Pay up, CFPB!
Pay bargaining updates
Thursday, 4/4/2024 call to action
We need CFPB to AGREE to our Union's most recent counter-proposal! Email Jan Singelmann (Rohit's Chief of Staff) and Tyshawn Thomas (Director of Human Capital) NOW, encouraging them to end the delays, accept our offer and reach a tentative agreement TODAY:| Label | Content |
| To: | [email protected]; [email protected] |
| CC: | [email protected]; [email protected] |
| Suggested body text | Dear Jan and Tyshawn, I understand that our NTEU National President Doreen Greenwald is speaking with Director Chopra today and that you are expecting a counter-proposal from our Union Bargaining Committee today as well. Since this counter-offer addresses the Bureau's concerns regarding short and long-term costs and logistics of implementation, while preserving our full increases for all of 2024 including locality, we believe we are now at or close to tentative agreement. I encourage you to accept the offer ASAP. If further discussions and edits are needed, then please make every effort to be responsive to our Union representatives, continue to meet with them daily and to bargain in good faith and reach an agreement quickly. I hope that you will take the time to respond to this email. Thank you for your time and consideration. |
Thursday, 3/28/24
Calls to action:- Email Adam and Tyshawn and copy OPM, OMB like Doreen (NTEU National President) did
| Label | Content |
| To: | [email protected]; [email protected] |
| CC: | [email protected]; [email protected]; [email protected]; [email protected]; [email protected] |
| Suggested body text | Dear Tyshawn and Adam,As a dedicated Bureau employee, I take pride in my hard work achieving results for consumers and showing up every day to support the Bureau’s mission. That is why I was disappointed to learn in NTEU President Greenwald's letter to Director Chopra (dated March 27, 2024) that the Bureau is the only federal agency that has refused to give pay increases to its employees in 2024.I also find it unconscionable that the Bureau’s latest pay proposal provides zero retroactive pay to its employees and zero locality for 2024. Why should we be punished for your delay? This flies in the face of your overtures to staff and managers that the Bureau’s proposal is "generous" and that you value employees like me. I hope that you will take whatever measures are necessary to ensure that the Bureau (1) shows up to the bargaining table, and bargains in good faith; (2) works to get an agreement in place as soon as possible; and (3) promises full increases for all of 2024, including locality, to its hard-working employees. I hope that you will take the time to respond to this email. Thank you for your time and consideration. |
- Don't volunteer to participate in hiring interviews
- Join the picket at HQ on April 2
- We are picketing EVERY DAY, so if you are in the DC area and can come downtown, please join us in front of HQ as we peacefully gather from 8:30-9:00 a.m. and 12:00-1:00 p.m. each day. If you can only come one day make it Tuesday April 2! RSVP to the picket line here so we know who's coming.
- Forward Doreen’s letter to your representatives in Congress
- Email Doreen to thank her for the letter to Rohit, OPM, and OMB
- You can restate your ask to escalate to the White House if we don’t reach agreement in the next few days, or just thank her for the letter
Thursday, 2/29/24
Join our Town Hall at 11am today to learn more about CFPB pay negotiations. Show your support for fair, comparable pay by signing the letter to Director Chopra.Thursday, 2/15/24
Happy (belated) Valentine's Day! Show Director Chopra you're ready for equal pay by sending him a Valentine's Day Card.- Click here to open an email draft with a Valentine's Day poem.
- Edit the poem if you'd like.
- Choose your favorite image below and copy/paste it into the bottom of the email (right click on the image, click "copy image" and then
ctrl + vin the email). - Send the email!
