04/03/09 Communique

PBC Budget Factor Negotiations Begin Next Week
The GAO Union bargaining team will meet with a GAO management team on Monday, April 6, to begin negotiations over the budget factor that will be used to determine the amount of Performance Based Compensation (PBC) GAO employees will receive in 2009. The Union bargaining committee has been researching the 2009 payouts for other federal agencies under pay for performance systems in preparation for negotiations. The GAO Union Assembly met yesterday, April 2, in a special meeting to provide input and approve the Union’s negotiation positions and strategy for 2009 pay. Now that management has indicated that they have a proposal and are ready to negotiate, the Union is ready and is committed to negotiating a fair and appropriate budget factor as quickly as possible.

In the first round of negotiations over 2009 pay completed in early January, the Union negotiated with management the across the board adjustment that all GAO employees received as of the first pay period, equivalent to the GS annual adjustment for their locality. In that negotiation, we reached agreement that GAO would begin negotiations over the PBC budget factor no later than 6 weeks after receiving a budget for FY 2009, and that the PBC would be paid retroactively to the first pay period of 2009. The Omnibus legislation providing a budget for GAO was signed on March 11.

After the across the board pay negotiation was completed and ratified, the GAO Union continued to meet with the management team to discuss issues related to the PBC component of the 2009 pay, pending a budget and negotiations over the budget factor. The GAO Union expressed several principles that are important for the PBC payout to be fair for all employees and achieve some equity with our federal colleagues:

• Everyone who “meets expectations” should receive some amount of Performance Based Compensation (which has not always been the case in the past);

• All PBC should be applied to base pay rather than some portion of it being in the form of a one-time cash payout;

• For Band Is and IIAs, PBC should be applied to base salary regardless of salary range caps to recover some of the earning power lost since the salary ranges were adjusted downward in 2005;

• For Band IIBs, PBC should be applied to base salary regardless of the Band IIB speed bump;

• The PBC payout should be determined using an alternative to the SRS score (which exaggerated small differences in ratings in some instances).

These PBC negotiations apply to employees in the bargaining unit who are in GAO’s full pay for performance compensation system. The PBC negotiations will not affect developmental employees, PDP and CAP, who are provided performance based compensation under a separate system.

The Union bargaining committee will be conferring with the Assembly as the negotiations proceed. Once negotiations are completed, we will hold information sessions for the bargaining unit and then the negotiated tentative agreement will be provided to the Union membership for ratification. Please send us your thoughts and feedback on this year’s PBC pay negotiations by emailing your Assembly delegate or an officer.

If you have not yet joined the Union as a dues-paying member, please see your elected representative to join or find the forms on our website [www.gaoanalysts.org] so you can participate in the ratification of this year’s PBC pay!

PAST COMMUNIQUES:
03/30/09:  GAO dispute resolution and grievance process discussion
03/16/09:  Selecting the new Comptroller General—Submit your comments for Congress
03/02/09:  GAO Employees Develop Alternative to SRS for 2009 Performance-Based Compensation
02/20/09:  FMA Assembly Delegate chosen, Union Assembly Officially Takes Office
02/02/09:  Management announces policy to streamline reports
01/27/09:  New Look Communique
01/16/09:  Assembly Election Schedule; Join the Union by January 30th to Vote
12/17/08:  Officer Election Results
12/15/08:  GAO Presents Initial 2009 Pay Proposal