LICO PAYMENTS ERRORS FOR FISCAL YEAR 1999-2000
Mike Donaldson

Applicable to former CUPE 1580 members only

Members who earned less than $30,000 during that fiscal year (April 01,1999-March 31,2000) are entitled to a retroactive payment. The Low Income Cut Off (LICO) payments have been in place since Bob Rae's Social Contract wage freeze. These payments are calculated by multiplying your hours paid by the difference between your step on the LICO and HICO scales.

ex: A GDT employee on Step 6 - HICO rate $21.53
                                                LICO rate $21.74

Employee was paid for 1000 hours of part time work.

(LICO rate - HICO rate) X 1000 = $210.00

For the GDT scales only, the percent differences between them are varied as a result of an arbitration award in April 1998. This will result in significantly larger LICO payments, the higher you are on the scale. The 6.7% difference at the top of the GDT scale was applied evenly to all other pay scales.

In February of 2001, the hospital paid the LICO amounts for the previous fiscal year. Because the hospital could not find any documentation in payroll as to how the calculations for C.U.P.E. 1580 had been done previously, they decided to use the formula in place for C.U.P.E. 576. Their formula was a flat 1%, a far cry from up to 6.7%.

The union is challenging this. The L.I.C.O. payment differences will cease to as of Jan. 05, 2000. This is the start date for the wage standardization. If you qualified for these payments and received nothing please contact Mike Donaldson at the Civic Campus.

SENIORITY LISTS (or last but not least…) Mary Sue Smith

Well, the on-going saga of the seniority list continues. For over a year now, the employer has been promising us a draft seniority list for members to review and correct. Earlier this year, a seniority list was circulated to all managers. Upon review, it was apparent that this list was chock full of glaring (and not-so-glaring) errors. The obvious problems were reported and we await a corrected list. In yet another push by the union (and in addition to a previously filed grievance), we have demanded a seniority list from the employer.

We have been informed that Rebecca Edmonds in Labour Relations is now putting the finishing touches on the ONA list and will then focus her full attention on the OPSEU group. Once we receive the draft we will be circulating it to all members so that problems can be identified and corrected. Attached to the front of the list will be instructions on how to report errors. Stay tuned.

Editorial Note: We've now learned that both ONA and CUPE have completed seniority lists. Guess what; we're last in the hospital's eyes again.