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Thursday, 11/16/2023
Download the slides from today's town hall on pay bargainingMonday, 11/13/2023
Management calls transparency “a mistake”, says “no end in sight” to pay bargaining delays
Today your coworkers on the CFPB Union Bargaining Committee met with Management and a federal mediator to try to reach an agreement on ground rules for pay bargaining. Despite our and the mediator’s best attempts, CFPB Management flat-out rejected all our offers. They made no counter-proposals of their own. (Dues-paying members, read more about our efforts to reach agreement at mediation – and management’s intransigence – here)What’s at stake
The current compensation agreement expires on December 31, 2023. Without an agreement, you go into the new year with no raise and no bonus. Salaries will stagnate, and inflation will continue to eat away our take-home pay. Bottom line: NTEU is proposing a 14.1% raise, while Management is happy to give you nothing! (Dues-paying members, read more about the NTEU proposal here.) Management is running out the clock in an attempt to bully us into less pay than we deserve.Tell management to stop stonewalling!
As management continues to stonewall the start of compensation bargaining over their insistence on banning employees from observing the negotiations, they are also inviting you to see the Washington Wizards with them on Friday, 11/17 at 7 PM at Capital One Arena. You should oblige them. Join your fellow workers in showing management that you want them to come to the table and bargain your compensation in good faith (and enjoy an NBA game too)! We’re printing “Pay Up CFPB!” T-shirts to wear to the game. Sign up for your free ticket and Union t-shirt here. (Outside DC but want to come? Email us to arrange your travel with Union reimbursement, per diem and meals included). If you can’t make the game in DC, you can still take action now!- Add a “Pay Up, CFPB!” background image & avatar to your Teams video this week to show you’re with the Union
- Call and email Chief Human Capital Officer Tyshawn Thomas every day to urge him to bring his management bargaining team to the table.
- Mark your calendars for November 29th and 30th & save the date to attend our Union march on the Director’s testimony to Congress. More soon 🙂
Pay bargaining 2023 archive
Pay bargaining update 11/2/23: What does Management have to hide?Pay reset FAQ and timeline
Appeal / Arbitration FAQs (based on info we have as of June 12, 2023)
1. How do I know if I can appeal a crediting decision? On or around May 18, 2023, every employee who went through the joint crediting committee process received their salary reset results report. If there were any positions on your form that went through the tie-break process (meaning the NTEU and management members of the joint crediting committee could not agree on how to credit your experience), in the same May 18 email, you also received a memo showing the positions that went to tie-break and the Chief Human Capital Officer (CHCO)’s decision on the crediting. According to the 2021 compensation agreement, if the CHCO did not adopt NTEU’s crediting recommendation, the union can appeal the CHCO’s decision by going to arbitration. If you met this criteria, you should have received an email from the chapter inbox ([email protected]) notifying you that you are eligible to appeal and asking that you complete a Google form to say if you do or do not want to appeal. If you believe you are eligible to appeal because you meet the criteria above and you did NOT receive an email from the chapter inbox telling you were eligible to appeal, please reach out by emailing the union at [email protected] (use the subject line “Pay Reset Eligibility Question”). 2. How will the union decide which tiebreaks to appeal? The Chapter and NTEU National are committed to arbitrating all tiebreaks. This is a significant cost, but getting correct crediting decisions is important for us all. The cost of arbitration is paid for through the contributions of hardworking union dues-payers. If you’re not yet a member, we strongly encourage you to join, and you can do so here. If you join between now and September, you get $100! 3. What do I need to do to prepare for arbitration? If you have completed the Google form to opt-in to appeal, you will be contacted by the Organizing Committee through the chapter inbox to sign-up for an interview with Cynthia Woerner, the lawyer for NTEU National who will be representing you during arbitration. The organizing committee is sending those emails on a rolling basis, so don’t be worried if you don’t get one right away. Hundreds of bargaining unit members are eligible to appeal, so the interview process will take a number of weeks. But we have already started: last week alone Cynthia interviewed 44 bargaining unit members. Before your interview with Cynthia, you will need to compile some documents that will help Cynthia understand your case. Instructions on how to compile the necessary documents will be sent when you get invited to sign-up for an interview with Cynthia. Your interview with Cynthia will likely also include one of the NTEU members of the joint crediting committee, who will help Cynthia understand NTEU’s crediting decision and help her prepare your case for appeal. During the interview, Cynthia will ask you about what you do in your current position and how your prior experience was similar to or helped prepare you for the work you do in your current position. The interview will likely take 30-45 minutes. 