100 % medical release

[UPS JEFF]

August 23rd of 2005 I was diagnosed with Leukemia. They had consolidated like make/year trucks into our bldg.6 months prior and I had written my truck up numerous times for strong exhaust fumes in cab/unsafe to drive. The causes of leukemia are Benzine, exhaust fumes and burning oil.
I have been on short-term disability for 6 months collecting $300/week and the 23rd of this month I go to long-term disability with Met Life and it goes to $2,000/month. After 6 months you must get Cobra coverage to the tune of $1,033/month.
I have been with UPS for 21 years. During my first 19 day hospital stay I was not contacted once by UPS management and have only had 4 phone calls in 6 months--the last 2 were for an approx. return date.
My 401k money is not assessable, because major medical is not one of UPS's guidelines for withdrawals----I know what some of you are going to say---it is retirement money, but who plans on having cancer.
As far as being on the job--I would have to prove that the leukemia came from my UPS truck. Workers Comp covers UPS's liability in the state of Colorado--right to work----trust me I have checked into all options.

Jeff

 

[mtumposky]

Yes I am a lawyer and I never meant to conceal that fact. "Load", I'm sorry I make you sick. Thankfully, UPS offers "extensive healthcare" for its employees so you should be able to get all the time you need to recuperate. Your disdain for those who go after UPS' ADA compliance (or lack thereof) reflects the attitude of many mid and upper-level mangers I am sure. The fact is that your employees give their life and their bodies to the company and when their backs and knees give out, UPS tosses them aside.

 

[trickpony1]

mtumposky,

God be with you.
We, the working slobs, need more like you!

 

[tieguy]

Ah yes give us an ethical lawyer to right this companies many wrongs. Shall we invite Satan in to teach sunday school next?

 

[tieguy]

That was rather harsh of me wasen't it?

My apologies to Satan for associating him with a lawyer.

 

[dannyboy]

Maybe if the company did not hire lawyers to cover up all the wrongs........or hire managers that hide evidence of the companies (or managers) wrongs, we would never have to hire lawyers.

But it is a game that has been thrust upon us both, so that game we shall play. And the only winners are the lawyers, BOTH company and employee.

Actually, If you care to read the good book, Satan could teach the class. He has an excellent working knowledge of the good book. But he choses to only quote things that help him out, and not the truth.

Kinda like some managers do the contract?

Jeff, sorry to hear about your problems. What you need to do is get a good atty that can get you a disability withdrawal on your 401K. I had to get into mine to pay off the retirement I owed on my teamster pension plan. It is hard, but not impossible. And it should not cost too much either, which is a very large concern after being off that long without a check coming in.

d

 

[Load Stand]

Yes I am a lawyer and I never meant to conceal that fact. "Load", I'm sorry I make you sick. Thankfully, UPS offers "extensive healthcare" for its employees so you should be able to get all the time you need to recuperate. Your disdain for those who go after UPS' ADA compliance (or lack thereof) reflects the attitude of many mid and upper-level mangers I am sure. The fact is that your employees give their life and their bodies to the company and when their backs and knees give out, UPS tosses them aside.

Michael, I am not making this up as I go..we are following the law...granted, there may be some mistakes we make along the way and for those we will pay dearly for....UPS and management in general do not have anything against those that have a disability...we too are real people!...if an employee is disabled according to the definition of the ADA then we have a process in place....I know several UPSers gong through trying times with personal health issues and work-related health issues...Jeff, your story is sad and it hurts to hear such a thing....I fear the day will come when I am told I have some terrible disease and I am told by UPS that unfortunately we cannot keep you on the payroll and must administrately terminate you....but I also see the employers' point of view in regards to what are they expected to do and for whom do they make a reasonable accomodation towards....

What started this conversation was a sniff for instances in which UPS says you must have a 100% percent medical release....I believe there is nothing wrong with having such a release, albeit the wording should be "can you meet the Essential Functions of your Job"....Michael, I am curious, under what auspices would you feel that this 100% medical release policy would be deemed a violation of the ADA...are you interpreting such a release to mean that one must be perfect and disability free? If so, that is a misinterpretation. Again, we simply must know if the employee is capable of meeting their Essential Job Functions...the 100% medical release terminology is simply a miscommunication regarding the ability to meet the Essential Job Functions 100% ...and I fear lawyers like you are trying to twist such miscommunication around to advantage yourselves and take shots at a company that overall does things responsibly and ethically...

