From the desk of the President

I thought for the New Year I would wait a month to put pen to paper. I wanted to see if 2021 was going to be any better than last year. Though we are still dealing with the pandemic, the certification on January 20th brought a renewed light of hope to our country.
As our country moves forward, we as Americans need to take this new beginning and find kindness amongst one another and by doing this we can begin to heal our country. Bring the values we were raised on and extend them to one another.
The local has received several calls with questions regarding the Covid-19 vaccine and our employment. As of the writing of this letter the company has determined that the employees will NOT be required to get the vaccine. Though they highly encourage their employees to receive the shot when available your decision is yours to make and is between you and your health care provider. The vaccine given to us should be at no cost, but the vaccination providers may charge an administration fee to give the shot. This cost is covered under the AT&T Medical plans. You may need to provide your health insurance information to the vaccine provider. As you may hear from the News coverage the vaccine is limited so the company has decided that their Covid-19 Vaccine Policy will comply with all applicable laws and is in effect until December 31, 2021. Any other questions please feel free to call the local.
A selected group of at&t’s retirees (approximately 130,000) received a letter with updates to their retiree life and death benefit insurance. For this group effective January 1, 2022 at&t will place a cap on their subsidized retiree life insurance up to 25,000, also under the Retiree Death Benefit plan the company is capping this at 25,000. These changes will not impact any employee or recent retiree still covered under their Collective Bargained for Agreement. For new retirees who separate from the company during the term of the Collective Bargaining Agreement these changes will go into effect after the contract expires. The company is going to later in 2021 will offer retirees a one-time opportunity to purchase additional life insurance coverage to supplement the newly capped benefit. Again, if you have any questions please feel free to contact the local.
With the new year I always like to remind our members to make sure their
Beneficiaries are up to date. You can go on-line to check and make any changes.
For those who have the CarePlus benefit they have added a several new
Experimental services, expanded a few services, and taken a number of
Experimental services and placed them as standard medical services. You can go
on-line for the list of all these services.
Jobs, a hot topic for sure. Lets’ begin by stating the first step prior to nominating
yourself for a job is to please view and update your skills set. This is the number
one issue for a member not to receive a job if their skills set is not up to date.
Then apply for the position you are nominating yourself for. Remember your
attendance and job performance comes into play. For your attendance you
cannot exceed 32 hours or more of incidental absence in a rolling calendar year,
you cannot exceed 6 or more tardys in a calendar year and you cannot exceed 2
chargeable disabilities in the last two years, 3 in the last 5 or 10% or more missed
scheduled days in the last five years. You can go to
https://hronestop.web.att.com or from home go to https://www.eaccess.
att.com/group/hr-onestop/career-nonmgmtopportunities
The local had a number of members retire throughout 2021 and we would like to
say Congratulations and we wish you all happiness in all of your next endeavors.
Solidarity,
Tina Culver
President