4. When will arbitration happen? As of now, we don’t know for sure, but we hope arbitration will begin in July and it will likely continue through the summer and likely into the fall. The arbitrator has given us and CFPB management all of his available dates between July and September, but we won’t be able to confirm dates until after CFPB completes the procurement process to pay the arbitrator. 5. How will I know when my arbitration session will be? Once we have finalized arbitration dates, the chapter’s Organizing Committee will reach out to you with available dates for arbitration and allow you to sign-up for an arbitration spot. We will try to group bargaining unit members with the same job together during arbitration, so, for example, the arbitrator will hear all appeals from examiners back-to-back, followed by a different group of employees. But if you are on leave or unavailable during the dates offered to you, do not worry–everyone who wants to appeal will have their chance to appeal. 6. What happens during the arbitration? For each employee appealing their crediting decisions, the arbitration process will last 40 minutes. Cynthia Woener, the lawyer from NTEU National representing bargaining unit employees appealing their crediting decisions, will have 10 minutes to make an opening statement explaining why your crediting was too low and why your experience should be up-credited by the arbitrator, and the lawyer representing CFPB will then have 10 minutes to make their own opening statement. The arbitrator will then have 20 minutes to ask questions. We expect the arbitrator will likely make a ruling on the spot, so you should find out what the final crediting decision will be during your arbitration session. 7. There was a typo in my form or a date error, causing a miscalculation in my total experience. Can I appeal that issue? No. Typos and date errors causing miscalculations in experience are not subject to the appeal process. CFPB management should be fixing those errors. If you identified a typo or date error in your salary rest results, you should email [email protected] and cc: [email protected]. We do not know how quickly CFPB management will respond to or correct these kinds of errors or miscalculations. 8. I am considered a “recent hire” and my experience was not credited by the joint crediting committee. Can I appeal or challenge any of the crediting decisions management made? If you are a recent hire whose experience was not reviewed by a joint crediting committee, you are not eligible to go through the expedited appeal process required by the 2021 compensation agreement, but you CAN file a grievance to challenge the crediting determination. CFPB is required to credit new hires consistent with the crediting decisions of the joint crediting committees. We are working to get more information from management about the crediting decisions for recent hires and will organize a process to determine if there were crediting errors for recent hires, including whether or not to file an individual grievance. If you are a recent hire who believes your past experience was not appropriately credited, please email [email protected] (please use the subject line: “New Hire Crediting Issue”).Tiebreaker FAQs
Q: Can you tell us how many people are in tiebreaker status? When will we know whether some of our work experience is subject to a tiebreaker? A: There were around 400 employees affected by tiebreakers when we last received a count and published our FAQs a few weeks ago. We don’t know exactly how many people are in tiebreaker status at this time. Currently, we only have information about the number of work experience items affected, which is 1,400 work experience items. So, out of the 10,000 or so work experience positions the Joint Crediting Committees reviewed, there are about 1,400 tiebreaks. Employees will not receive their crediting results until May 1 (whether they have a tiebreaker situation or not). As of February 27, the Bureau has refused to share crediting results with employees sooner than May. The Union continues to advocate for employees to receive our results ASAP, even if the initial results include ties that are still to be decided by the tie-breaker by May 1. The union representatives on the Joint Crediting Committees completed their decisions on February 28. Q: Will tiebreaking decisions by CHCO be made without knowing the identity of the subject employee, to prevent the reintroduction of biases? A: Every employee whose work experience is being reviewed has been anonymized. The experience will also be anonymized for the deputy CHCO’s tiebreaker decisions. Q: Is there any consistent theme to the tiebreaker disagreements related to examiner crediting decisions? A: Yes, there