More precise language ordered back into position definitions
Due to changing technology and practices regarding maintenance of water meters in the city of Vancouver, three employees requested their jobs be reclassified and they get paid more per hour.
Ken Pinder, Nick Botsis and Ed McKeown worked in a trades 1 (water-meter mechanic) position and were paid $31.72 per hour, but on Sept. 15, 2014, the union, Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE), Local 1004 requested a review of the job descriptions.
The description had been in place since 1986, when the wording was finalized. Because so much of their jobs had changed over the year, the union requested the three employees be placed into the trades 2 (water-meter mechanic) class and be paid $36.16 per hour.
The workers were responsible for installing, testing, maintaining and repairing water meters. Previously, most of the work was done inside the Waterworks Operations Branch shop, but most of their current jobs were performed in the field.
“A trades 2 (water-meter mechanic) exercises considerable independent judgment in the technical aspects of the work, with particularly complex problems or policy matters being referred to a superior,” read the job description, and was staffed by “skilled work at the journeyman level in the maintenance, repair and testing of all types of water meters.”
“A tradesman 1 (water-meter mechanic) works under the supervision of a superior and exercises some independence of judgment and action in the more familiar phases of repair work,” according to the written description, and works at a “below journeyman level.”
Kate Bearblock, compensation consultant, handled the review process for the city and it was completed on April 20, 2015. The union received two revised class specifications on April 23.
However, David Fairey, job evaluation and labour relations consultant, worked with the union to evaluate the classifications.
“The evidence is that the subject positions are required to perform all of the duties and responsibilities that distinguish a trades 2 from a trade 1 water-meter mechanic; they therefore fit squarely within the trades 2 water-meter mechanic class specification and should be reclassified to that class,” wrote Fairey.
Arbitrator John Kinzie dismissed the grievance.
“I am of the view that the water-meter mechanic 1 class specification provides the better fit for the positions of Pinder, Botsis and McKeown and that that class specification is appropriately assigned or allocated to the trades 1 class on the parties’ schedule A wage schedule on the basis that that class captures positions performing skilled work below the journeyman level.”
The union argued that because the job had changed, the three employees sometimes did more complex work and they should be compensated.
“The fact that the incumbents’ jobs may have them performing complex repairs on an occasional basis is not sufficient to justify their positions being classified at the higher level of trades 2,” said Kinzie.
“Their positions are only required to perform less complex duties that can be undertaken by someone below the journeyman level. It is that job of work that has to be classified and the better fit for it, in my view, is the trades 1 class, not the trades 2 class which captures core duties at the journeyman level.”
The arbitrator also took exception to the new descriptive language that excluded the words “at journeyman level” and “below journeyman level” and ordered “these two descriptors should be included in the first sentences of the nature and scope of work sections of the water-meter mechanic 1 and 2 class specifications ” said Kinzie.
Reference: Vancouver (City) and Canadian Union of Public Employees, Local 1004. John Kinzie — arbitrator. Marylee Davies for the employer. Bill Pegler, Hasan Alam for the employee. March 27, 2018. 2018 CarswellBC 742, 135 C.L.A.S. 32
