Union Contract not settled

[Michelle Mianecki]

A company has a group of 80 employees that are part of a large union plan.  The contract has not settled and negotiations are not happening at this point.  What happens to these 80 employees?  Are they now non-union  employees and have to be included as not benefiting in the non-union 401(k) plan?  Do the employees have to first formally disavow the union in order to be considered non-union?

[Luke Bailey]

I think you should probably consult a labor attorney as well as ERISA. I know from experiences that often the new contracts are not in place at the time of expiration of the old, and they keep on bargaining, perhaps with hiatuses, and then when the new contract is finally signed it's retroactive.

Having said that, if you have a situation where bargaining has completely failed, the union has left the field, and the employees are coming back to work outside any contract, as nonunion employees, then clearly their benefits or lack thereof are not the subject of a CBA, so I would think would at that point be considered nonunion. But again, make sure you understand your facts and get input from a labor attorney. Your client must have one if it was negotiating with a union.