are some themes. We sent a memo to management about it and they have not responded. Q: Are delays with the tiebreakers preventing the experience crediting decisions from being released to employees? A: No, they should not, but management is using it to impede the process and refuse to release the experience crediting decisions until May. There’s no reason, beyond management making their own unilateral decision. Ongoing experience accumulation FAQs Q: I have accrued additional experience in my role since I submitted my ERSR form in May 2021. Will that experience count towards the Salary Reset? A: Until the pay reset is officially implemented (expected in July), all of the experience you continue to accumulate in your role at CFPB counts as direct experience. So everyone will receive credit for their experience up through the pay period before the implementation of reset salaries.Back pay FAQs
Q: Has Management agreed to provide back pay if their delays extend the process past Pay Period 12? A: Management has still not agreed to any back pay past Pay Period 12. We have a grievance in abeyance, ready to go, if appeals go beyond that timeframe. Q: Would CFPB allow an employee to receive their entire (or partial) lump sum payment (after tax) as a non-matched employer contribution to their 401(k) in lieu of a one-time lump sum in their paycheck, if an employee expresses that preference? It would help some employees’ savings. A: No, the lump sum payment will be paid out in the same manner for all employees. However, the lump sum payment will impact eligible FRS thrift earnings. The union asked CFPB's Salary Reset Team and received a somewhat terse response, despite this not really costing the CFPB any significant additional cost (from the union’s vantage point). Unfortunately, under federal law, retirement is a topic that is non-negotiable. The union can make a suggestion, but the Bureau is under no obligation to respond to our request.Estimating direct experience and new salary FAQs
Q: Can we get our results for experience crediting (pending tiebreakers) now so we can estimate the salary increase we will receive? A: As stated in the first FAQ above, employees will not receive their crediting decisions until we receive the final results from management, after the tiebreakers, in May. We do have a salary calculator (dues-paying members only) that can help you estimate your new salary. Q: Are the average pay increases falling within the union’s initial expected estimates? A: The union calculated a $17,400 average estimated pay increase in late 2022. We don't know the actual pay outcomes, yet. There are currently many tiebreakers that will impact people’s actual new salaries, so we don't have final numbers. Q: For personnel with military service, do the Joint Crediting Committees understand the various applicability of military service toward both direct and indirect experience? What about other types of work experience? A: If the duties of the positions are similar, then they can be counted as direct experience. Some folks were not very detailed in describing their past work experience, and therefore may not get direct credit for those positions. The work experience submission form we all filled out was your opportunity to demonstrate how your individual prior work experience should be interpreted as direct or indirect. This is why the union heavily emphasized the importance of being thorough on the form.Correcting pay disparities FAQs
Q: The union analysis found that racial salary disparities have been present at CFPB since the beginning. What time period is this pay reset addressing/correcting? A: Based on the data and disparate impact analysis the union did, these disparities probably existed since day one at CFPB. This agreement is not meant to address those disparities since the start of the Bureau. The union tried to get corrections for the past disparities, but CFPB refused to do any retrospective relief and would only agree to prospective changes. So the time period affected is from January 2023 to the implementation date (CFPB says July 2023). For any time before that, this agreement does not apply. The union is working on other avenues to address past disparities and exploring legal options, so stay tuned.FAQ
- When will you know your crediting results and new salary? As of February 27, the Bureau has refused to share crediting results with employees sooner than May. The Union continues to advocate for employees to receive our results ASAP, even if the initial results include ties that are still to be decided by the tie-breaker by May 1. The Joint Crediting Committees completed their decisions February 28th.
- When will the salary updates go into effect? After an attempt to stretch out the process even more which caused us to file an institutional grievance, Management has now stated they expect the implementation to occur on time as confirmed by NFC in PP13 as of July 13. We still believe an agreement should be reached to account for any possible delay after that day and will keep you updated on progress to achieve that — and encourage employees to contact Human Capital to request this!
