S & S Parts Distributors Warehouse, Inc.

National Labor Relations Board - Board DecisionsDec 26, 1985

277 N.L.R.B. 1293 (N.L.R.B. 1985)

S & S PARTS DISTRIBUTORS WAREHOUSE S & S Parts Distributors Warehouse , Inc. and Retail, Wholesale and Department Store Union, Local 150, Petitioner . Case 26-RC-6665 26 December 1985 DECISION ON REVIEW, ORDER, AND DIRECTION By CHAIRMAN DOTSON AND MEMBERS DENNIS AND JOHANSEN On 5 April 1984 the Regional Director for Region 26 issued a Decision and Direction of Elec- tion in which he directed that an election be held in a unit of all order pullers, packers, truck loaders, shipping department employees, customer order takers, core department (return goods) employees, local truckdrivers, the will-call employee and re- ceiving employee at the Employer's Nashville, 'Tennessee warehouse facility.' Thereafter, in ac- cordance with the National Labor Relations Board Rules and Regulations, the Employer filed a timely request for review of the Regional DirectorÂ°s deci- sion on the ground, inter alia, that the Regional Di- rector departed from officially reported precedent in excluding two special order takers, the customer credit employee in the "core" or returned goods department, the customer catalogue employee, and a bookkeeper/substitute order taker from the unit because they lack sufficient community of interest with the included employees. By telegraphic order dated 9 May 1984 the Board granted the Employer's request for review. Pursuant to Section 102.67(b) of the Board's Rules, the election was conducted on 8 May 1984 and the ballots impounded pending the Board's Decision on Review. The National Labor Relations Board has delegat- ed its authority in this proceeding to a three- member panel. The Board has considered the entire record in this case and makes the following findings. The Employer, S &: S Parts Distributors Ware- house, Inc., is a Tennessee corporation engaged in the wholesale distribution of auto parts from its Nashville, Tennessee facility. The Employer sells parts to customers located in the Nashville metro- politan area and within an 120-150-mile radius of Nashville. There is no history of collective bargain- ing at the Nashville facility.2 i Excluded from the unit found appropriate were office clerical em- ployees, outside salespersons , special order takers, the customer credit clerk in the core department , the customer catalogue employee, guards and supervisors as defined in the Act 2 Between 1977 and 1983 S & S Parts Distributors Warehouse, Inc, shared common ownership with Parts Distributors Warehouse of Mem- phis, Tennessee During those years the Memphis warehouse was cov- ered by a collective-bargaining agreement The Nashville and Memphis 1293 Customers order parts from the Employer over the telephone by calling a special "sales" number or in person at the "will -call" desk in the Nashville facility. The Employer arranges for delivery of or- dered parts to customers , or customers may pick up the parts themselves at the will-call desk. The Employer designates customers orders either "regular" or "special ." Regular orders are those that can be filled from an inventory of parts maintained at the Nashville facility . Special orders are those for parts the Employer does not have in stock. The Employer fills these orders by obtaining the parts from other local facilities that do have them in stock , or by ordering them directly from the manufacturer. The Employer' s entire wholesale operation is performed in a single building Which is divided into a warehouse area and an office area. The warehouse area is two stories high and occupies two-thirds of the building, stretching in front and to the right of the front entrance . The center of the warehouse area is filled with shelves on which the regular inventory of parts is stored . The will-call desk is located in the left front corner of the ware- house area inside the front entrance to the building, and the "core" or returned goods department is lo- cated in the right front corner. The office area occupies the remaining one-third of the building and is divided into two floors. The first contains, among others, the offices of the Em- ployer 's president, vice president , and plant manag- er, as well as the only restrooms in the facility, The second floor contains the employees ' breakroom and one other large room in which catalogues list- ing auto parts are stored. The shipping department, where customer orders are staged and loaded on trucks, is located at the rear of the warehouse area. The Employer records parts received , ordered, shipped, and returned on computer terminals, or CRT's, consisting of a video screen and a key- board. Information entered on the terminals is processed by a computer in Memphis, Tennessee, which is owned by another company and shared by other businesses. Six