As for tossing employees aside after their backs and knees give out....we do anything but....we provide benefits that compensate for such conditions...our Workers' Comp costs are pretty evident of that and we pay our fair share for on the job injuries....this is labor intensive work and yes stuff happens...but at least we own up to our responsibilities when our employees are truly injured on the job....try working as a FedEx Ground Contractor and see what happens when you are injured...what a set up that they have that we must compete with - totally unfair and truly unfair to those that are "contractors".....

We all chose our career paths and for the most part, the career path for a package employee at UPS involves medium to heavy duty work....when employees can no longer do such work, what is a company to do? Try and create jobs for all those that can't do the EJF's? If you ran a labor intensive operation such as ours, what would you do Michael? How do you chose who should be accomodated and who should not? What is your understanding of the definition of a disabled individual according to the ADA? Furthermore, how does your law firm handle such cases? In a less labor intensive environment I would imagine you do have truly more opportunities to find other jobs for your disabled workers...but how does your firm chose or determine who gets the accomodation and who does not? Does the person that have Parkinson's get the accomodation or does the person that can't lift a box of printer paper get the accomodation? Does the person that has MS get an accomodation or does the person that has frequent migraines often get it?

As for other supporting cases there is Hutchinson v UPS in the midwest in the mid 90's I believe that also supports our understanding of QID and involves a UPS driver that was given permanent lifting restrictions and argues they were a disabled person and we should make an accomodation...the court agreed with our handling and understanding of the ADA law....I suspect there may be cases that others will point out in which we wrong, and if we were, we most likely paid the price and more and shame on us....there is no blanket policy that is err, but there are admitted some mistakes along the way...this 100% medical release is really not one of them I believe...it's a misinterpretation.

 

[tieguy]

Maybe if the company did not hire lawyers to cover up all the wrongs........or hire managers that hide evidence of the companies (or managers) wrongs, we would never have to hire lawyers.
But it is a game that has been thrust upon us both, so that game we shall play. And the only winners are the lawyers, BOTH company and employee.
Actually, If you care to read the good book, Satan could teach the class. He has an excellent working knowledge of the good book. But he choses to only quote things that help him out, and not the truth.

ah my friend i hope retirement is not making you ill.

Yes I understand we work for an evil company who looks to suck every drop of blood out of the working man and then discard him to the trash heap with no compensation. But as I look at how we abuse these workers I am alwasy amazed to see people perform these grueling jobs and somehow survive thirty years with few physical problems or in some cases no injuries at all. I would think each person wears out or down differently. I am always amazed that some think work is the cause of all their physical problems and yet never consider the years of playing sports or working around the house could possibly have done anything to contribute. At work we scream about over 70's at home we carry around 80 pound bags of concrete like nothing.

Since you did raise the issue of the good book I am always amazed at people who preach the contract and the union grievance process to me (not necessarily you) and hold me accountable for following the language of the contract as long as it suits them. If the good book does not suit them then they are quick to run to the outside help such as lawyers. The union and the company have many process in place to address these issues but alas the payoff is not as rich as running to some sleazeball lawyer. So in this case the holy grail of contracts is conviently ignored.
For some reason the rules of the game seem to be that only the company is to be held accountable for following the contract.

I am always amazed at how so many of you are quick to point at a management person who they feel is unethical. But yet they welcome a lawyer who sneaks on here to research his case outside the normal disclosure process with open arms. And willingly tell all. Your lawyers are terrific for gaining some poor schmuck and himself a nice settlement but in the long run an excess of sneaky lawyers looking for fast gains will generate many more poor schmucks. The company will and could get to a point where they simply fire anyone who has an injury as the result of poor methods rather than take a chance on the guy hurting himself and seeking the big legal lottery ticket later down the road. Cut your losses early in the game has always been a business strategy that I would hope would never be applied to our workforce.

Work the contractual process and the union system you have in place to address these issues. If I violate the contract and you go outside of it for convience then the contract and the process lose all credibility. The legal arena is still an option after the contract and the grievance process has been exhausted.

As always I respect your wisdom,input and passion immensly Daniel. Nothing but love from this representative of the evil empire.

 

[dannyboy]

Not ill here. Just a simple comment on the fact that in the Bible, satan used the Bible to his ends to achieve his goal. I said nothing more, nothing less.

