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UPS fired driver for union activities, social media use - NLRB judge - Reuters
United Parcel Service Inc violated federal labor law when it fired a driver in Pennsylvania for his union activities and criticism of the company on social media, a National Labor Relations judge in Washington D.C. ruled on Friday.
Administrative Law Judge Geoffrey Carter rejected UPS' argument that it would have fired Robert Atkinson for his poor performance in the absence of his organizing and criticism, finding that the company's decisions were "tainted" by its unlawful goal of removing a vocal leader and union activist from the workplace.
UPS Drivers stays fired and no back pay due to Social Media Postings - NLRB Judge
Despite holding that Atkinson’s firing did indeed violate the NLRA, the judge refused to order that Atkinson be reinstated by UPS because of comments he made on Facebook in May 2015 after he had been terminated.
Those Facebook rants including Atkinson calling one manager a “piece of garbage” who “definitely gives off the impression that he’s trying as hard as he can to compensate for erectile dysfunction [smiley face indicated by semicolon and parenthesis].”
Atkinson lodged similar online insults toward another manager whom the ex-UPS employee called a “knuckle dragger” that talks “like he’s chewing on cotton balls and marbles.”
Those comments, Judge Carter concluded, violated UPS’s anti-harassment policy and that he would have been fired for making those remarks.
United Parcel Service Inc violated federal labor law when it fired a driver in Pennsylvania for his union activities and criticism of the company on social media, a National Labor Relations judge in Washington D.C. ruled on Friday.
Administrative Law Judge Geoffrey Carter rejected UPS' argument that it would have fired Robert Atkinson for his poor performance in the absence of his organizing and criticism, finding that the company's decisions were "tainted" by its unlawful goal of removing a vocal leader and union activist from the workplace.
UPS Drivers stays fired and no back pay due to Social Media Postings - NLRB Judge
Despite holding that Atkinson’s firing did indeed violate the NLRA, the judge refused to order that Atkinson be reinstated by UPS because of comments he made on Facebook in May 2015 after he had been terminated.
Those Facebook rants including Atkinson calling one manager a “piece of garbage” who “definitely gives off the impression that he’s trying as hard as he can to compensate for erectile dysfunction [smiley face indicated by semicolon and parenthesis].”
Atkinson lodged similar online insults toward another manager whom the ex-UPS employee called a “knuckle dragger” that talks “like he’s chewing on cotton balls and marbles.”
Those comments, Judge Carter concluded, violated UPS’s anti-harassment policy and that he would have been fired for making those remarks.