On July 11, 2008, a staff member from the Pine Valley (Campo) Border Patrol Station (BPS) administration sent an email to every employee assigned to the Pine Valley BPS. The problem with this email is it contained the names and social security numbers of practically every bargaining unit employee assigned to the San Diego Sector. In response, Local 1613 filed a grievance and proposed reasonable changes to properly safeguard employee’s social security numbers and prevent identity theft in the future.
In the grievance, Local 1613 proposed the Agency stop the practice of using social security numbers to identify employees in all cases except where absolutely necessary (i.e. Official Personnel Folder). Local 1613 proposed the Agency consider using some other unique identifier such as the last four numbers of the social security or hash id to identify employees. In addition, Local 1613 requested the Agency notify all employees of this unnecessary disclosure of their social security numbers.
Instead of considering the Union’s proposal or recognizing the potential harm to employees by this irresponsible practice, San Diego Sector said: “As you should be aware, CBP policy is established at the National level.” While the Union is aware of how all policies are now established at the National level, San Diego Sector should also be aware of how the negotiated agreement, specifically Article 33 J, requires management to forward the grievance to the level that the Agency designates as being responsible for the action being grieved. Since the “action” in this grievance involves the careless handling of employee’s social security numbers and a potential harm to employees with the improper safeguarding of the information, one would expect San Diego Sector to forward this matter to the Office of Border Patrol or Customs and Border Protection for proper consideration.
As you will see, it is apparently too difficult or confusing for San Diego Sector to forward correspondence from the union to the national level when necessary. This is proven again when San Diego Sector rejected the union’s written request for arbitration regarding this case. Instead of simply forwarding the union’s request for arbitration to the level management delegated to receive arbitration requests, San Diego Sector thought it made more sense to waste time drafting a new letter, having an Assistant Chief Patrol Agent review and sign the letter, and then mailing the letter to the union informing the union of how they were rejecting the union’s written request.
Since there were a few representatives from San Diego Sector involved with the drafting, reviewing, signing, and mailing the rejection letter and the response to the grievance, it is difficult to ascertain who made the irrational decisions in the responses from Sector. However, one thing is clear from this issue; nobody in San Diego Sector is willing to take the initiative to propose a change to internal practices which would safeguard employee’s personal information; and nobody at San Diego Sector is interested in reading or honoring the negotiated agreement, unless they are trying to figure a way out of avoiding protecting employees or avoiding proposals presented by your elected union representatives.
With regards to the use of social security numbers, Local 1613 would like to inform the members of some important information regarding this topic. The Office of Personnel Management (OPM) has issued a document titled, “Guidance on Protecting Federal Employee Social Security Numbers and Combating Identity Theft”. All employees should read this document and take action to protect themselves from future mishandling of their social security numbers. A few important points outlined in this document, which all employees should consider next time they are asked to enter their social security number on some nonessential form, are listed below:
In the grievance, Local 1613 proposed the Agency stop the practice of using social security numbers to identify employees in all cases except where absolutely necessary (i.e. Official Personnel Folder). Local 1613 proposed the Agency consider using some other unique identifier such as the last four numbers of the social security or hash id to identify employees. In addition, Local 1613 requested the Agency notify all employees of this unnecessary disclosure of their social security numbers.
Instead of considering the Union’s proposal or recognizing the potential harm to employees by this irresponsible practice, San Diego Sector said: “As you should be aware, CBP policy is established at the National level.” While the Union is aware of how all policies are now established at the National level, San Diego Sector should also be aware of how the negotiated agreement, specifically Article 33 J, requires management to forward the grievance to the level that the Agency designates as being responsible for the action being grieved. Since the “action” in this grievance involves the careless handling of employee’s social security numbers and a potential harm to employees with the improper safeguarding of the information, one would expect San Diego Sector to forward this matter to the Office of Border Patrol or Customs and Border Protection for proper consideration.
As you will see, it is apparently too difficult or confusing for San Diego Sector to forward correspondence from the union to the national level when necessary. This is proven again when San Diego Sector rejected the union’s written request for arbitration regarding this case. Instead of simply forwarding the union’s request for arbitration to the level management delegated to receive arbitration requests, San Diego Sector thought it made more sense to waste time drafting a new letter, having an Assistant Chief Patrol Agent review and sign the letter, and then mailing the letter to the union informing the union of how they were rejecting the union’s written request.
Since there were a few representatives from San Diego Sector involved with the drafting, reviewing, signing, and mailing the rejection letter and the response to the grievance, it is difficult to ascertain who made the irrational decisions in the responses from Sector. However, one thing is clear from this issue; nobody in San Diego Sector is willing to take the initiative to propose a change to internal practices which would safeguard employee’s personal information; and nobody at San Diego Sector is interested in reading or honoring the negotiated agreement, unless they are trying to figure a way out of avoiding protecting employees or avoiding proposals presented by your elected union representatives.
With regards to the use of social security numbers, Local 1613 would like to inform the members of some important information regarding this topic. The Office of Personnel Management (OPM) has issued a document titled, “Guidance on Protecting Federal Employee Social Security Numbers and Combating Identity Theft”. All employees should read this document and take action to protect themselves from future mishandling of their social security numbers. A few important points outlined in this document, which all employees should consider next time they are asked to enter their social security number on some nonessential form, are listed below:
- 5 CFR 293.105(b)(2) - Individuals asked to voluntarily provide their SSN shall suffer no penalty or denial of benefits for refusing to provide it.
- 5 CFR293.108- Agencies shall require all employees responsible for the creation, development, maintenance, processing, use, dissemination, and safeguarding of personnel records to be familiar with the rules of conduct presented in this section.
- Unnecessary printing and displaying of the SSN on forms, reports, and computer display screens should be eliminated.
- Access to the SSN should be restricted to only those individuals whose official duty requires such access. A listing of all access authorizations should be maintained and monitored regularly for continued applicability.
All members should take some time to read the correspondence between the union and San Diego Sector so you can understand how difficult it is for your union representatives to resolve a simple matter or propose solutions to protect you and your personal information. Just click on the title above or click here to view the documents.
Chris Bauder
President
NBPC Local 1613
Chris Bauder
President
NBPC Local 1613
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