Except that management uses and quotes the contract, many times out of context, to achieve their goals.

But as a practical matter, the whole thing was written as vague as our tax code, and for a reason.

And my thoughts are that Casey was smart enough to understand that whatever the cost of bringing in the union, it was far cheaper than to let internal workings find their way into the court systems.

But since you did bring it up. there are times when in negotiations that there is give and take. I have seen where the company has had one person that they wanted rid of very badly. So in say 7 termination hearings, deals were made where the 6 other people get only token suspensions, but the one they want rid of gets to hit the road.

Not really the best way, but it works. And the union, eager to get the best deal for the greatest number of filers, is trying to get the best picture for the group. So it allows the one to get fired, while bringing back the other 6 for sure. It is in cases like the above where the contract did not, repeat not, serve the correct function. And that is why, until the process has completed, legal advice is not allowed.

In the case of violations of federal law, these are issues that are not covered in the contract, but the contract alludes submission to the law. So the employee seeks to clear the issue with the employer, and the employers counsel. So if the employer has staff counsel to handle issues outside the contract, why should not the employee. That goes against everything American that you hold so dear. Equal representation.

And just because you dont like the lawyers that the employee has to choose from does not make them bad, or the ones you have on staff good.

As for Micheal learning something of value here, I really think that would be a stretch.

Lemme see your judgeship, I got this information on a non authorized chat site on the internet called brown caf. While I realize it has no legal ties to UPS, there were several statements that were made that obligates UPS to take care of my client. These statements were made by what we think were very high ranking UPS corp managers, and it proves that UPS is clearly intentionally violating my clients rights. These orders came from the highest levels, the corp VP named Tie guy.

Yeah that would be a good one. I bet he wins.

Not

As for passion, that is one thing I have never lost. And one thing UPS could not take away. That is also what makes me a formidable opponent, even when I am on the lost cause side of an issue.

Regards

d

 

[tieguy]

Not ill here. Just a simple comment on the fact that in the Bible, satan used the Bible to his ends to achieve his goal. I said nothing more, nothing less.

Except that management uses and quotes the contract, many times out of context, to achieve their goals.

Perhaps and it has always been a pleasure of mine to be able to out quote the minister on what the bible holds.

But as a practical matter, the whole thing was written as vague as our tax code, and for a reason.
And my thoughts are that Casey was smart enough to understand that whatever the cost of bringing in the union, it was far cheaper than to let internal workings find their way into the court systems.

True to some degree. You do realize however that a more indepth version of the contract exists in the coffers of UPS and the teamsters union that lists the original intent behind much of the contract? Its also why I listed the process in addition to the contract. There are I believe quite a few local, regional and national level joint panels and committees designed to actually address the type of issues we are discussing on this thread. I do believe they should be allowed to do their job , do you?

But since you did bring it up. there are times when in negotiations that there is give and take. I have seen where the company has had one person that they wanted rid of very badly. So in say 7 termination hearings, deals were made where the 6 other people get only token suspensions, but the one they want rid of gets to hit the road.

yes sir I am sure you are right. And in all honesty from what I saw that one person usually begged to be fired. In fact I would say I have seen more people that also deserved to be fired several times and somehow survive.
Danny I really think you're in a different arena here. The issues of Injury compensation, disability and reasonable accomodation are issues the union and company should work out through these joint internal panels. I despise people smacking me with the contract when it suits them and bypassing it when it does not. This subject is one where that occurs.

You answer about the sleazeball lawyer sneaking around here outside the discovery process was somewhat dissapointing. The guy is circumventing the discovery process to contact current and former UPS employees for information and for contacts that could possibly help his case. I'm sure its perfectly legal but definitely somewhat shady or sneaky. Where I come which is not far from where you came from we don't mince words. Shady or sneaky is unethical. Defense of such inexecusable.

The fact Danny is there are legitimate victims of UPS that deserve to be compensated for their troubles. However there are many more treasure seekers trying to collect on the injury lottery ticket and many snake oil salesman lawyers trying to push those people to circumvent the union process to seek their quick pot of gold.

Many more treasure seekers then victims out there Danny. Many , many more.