- If you disagree with your crediting results, can you appeal? Yes, there will be an appeals process for bargaining unit employees represented by NTEU. As of now, the criteria are going to be based on:
- Whether the NTEU representatives who reviewed your anonymous work experience data credited you higher and disagreed with management’s lower crediting, resulting in a tie and a tiebreak decision, which then resulted in the tiebreak decision maker (Deputy Director of Human Capital, Vickki Johnson) choosing the lower crediting option.
- If you meet these criteria, NTEU representatives will contact you!
We plan to streamline the appeals process by identifying these cases at the same time as you receive your results, and contacting you to inform you of your right to appeal your results.
- If you agree to appeal, then we will file your appeal along with all others within 30 days of the crediting results.
- At that stage, we’ll prepare your case to go before an arbitrator, and we will let you know when, where, and how you can participate in that arbitration hearing.
- There are currently over 400 bargaining unit employees with “ties” in the experience crediting decisions.
NTEU National is ready to appeal all of the cases where people receive lower crediting in the tiebreak than our union colleagues on the crediting committees had determined they deserve. Whether that’s 40 people or 400, NTEU is already committed to taking these cases to arbitration.
This could cost our union tens of thousands of dollars, but we’re budgeting for it and we believe it’s well worth the cost.
Doing this will help secure permanent salary increases that employees deserve. These increases will ultimately affect our financial futures and our retirement income.
We are aware that CFPB managers have stonewalled multiple committees on some disputes already, and we are concerned that Deputy Director of Human Capital, Vickki Johnson, who has the responsibility to make tiebreak decisions, will simply accept the managers’ recommendations. However, we’re doing our due diligence to make sure Johnson has the info needed to make a fair decision using NTEU’s recommendations. We are committed to representing every employee fairly who deserves equal and comparable pay.
Expected Timeline (based on the info we have as of Mar. 8, 2023)
Feb. 28 - NTEU representatives will complete their work on the Joint Crediting Committees by Feb 28. Management has confirmed they have completed all their crediting on the JCCs as of February 28. March 7 - CFPB and NTEU have agreed to an extension to midnight March 7 for NTEU to make additional quality control updates to its crediting on the Miscellaneous 301 job code committee. All other Committees finished crediting as of February 28. NTEU is particularly focused on making sure that crediting decisions on this committee were made consistently across different employees’ forms, so that similarly-situated employees receive equal crediting before this committees’ forms advance to the tie-breaking and/or appeals steps. NTEU representatives are committed to a fair and thorough quality control process for this committee, just like all other Committees conducted, and have found the number of unique position descriptions and the technical issues with the system for recording our decisions requires this additional time. May (per Human Capital's withholding of results) - BU members receive experience crediting decisions via Employee Results Reports. Employees will be notified via email once their experience crediting has been completed and will be provided a Results Report of the findings. This Results Report will include:- The final crediting of the employee's experience, including which positions were credited, and for how much “direct,” “indirect,” and “other” experience for each position.
- The names of compensation team members, subject matter experts, and committee members who participated in the review
- The anonymized version of the employee's experience submission that was evaluated by the reviewers
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Show you're with the union even when working from home with our "Pay up, CFPB!" profile pictures and virtual backgrounds! Get the instructions to update your profiles here. If you have a little proficiency with an image editing app, try to superimpose your head onto the profile picture! Hint: You can do the hard part (removing the background from a picture of yourself) using the remove.bg web app
Pay bargaining links
- Download / Read our summary of the 2022 Pay Bands Agreement →
- Get an estimate of your potential salary under the new agreement →
- Have questions about the Bureau-wide salary reset, the crediting process, and direct/indirect experience? Find answers on the CFPB wiki FAQs, including definitions of the key terms.
- Looking for info on annual merit increases, lump sum bonus payments, locality pay, and other compensation and benefits details? Download the 2021 Compensation Agreement, which is up for renegotiation again before it expires at the end of 2023.
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