employees take "regular " cutomer orders over the telephone. These customer order takers share an office in the first floor office area with the Employer's receptionist/switchboard operator. The parties stipulated that the receptionist/switchboard operator be excluded from the unit. Each of the regular customer order takers sits in front of a CRT. When ordering a part, the custom- facilities are no longer affiliated Although the bargaining history at an- other plant of the same Employer may be a factor in unit determination, the Regional Direcetor declined to give it any weight here because it re- sulted from an election conducted in a unit stipulated by the parties 277 NLRB No. 138 1294 DECISIONS OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD er provides the order taker with its customer number and the part number. The order taker enters this information on the CRT, but the cus- tomer is not invoiced at this time. The computer generates a typed copy of the order called a "pick ticket" on a printer located in the warehouse area. Four shipping desk employees sort the pick tick- ets as they emerge from the printer, place them in metal carts, and put the carts on a moving track which makes a circuit of the warehouse floor. Thirteen order pullers remove the carts from the track and read the accompanying pick tickets. They put the ordered merchandise in the carts and replace them on the track. The track conveys the carts to the staging area, where the orders are checked and packed. The order takers communicate to employees on the warehouse floor via an intercom or by calling through a window between their office and the warehouse area. An order taker can call an order back up on the CRT to verify a part number if an order puller gets confused , and can use the CRT to check the balance in inventory of a particular part if the order puller is unable to find it. In the mornings, order pullers are given "lost sales" forms listing parts which the computer shows have been reduced to a balance in inventory of zero. The order pullers check to see if they have a supply of these parts. If the parts are on hand, the order pullers write this information of the forms. One will-call employee passes merchandise to customers across the will-call desk, secures custom- er signatures on the pick tickets accompanying the merchandise, and places the tickets in a basket from which they are taken and used for billing the customers. The Employer's merchandise is staged on racks in the shipping department before it is loaded on trucks. Each customer's order is placed in a space on the racks labeled with the customer' s name. Five truckloaders unload incoming trucks and load orders on outgoing trucks. The Employer em- ploys three local truckdivers to make two sched- uled delivery runs a day to customers in the city of Nashville. It employs four packers and one receiv- ing employee.3 The Employer is sometimes unable to ship as many parts as ordered. To ensure that customers are billed only for merchandise received, orders are retrieved on a CRT each evening and corrected to reflect goods actually shipped. This process is known as "entering the pick results for the day." One of the six regular order takers receives cus- 3 There is no evidence in the record concerning the specific duties of the packers and the receiving employee. tamer calls only in the morning and enters the pick results for the day in the afternoon. Two employees receive returned goods in the core or returned goods department. Returned goods arrive in plastic boxes accompanied by pack- ing slips, also called credit memos. The returned goods employees unload the merchandise and verify that the packing slips correctly reflect the parts returned. They then store returned parts on shelves in the core department until it is deter- mined if the parts should be replaced in inventory, sent back to the manufacturer, or returned to the customer. The Employer contends that the customer credit clerk, Judy Scarborough, the two special order takers, Deena Montgomery and Caroline Key, the catalogue employee, Christine Darden, and the bookkeeper/substitute order taker, Billie Marshall, should also be included in the unit. Scarborough handles the paperwork for the core department. She shares an office in the first floor office area with Caroline Key. The office contains a CRT. After the two core employees check the credit memo listing parts returned against the accompany- ing merchandise, the memo is given to Scarbor- ough. Scarborough enters it on the CRT and the computer automatically issues a credit to the cus- tomer. If there is no price within the system for a re- turned part, Scarborough looks up the price on the price sheets in her office, the warehouse area, or the purchasing department. Scarborough returns this paperwork to the returned goods manager in the core