 

[beatupbrown]

Transfer your money from ups 401k to a IRA then you can get your money in the IRA with a major medical.Check with a bank of your choice on this matter concerning withdrawal of IRA money for major medical.









i

 

[beatupbrown]

(Many more treasure seekers then victims out there Danny. Many , many more.)
Tie I do not buy that for a second with the hard working folks at UPS.Lets just say I have seen the light and it burns bright. UPS fight all cases like you are a phony wanting money when in fact 80%to 90% of major problems are real injurys that need help ,but are trivialized and minimized.

 

[tieguy]

Beat sadly so. You unfortunately are a victim of a process where there are many who try to work the system. The right thing would be that we judge you solely on the merits of your case and filter out the liars and thieves. For every person I have seen who was not able to get a 100 percent release I have seen 5 try to come back with less than 100 percent and then all of a sudden they actually get the 100 percent from their doctor when challenged. Too many liars and thieves trying to work the system and making it harder on you.

 

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Beat sadly so. You unfortunately are a victim of a process where there are many who try to work the system. The right thing would be that we judge you solely on the merits of your case and filter out the liars and thieves. For every person I have seen who was not able to get a 100 percent release I have seen 5 try to come back with less than 100 percent and then all of a sudden they actually get the 100 percent from their doctor when challenged. Too many liars and thieves trying to work the system and making it harder on you.

I'm calling shenanigans on this one.
<o></o>
UPS consistently denies comp. It is unwritten policy. They do it with management too. You sir, are full of crap, and your constantly kowtowing to the company line is becoming tiresome. I know of more employees than the mysterious five you claim to know that have had to work through excruciating pain because they have no choice. I know of dozens who have had legitimate claims contested because UPS fights everything. I know of people who UPS has had $500/day PIs follow out of therapy, hoping to catch them use a limb, so they could deny claims to, yet have ended up paying $100s of thousands of compensation to in order for them to go away.
<o></o>
The job (pkg car driver) beats you up and ruins your body for the rest of your life. Industrial Athleticism, my .
<o></o>
This company went wrong when they allowed loser hourlys into management(Peter Principle). Nowadays management thinks all hourly are the same as they were when they were hourly, i.e.: incompetent. I think that you fit into that generalization (and I really, really hate generalizations).
<o></o>
Why was it you got demoted to your present lousy shift? Playing with numbers or something else; eehhh JH?
<o>
</o>

 

[tieguy]

<O></O>
Why was it you got demoted to your present lousy shift? Playing with numbers or something else; eehhh JH?
<O>
</O>

Gee whiz TS was that supposed to be a sane response to something being discussed here?

To be honest TS I don't recall being demoted to anything but perhaps it happened around the time you were busted for Bestial pedophilia.

What an idiot you are. If you're going to put up a fight for something at least try to put the wacky weed down and make it credible.

 

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Gee whiz TS was that supposed to be a sane response to something being discussed here?

To be honest TS I don't recall being demoted to anything but perhaps it happened around the time you were busted for Bestial pedophilia.

What an idiot you are. If you're going to put up a fight for something at least try to put the wacky weed down and make it credible.

That's it? That's all you have? Dirty talk and name calling?

What a maroon, to quote someone much smarter than you.

l8r mr harvey.

 

[tieguy]

TY for you input TSusan.

 

[happybob]

Have you done your research yet? Pacinich v UPS. A level 18 manager had to file suit against the company after they discharged him because of his disibility. Company claimed they had no work for him to fit his permanent disibility. Lifting restrictions, climbing restrictions, bending, and on and on. The manager took a beating on his body over the years and when he was all used up he got tossed aside. Yes, he did win his suit, only problem was that he didn't win reinstatement. Was awarded back pay and benefits. It came to light that he was tapeing conversations and the management and supervisors said they could never trust working with him again. The judge did find that the company violated his ADA rights.

The consent decree the company had to sign in Arizona was another ADA violation that came to light.

I did notice the posting of the Murphy v UPS case. Something that I never saw in that decision was if Murphy asked to be transfered to another job.

Many of the injured workers at UPS are not aware that the company is required to transfer disabled employees that can not perform their original jobs. If there are other jobs in the company that their disabled employees can perform, and an opening exists, they are supposed to accommodate them with a transfer. The policy of a 100% medical release is true. If you can't go back to your original job the company will not move you, unless you file charges with the EEOC. and even then they will drag it out in the courts, with the hope of making their disabled employees to take workers comp buyouts instead of fighting to transfer. I hope this changes soon. This multi billion dollar corporation can well afford to treat their disabled workers with dignity and not disdain.