Vacation selection (Summer weeks)

brownboxman

Well-Known Member
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Bryce Canyon National Park

Ok I stole this from another thread, but here goes. I am almost at 22 yrs driving, one of my pet peaves is that some drivers will select all of their weeks in the middle of summer or always take spring break or the week after Christmas. Now I know that there are few things seniority gets you but here is my idea.

When selecting vacation there should be high weeks and low weeks. High weeks being spring break, June 1st thru August 31st, the week after Christmas(or the week after peak for you politically correct folks). So when you are selecting you get to pick 3 of the high weeks and then are free to pick any other of the low weeks.

I have six weeks to pick, this year I used only 2 high weeks. I have never picked more than 3 . I seems only fair to get the younger drivers a shot as yearly as possible to summer vacation. It took me 14 yrs to make it to a summer week. If we are truely a brotherhood seems to me this would be the way to go. Let me know why I am wrong.
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DorkHead

Well-Known Member
Ok, here is my idea! Put your time in like I did and everyone else does and stop your crying. It took me 20 yrs. to get a week in August. Now I take all 6 in a row.
 

UpstateNYUPSer(Ret)

Well-Known Member
Dork, think back to when you were a newbie (pre-Dork). I am going to assume that you are married and have a family. Wouldn't it have been nice to have been able to take a vacation during their school break? Or maybe take a week in the summer to go camping? Or maybe take the week after Christmas off to wind down and spend time with the family?

Flash forward to present day Dork. Screw them, I'm taking all six weeks in a row. That's the beauty of seniority.

Dork, you may be right but being right is not always being fair.

My kids are grown and out of the house. My vacation selections usually coincide with a holiday so I can get an extra day's pay.

We all start with 2 weeks vacation. These should be limited to low weeks. Every 5 years thereafter we gain another week. These additional weeks should be high weeks. At 25 years we would have 4 high weeks and 2 low weeks.

I am not familiar with optional weeks so have not included them in this scenario.
 

TheKid

Well-Known Member
When I was a junior guy I had a similiar idea and was told to friend#!& off by the senior drivers....A couple years ago a junior guy came up with the same idea....wanna guess what I told him ? Earn your stripes.
 

DorkHead

Well-Known Member
Upstate, it has nothing to do with being fair. My seniority allows me to take all 6 in a row if I choose to and I choose to. Yes, I would love to have had a week off in summer 20 yrs, ago but that wasn`t a option.
 

UpstateNYUPSer(Ret)

Well-Known Member
Upstate, it has nothing to do with being fair. My seniority allows me to take all 6 in a row if I choose to and I choose to. Yes, I would love to have had a week off in summer 20 yrs, ago but that wasn`t a option.

...and that is the point of this thread. Perhaps this should be an option discussed in 2013.
 

soberups

Pees in the brown Koolaid
Another scenario that might work would be to continue letting everybody pick any weeks they want in seniority order...but only 3 weeks at a time. Once everybody in the center has picked their 3 weeks, then selection goes back to the top of the seniority list and starts all over again until everyone has picked all of the weeks they have available.

My personal opinion though...is that I paid my dues when I was low seniority and I didnt complain about it. You know ahead of time when you accept the job that you will be selecting vacations in seniority order.

I have 23 years and this is the first year that I had all weeks still available when it was my turn to pick. And it probably wont be that way next year. We are transferring a bunch of our routes up to the new facility on Swan Island and our building is contracting from 3 centers down to 2. The drivers in my loop...many with more seniority than me...are being shifted over to a different center, with a bunch of lower-seniority drivers from the defunct center being transferred into the one I am currently in. I'm going to drop several rungs down the ladder.
I'm not at all happy about it, but the company is following the change-of-operations language so I have to just accept it.
 

DorkHead

Well-Known Member
Upstate let me put it another way. Would you be willing to give up your route at bid time to a lower seniority driver? Is it not fair for junior drivers to run cover routes for several years?
 

UpstateNYUPSer(Ret)

Well-Known Member
Upstate let me put it another way. Would you be willing to give up your route at bid time to a lower seniority driver? Is it not fair for junior drivers to run cover routes for several years?

You are talking 47 weeks as opposed to 5.

I like Sober's idea as well.

Look, I understand and certainly benefit from the seniority thing. I am #10 on the driver seniority list and got every week that I wanted with no problem.
 

UpstateNYUPSer(Ret)

Well-Known Member
Here's another question regarding vacation/sick/personal/option days:

Do you think we as employees should be given the right to donate any of the above to a fellow hourly who has been out of work for an extended period of time due to an off the job injury or illness?
 

TheKid

Well-Known Member
You are talking 47 weeks as opposed to 5.

I like Sober's idea as well.

Look, I understand and certainly benefit from the seniority thing. I am #10 on the driver seniority list and got every week that I wanted with no problem.

...are you willing to give that up ? I am not....I earned it....and so will they.
 
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