department, Carl Schultz. Schultz super- vises the two core employees. He checks the pa- perwork to ensure that it is in order before the credit is issued to the customer. If a returned part is not in the system and no longer on the price sheet, Scarborough takes the corresponding packing slip back to the core depart- ment. The part is pulled from the shelf and sent back to the customer because the Employer cannot issue a credit. Scarborough spends 85 to 90 percent of her time in her office, 50 percent on the CRT. The Employ- er's president testified that Scarborough is not physically located in the core department only be- cause it would be prohibitively expensive to run a CRT cable out there and a CRT in the core de- partment would not be secured against unauthor- ized use. Although Carl Schultz supervises Scarborough in the completion of her core department paper- work, her supervisor in the area of evaluation, raises, hiring, and firing is the coordinator of the S & S PARTS DISTRIBUTORS WAREHOUSE Employer's advertising program , Al Wheeler 7Fhe_ record is silent as to why Wheeler is Scarborough's principal supervisor.4 Montgomery works in the purchasing depart- ment, an office in the first floor office area, with Stan Marks. The parties stipulated that Marks is a member of management and thus not appropriately included in the unit . Marks sets up price sheets, handles outside salesmen , and does inventory buying and feasibility studies on new lines. Montgomery places special orders for parts that must be obtained directly from out-of-town manu- facturers . She receives these orders from customers over the telephone. On a given day, Montgomery may spend a great deal of time on the telephone or very little. Merchandise ordered for a customer by Mont- gomery is either drop shipped by the supplier to the customer or delivered to the Employer and routed through the Nashville warehouse. Mont- gomery receives the invoices for drop sipments. Where the Employer is billed for a special order, Montgomery handwrites a pick ticket which is punched into the computer by the pick results em- ployee so that the customer in turn is billed for the merchandise. 5 Montgomery is expected to follow up on all spe- cial orders. She routinely goes into the warehouse area to check on special orders that are being de- livered to the warehouse for shipment to custom- ers. Montgomery may. ask the warehouse manager for the information about an order, or she may go out onto the warehouse floor to ask the receiving employee if an order came into the warehouse or the shipping desk employees how an order was handled. Montgomery keeps records of the special orders she has placed for customers and of merchandise the Employer has sent back to its suppliers. She spends a few minutes every day filing. Montgom- ery also keeps track of merchandise coming into the warehouse to replenish the Employer's regular inventory. She uses a calculator and works on the CRT in the purchasing office daily. Key places special orders-for parts that are not stocked by the Employer, but are available from other local suppliers. She takes customer requests for parts over the telephone all day long and handwrites the corresponding pick tickets. She also 4 It was stipulated that both Schultz and Wheeler are supervisors prop- erly excluded from the unit ' The Employer 's vice president testified that he "suspects" Montgom- ery takes her handwritten pick tickets to the pick results employee her- self. There is no evidence that the Employer has an mtraoffice messen- ger, pneumatic tube system , or other such means by which paperwork is transmitted between employees 1295 orders parts listed on computerized pick tickets that are sent in to her, called "musts." The Employer's truckdrivers pick up local spe- cial orders. The shipping desk employees sort and stage the special orders brought in by the Employ- er's drivers throughout the day. Key goes into the warehouse area to check on special orders even more frequently than Montgomery because all orders placed for customers with local suppliers are routed through the warehouse. - Montgomery does not share an office with Key be- cause the manufacturers with whom Montgomery deals are also the suppliers of the Employer's regular invento- ry, whereas Key deals with local suppliers. Key does not use a CRT. e Darden shares the catalogue room in the second floor office area with the Employer's clerk/typist. The parties stipulated that the clerk/typist be ex- cluded from the unit. Darden 's office is reached by passing through the employee breakroom, She is supervised by the warehouse manager. Manufacturers periodically issue new lines of re- placements parts with new part numbers and con- stantly revise the prices of parts. Catalogues listing new part numbers and revised price sheets are mailed to the Employer by