Kaiser Workers Rap Demerit System That Punishes Even Coming In Early

Michael Butler says he is about to be suspended from his job at Kaiser Permanente Medical Center in Bellflower because he likes to come to work 15 minutes early.

The practice violates a new personnel policy that Kaiser has enacted to curb employee absenteeism at its seven facilities in Los Angeles, Orange and Ventura counties. For example, the absentee rate at Kaiser’s Harbor City hospital last year was twice the national average.

However, Butler says the policy is so inflexible in dispensing demerits to errant workers that it has also needlessly punished conscientious ones.

“I don’t understand how someone who has demonstrated a high amount of professionalism can be penalized for coming in early and getting prepared adequately,” said Butler, a cardiovascular technician at Kaiser for the past two years.

Ruth Brown, a Kaiser receptionist for 23 years, complains that she has been penalized several times for arriving at her work station one minute late.

“I feel like I’m being treated like a 5-year-old,” said Brown. She says she had never been cited for any personnel infraction until the demerit system went into effect in January. “The consensus here (at the Bellflower facility) is that it is a stupid thing.”

Butler, Brown and thousands of other unionized Kaiser workers have begun protesting the demerit system, pinning buttons to their regular identification badges that say “No Points.” About 11,000 employees have signed petitions against the policy.

Last week, leaders of a 10-union coalition representing 17,000 Kaiser workers sought support from the Los Angeles County Federation of Labor, complaining that the personnel policy violates federal law because it was not part of current collective bargaining agreements. Union leaders filed a grievance with the National Labor Relations Board earlier this year and also opened direct negotiations with Kaiser.

“The point system robs employees of dignity and treats them like children,” said Thomas Ramsay, a spokesman for the 9,500-member Hospital and Service Employees Union Local 399.

A spokesman for Pasadena-based Kaiser--the largest and oldest health maintenance organization in the nation, with 53,000 employees--defended the demerit system last week as a necessary tool for controlling costs in today’s highly competitive health industry.

“We feel it is an employer’s right to establish reasonable rules for our employees,” said Michael McCabe, manager of Kaiser’s labor relations department.

McCabe acknowledged that the demerits placed against Bellflower technician Butler--who received no additional pay for showing up early--might demonstrate a quirk in the system. He said conscientious employees who put in extra time without pay are routinely encouraged.

“(Butler) is the kind of person we want,” McCabe stressed.

“But we have 25,000 employees in Southern California alone. We have to have some controls.”

Under the demerit system, workers are penalized for an assortment of time-card discrepancies, including long lunch hours and unauthorized overtime. Penalty points are automatically issued based on readings of employees’ time cards, McCabe said.

For instance, Kaiser employees are assessed five demerits if their time cards show they clocked in one to six minutes late. Larger assessments, ranging from 15 to 100 points per infraction, are given for unverified emergencies, medical leave or absence due to a “last-minute personal problem,” according to a Kaiser memo sent to workers at the Harbor City hospital in January.

Butler said he has received 220 demerits for coming to work early and has been told he will face a three-day unpaid suspension should the total reach 300.

McCabe said Kaiser officials have yet to determine how many demerits would be enough to prompt an employee’s dismissal.

The policy has already proven to be an “effective accounting system,” McCabe said, that allows supervisors to monitor chronic tardiness and discourage abuse of medical leave, sick days and unauthorized overtime. He said the policy is expected to save Kaiser “tens of million of dollars.”

McCabe also said the demerit system has been used by other health-care industry employers and is becoming more common.

However, officials at three area medical organizations last week criticized the policy and said they know of no other health organization with a similar demerit system.

“We don’t use anything like that here,” said Patti Ossen-Grizzli, a human resources spokeswoman at Memorial Medical Center of Long Beach. “I use (a summary of Kaiser’s demerit system) as a bad example in my training sessions (with Memorial employees).”

Spokesmen for Whittier Presbyterian Hospital and the FHP health maintenance organization in Fountain Valley also said they did not use such a system and doubted that it had merit.

Shortly after the Kaiser policy was implemented in January, about 5,000 workers marched in picket lines at the corporation’s two West Los Angeles hospitals as well as others in Harbor City, Panorama City, Woodland Hills, Anaheim Hills and Bellflower.

The demonstration coincided with the filing of unfair labor practice charges with the NLRB. The federal board declined to rule until the issue has gone through arbitration, scheduled to begin in September, union leaders say.