Workers walked off the job on April 13.
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On April 29, Verizon said it has submitted its last, best offer. Yoo said they’d have to show it’s costlier for them to stay on strike and disrupt customer service than for Verizon to meet their demands.
“I am heartened by the parties’ mutual commitment to get back to immediate discussions and work toward a new contract”, Perez said in a statement. The union leaders’ rebuttals consist mainly of reasoning’s that the cut lines are largely due to Verizon opting to hire untrained workers, thus ruining the company’s business name and legacy.
The vandalism is suspected of being connected to guerrilla tactics allegedly being used by some of the 36,000 workers continuing their month-long strike against Verizon.
Martin “Skeeter” Grubb, another CWA Local 2201 vice president, said for the strike to stop, Verizon needs to agree to contracts that improve job security, healthcare for active and retired employees, and stop outsourcing jobs.
James A. Parrott, chief economist at the nonpartisan Fiscal Policy Institute, defended the strike in an article in Salon, arguing “Verizon’s version of the rules harm Americans both as workers and as consumers”.
Chris Shelton, president of Communications Workers of America, or CWA, says his union was contacted by call center workers in the Philippines who work for Verizon.
During the earnings call following first-quarter earnings, Verizon CFO Francis J. Shammo had assured investors that the strike, and the subsequent need to bring in 20,000 temporary workers, did not require for the company to change its fiscal 2016 earnings per share guidance – of $3.99. He said that the temporary workers lacked the expertise required to install the FiOS service for customers. Verizon’s subcontractors do not pay workers additional overtime compensation for these hours, it said.
Verizon spokesman Richard Young said the company had no comment on Filipino wages because the call center workers are not Verizon employees.
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Last month, the company reported a sharp increase in the number of sabotage incidents involving US infrastructure equipment – which has interrupted some wireline service.