manufacturers and routed to Darden. The 30-by-40-foot room in which Darden works is lined with 8-foot-high bins like those used on the warehouse floor to store auto parts. Darden files new catalogues in the bins in alphabetical order by manufacturer. She also re- moves and replaces superseded price sheets accord- ing to the manufacturers ' instructions. The Employer ships updated catalogues to cus- tomers routinely with their orders of auto parts. Darden places catalogues to be shipped in the spaces alloted to customers on the rack in the stag- ing area. She goes down to the shipping depart- ment 10 to 12 times a day to stage catalogues. Sometimes a customer will call and request that a catalogue be delivered on other than a regularly scheduled delivery day. It is not part of Darden's - job to talk on the telephone, but she may take a customer 's order for a catalogue if she is available. Otherwise, such orders are taken by the regular customer order takers and passed on to Darden. Marshall worked as a regular customer order taker for 9 months. Three weeks before the 26 March 1984 hearing in this case Marshall was as- signed new duties in the bookkeeping department. She shares an office in the first floor office area with the Employer's head bookkeeper and its cash- 6 The record is unclear as to who supervises Montgomery and Key The Employer's vice president testified only that the warehouse manager supervises the telephone order takers and "all employees who should be in the unit " 1296 DECISIONS OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD ier and accounts payable bookkeeper. The parties stipulated that the head bookkeeper and the cashier and accounts payable bookkeeper lack sufficient community of interest with other warehouse em- ployees to be included in the unit. Marshall 's principal classification is bookkeeper. The head bookkeeper supervises Marshall in her bookkeeping functions. Marshall keeps small sets of books for the Employer' s customers who request this service . She does not keep the Employer's books or have access to payroll or personnel records. Occasionally , the head bookkeeper may ask her to add timecards . Marshall keeps a check journal , a general ledger, and a record of the daily receipts at the Employer' s store location. She uses a typewriter and an adding machine. The Employer's vice president testified that Mar- shall had not worked as an order taker since she was assigned to the bookkeeping department, but as soon as she learns her new duties she will be designated a regular fill -in order taker and be called upon to substitute for full-time order takers who are ill or on vacation . He further testified, however, that any prediction he might make as to how much time Marshall will spend as an order taker in the future would be speculation, and ob- served that it could be a lot of time , very little, or none at all. All of the order takers transferred from ware- house positions . Employees who work with the CRTs need not know how to type and are not sent to special training sessions . The Employer trains its order takers from scratch. Judy Scarborough has worked in almost all of the Employer' s depart- ments over the years . Any one of the regular order takers and either Scarborough or Montgomery could substitute for the pick results employee. All of the disputed employees are hourly paid like employees included in the unit. They also punch the same timeclock , receive the same fringe benefits, use the same breakroom, and are sched- uled to take the same breaks as the included em- ployees . Most employees work from approximately 8 a.m. to 5 p .m. Some warehouse area employees stay until 7 or 8 p.m. to load trucks, and the pick results employee works until 7 or 8 p.m. to finish reconciling the day's orders. Upon careful review of the records, we find that the two special order takers and the customer credit clerk share a strong community of interest with employees included in the unit. The duties of all three employees are integrated into and neces- sary to the smooth functioning of the Employer's warehouse operations. See, e.g., Gustave Fisher, Inc., 256 NLRB 1069 (1981); American Parts Sys- tems, 254 NLRB 901 ( 1981); Industrial Supplies Co., 237 NLRB 189 ( 1978). Order takers and CRT op- erators are drawn from warehouse personnel and need not have special skills or training as a prereq- uisite to transfer . See Birdsall, Inc., 268 NLRB 186 (1983); American Parts Systems, supra . Scarborough performs essentially the same function on the CRT as the pick results employee does , and both Scar- borough and Montgomery possess computer skills shared by the regular order takers. See Scholastic Magazines, 192 NLRB 461 (1971). Key and Montgomery have work contact with warehouse personnel in the furtherance of their job responsibilities . See American Optical Corp., 