee’s behalf, TSA backed off, reinstated the employee and restored more than four weeks of personal leave.

At Charlottesville-Albemarle Airport (CHO) in Virginia, NTEU's hard work led to a TSA employee being awarded a fair final PASS rating for 2009, as well as a 4 percent raise and $1,000 bonus payment that came with it.

NTEU staff attorneys filed a grievance on behalf of a TSA employee at CHO who challenged a low year-end PASS rating that was based on management's unfair application of TSA's unexcused absence policy. As a consequence, the employee was denied a $1,000 bonus and was set to receive a 2 percent raise instead of a 4 percent raise

Under TSA's AWOL policy, fewer than five unexcused absences of less than two hours each cannot justify a reduction in an employee's final PASS rating. When NTEU pointed out that the employee in question only had three unexcused absences, all of which were less than two hours, management reversed its decision and awarded the employee appropriately.

In Texas, Chapter 323 (TSA Austin) President Bob Bartz filed a successful grievance forcing management to allow off-duty chapter members and other TSA employees at Austin-Bergstrom International Airport (AUS) who attended a recent security briefing to claim overtime.

Following the failed Christmas Day bombing attempt in Detroit, TSA employees on the morning shift at AUS were required to stay after their shift ended to attend a mandatory meeting on the incident.

Verbally instructed by management at the meeting to include 15 minutes of overtime duty on their time cards, several TSA supervisors at the airport later refused to accept the overtime requests, saying overtime had not been officially authorized.

At Chapter 311 (TSA LaGuardia), instead of a grievance, one phone call was all it took for NTEU to get TSA management to change course after it tried to implement a new policy regarding employee cell phone use that contradicted the agency's national policy.

All cell phones brought to work, management said, were to be kept in employee lockers during their shift. According to national TSA policy on personal electronic equipment, employees may carry cell phones while at work, but can only use them in designated areas during off-duty rest or meal breaks. (TSA Directive No. 1100.73-2).

In response, Chapter 311 President Yasir Sheikh contacted a local NTEU staff attorney who quickly got in touch with senior airport officials. Within 24 hours, LGA's federal security director told management that unilateral changes to national TSA policy were unacceptable and to revert back to following national TSA policy on all workplace issues.

"Chapter members and other employees here at LaGuardia are very happy to see how quickly we got results thanks to NTEU," Sheikh said.

At Chapter 304 (TSA JFK), NTEU staff attorneys successfully represented a TSA employee challenging a letter of reprimand for misconduct before a peer review panel. The misconduct had allegedly occurred after an unauthorized item was found during a TSA training session.

Once NTEU attorneys highlighted the employee's exemplary performance record and explained that proper protocol and chain of command had been followed in the wake of the incident as required, the peer review panel overturned management's reprimand. 

NTEU success stories like these gives many TSA employees hope that the union will soon achieve its larger goals of fairness, respect, recognition and collective bargaining rights in the workplace.

The union recently won a fight to represent a Chapter 313 (TSA Miami) member who was denied NTEU representation during an oral reply following a proposed suspension notice. Airport management told the TSO that since TSA employees do not have collective bargaining rights, they have no right to union representation.

A local NTEU staff attorney contested this claim and TSA officials immediately backed down, rescheduled the oral reply and allowed NTEU to represent the grievant. A decision over the proposed suspension is pending.

At Chapter 327 (TSA Charlotte), NTEU successfully returned to work a member who sought a reasonable accommodation request after being forced to take LWOP for exceeding the maximum days (180) allowed for light duty assignments.

When TSA challenged the employee’s medical clearance to return to work, NTEU responded by sending airport officials a letter threatening legal action for preventing a legal reasonable accommodation request.

Upon receipt of the letter, airport management immediately relented and allowed the member back to work. Since NTEU's victory, airport officials have allowed many other TSA employees at the airport the opportunity to make reasonable accommodation requests.

In Texas, NTEU recently secured a well-deserved promotion for a TSA employee after the request was originally denied by management on the grounds that it would constitute a conflict of interest with another employee. In a phone call to airport management, a local NTEU staff attorney explained that no conflict of interest existed because the two employees in question worked different shifts and would not interact while on duty. TSA officials agreed and granted the employee’s original promotion request.

Also, an NTEU staff attorney helped a Chapter 310 (TSA Atlanta) member keep her job as a passenger screener after management threatened the employee with dismissal for allegedly texting while on duty. When NTEU questioned the validity of the charge, local TSA management immediately rescinded the removal notice. And, in a recent oral reply in Ohio, NTEU succeeded in getting a proposed removal for a Chapter 319 (TSA Port Columbus) member who had allegedly “failed to follow directions” reduced to a three-day suspension.

When management at Miami International Airport threatened to unilaterally strip more than 60 full-time TSA baggage screeners of their baggage certifications and force them to transfer into part-time baggage or checkpoint positions, NTEU quickly responded.

After requests to review the matter with management were ignored, NTEU staff attorneys filed an airportwide grievance on behalf of the employees, many of whom are members.

Within days, TSA management notified NTEU that they were reversing course, reinstating all baggage screener certifications and returning all transferred employees to their previous positions.

"Without NTEU's efforts from the beginning of this ordeal, this would not have been possible," said Jorge Garcia, the interim president of NTEU Chapter 313 (TSA Miami).

During the course of events, several former AFGE members at MIA dropped their membership in favor of NTEU because AFGE refused to help them fight for their rights and win back their jobs and certifications

Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport

NTEU helped two TSOs at Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport regain their jobs after they were fired for failing to pass the required passenger screening exam. The employees were not given the opportunity to return to their previous baggage screening positions, even though both were certified to do so. The union successfully argued, before TSA’s internal board, that the agency did not follow its own internal directives that require cross-trained employees who fail testing in their new positions to be moved back to their former positions before any dismissal is initiated. Both employees returned to work—and received full back pay.

A LaGuardia Airport TSO was threatened with AWOL after not signing up for voluntary training sessions that occurred during his regularly scheduled days off. His repeated attempts to reschedule were turned down, so the TSO took the matter to NTEU, which immediately contacted senior TSA officials at LGA to express concern about the situation. Within hours, the agency reversed course and informed the TSO that no disciplinary action would be taken and they would accommodate his previous request to reschedule the training.

At John F. Kennedy International Airport, NTEU saved the vacation of a TSA employee after management revoked an approved leave request when the employee switched terminals. Fighting for principle and to save $2,500 in vacation funds, the employee approached NTEU which addressed the situation with TSA's Office of General Counsel as well as the employee's congressman. TSA quickly relented and granted the original leave request.

NTEU stepped up at El Paso International Airport to challenge management threats to fire employees who attended a meeting with House Rep. Silvestre Reyes (D-Texas). When NTEU pressured the agency to defend its actions, airport supervisors backed off, claiming their threats were "misunderstood."