Canadian National Attempts to Change Letter of Agreement
Published: Jan 26 2023 9:44AM
A deal is a deal. That is unless you are a powerful Class I railroad.
CN and the BMWED reached a Letter of Agreement with specific application to the payment of Mobile Employees that do not stay in a motel/hotel room provided by the railroad because the Mobile Employees are able to return home each night. That Letter of Agreement stated these Mobile Employees will be paid an hourly differential in exchange for CN not having to provide the hotel rooms and pay meal per diems to these employees.
CN and BMWED had a very clear understanding of this Letter of Agreement. But shortly after the ink dried, CN railroad decided that it had buyer’s remorse; CN is now trying to change the Letter of Agreement which means Railroad Workers will yet again be denied compensation that they are titled. CN's actions of agreeing to certain terms and then immediately trying to slime their way out of paying their Employees is yet another prime example of why the Railroad Workers are so disgruntled with their railroad employers.
CN says that it wants to renegotiate the terms of that Letter of Agreement by entering a new arrangement for compensation for the Mobile Employees. What this really means is that CN wants to make a new Agreement to pay their Employees significantly less than what CN had agreed to. But we already have the Letter of Agreement and the Mobile Employees are entitled to those payments. Buyer’s remorse is not an acceptable grounds for denying Employees the compensation to which they are entitled.
CN has filed a complaint against BMWED in the Court of the Northern District of Illinois. Their complaint has not yet been served, but their intention is to force this issue to arbitration to try to get another bite at the apple. We are going fight CN on this issue and we will keep you up to date of this as information develops. We are not going to allow CN to weasel their way out of this.
In the meantime, please document any loss of compensation that you are suffering because you are a Mobile Employee and you are being denied payments by CN that you are entitled under the Letter of Agreement.