236 NLRB 1046 ( 1978). Like employees included in the unit , both Key and Montgomery must have knowl- edge of the way merchandise is moved through the warehouse to perform their jobs and the prepara- tion and handling of pick tickets is central to their functions . See Birdsall, supra ; American Parts SyS- tems, supra. Moreover , both employees deal -'direct- ly with customers on the telephone like the regular order takers. See Industrial Supplies, supra. It appears that Scarborough's duties also necessi- tate face-to-face work-related contact with ware- house employees . Even if this were not so, her in- clusion in the unit would be warranted in ' view of the close integration of her function with that - of the core department employees and the similarity between her skills and those ' of the regular order takers. See Scholastic Magazines, supra. We find that the community of interest between the employees included in the unit and the special orders takers and customer credit clerk arising from the similarities in their skills, the integration of their functions, and the work-related contact and facility of transfer between the two groups out- weighs any differences in their working conditions or supervision . See, e.g., Abdow Corp., 271 NLRB 1269 (1984); Napa Columbus Distribution Co., 269 NLRB 1052 (1984); Berea Publishing Co., 140 NLRB 516 (1963). That Montgomery has the addi- tional responsibilities of recording returned mer- chandise and monitoring inventory does not compel a different result, as such duties are charac- teristic of plant clericals appropriately included in warehouse units. See Magna Corp., 261 NLRB 104 (1982). Moreover , it appears that Montgomery must rely on information provided by the order pullers in updating inventory. We find, however , in agreement with the Re- gional Director , that the catalogue employee and the bookkeeper/substitute order taker should not be included in the unit . Marshall's bookkeeping duties are traditional office clerical functions and there is no evidence that she currently participates in the order filling process. Accordingly , her inter- S & S PARTS ]DISTRIBUTORS WAREHOUSE ests are aligned with employees in the bookkeeping department and other office clericals whom the parties have stipulated do not belong in the unit. See Mosler Safe Co., 188 NLRB 650 (1971). Of course, should Marshall assume order taking re- sponsibilities in the future , her exclusion from the unit may appropriately be reconsidered in a unit clarification proceeding. That catalogue employee Darden files and col- lates documents not used in the order filling proc- ess" in an area removed from the warehouse floor indicates that she is also an office clerical. See Mosler Safe , supra . The Employer argues that Darden should be included in the unit because her duties are analogous to those of warehouse em- ployees and she provides the catalogues needed by customers to initiate the order filling process. We conclude , however , that while Darden ensures the delivery of part identification information to cus- tomers without which the Employer 's operation would not funciton , her duties are not so bound up in the order filling process itself as to provide her with a community of interest with order filling and processing employees . That Darden performs part of her job in the company of warehouse personnel does not detract from the community of interest she shares with the other office clericals excluded by stipulation from the unit . See Boeing Vertol Co., 233 NLRB 866 (1977). In accord with the above analysis , we find that the unit appropriate for collective bargaining 1297 within the meaning of Section 9 (c) of the Act is as follows: All order pullers , packers , truck loaders, ship- ping department ' employees , customer order takers , special order takers, core department (return goods) employees , the customer credit clerk in the core department , local truckdriv- ers, the will-call employee and the receiving employee employed at the Employer 's Nash- ville, Tennessee , warehouse facility, excluding office clerical employees,' outside salespersons, the customer catalogue employee , guards and supervisors as defined in the Act. We shall therefore remand this case to the Region- al Director for Region 26 for the purpose of open- ing and counting the impounded ballots in the unit found -appropriate. ORDER IT IS ORDERED that the above-entitled matter be remanded to the Regional Director for Region 26 for further processing consistent herewith. DIRECTION It is directed that the Regional Director for Region 26, within 10 days of this Decision on Review , Order, and Direction , open and count the impounded ballots in the above -described unit, pre- pare and serve on the parties a tally of ballots, and proceed thereafter as is appropriate in accordance with this decision.