DC Velocity - June 2010

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transportationreport

UPS failed to show the same level of interdependence between its air and ground businesses.

The ruling affirms FedEx’s position, Lane said. FedEx Express drivers are “an extension of the airline system, shuttling packages between the planes and the customers, which is a radically different approach to how UPS structured its business,” he said.

UPS, for its part, is sticking to its stance that employees who do the same work should be covered under the same labor law, regardless of their employer. UPS maintains that FedEx is the only U.S. transportation company governed by a different set of labor rules.

Berkley of UPS scoffs at the notion that a change in classification at FedEx Express would affect the way it operates, noting that FedEx remains staunchly anti-union nearly 40 years since its founding. For example, of the air unit’s 125,000 employees, only 4,500 pilots are union members. In addition, more than 100,000 FedEx employees in other divisions like less-than-truckload carrier FedEx Freight and expedited operator FedEx Custom Critical have always been eligible to be organized under the NLRA, yet no one has done so, Berkley said.

Still, that hasn’t stopped the Teamsters union, which has long coveted a foothold inside FedEx, from vowing to organize the Express unit should Congress change the law. Teamster General President James P. Hoffa said publicly in mid-February that the union will organize “100,000 workers at FedEx” if that happens.

Threat to the empire

To some, the real threat to Fred Smith’s air empire is not UPS but the Teamsters. Jerry Hempstead, who for decades had a ringside seat at the FedEx-UPS brawls as a top U.S. sales executive at rival Airborne Express and then DHL Express, said UPS—which employs 240,000 Teamster members—could be seen as simply aiding and abetting the union in its drive to organize FedEx.