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55 FLRA No. 165
U.S. Department of the Navy, Norfolk Naval Shipyard Portsmouth, Virginia and Tidewater Virginia Federal Employees Metal Trades Council Local 734, 0-AR-3154 (Ables, Arbitrator) (Decided September 30, 1999)
The Arbitrator found that the Agency violated the parties' collective bargaining agreement by failing to pay the grievants for performing higher-graded work. The Authority concluded that the Agency's exceptions that the award failed to draw its essence from the parties' agreement, and was contrary to the Back Pay Act and Government-wide regulations, did not establish that the award was deficient.
The Authority rejected the Agency's assertion that the award was inconsistent with 5 C.F.R. § 335.102(c) because the regulation did not permit the Agency to non-competitively promote the grievants for more than 120 days. However, the Authority found that the Arbitrator expressly declined to retroactively promote the grievants, and that there were no exceptions to this aspect of the Arbitrator's award. Thus, there was no basis to find that the award was inconsistent with 5 C.F.R. § 335.103(c).
The Authority also held that there was no deficiency in the Arbitrator's determination that the Agency violated Article 9, Section 4.a. of the parties' agreement by failing to promote the grievants. The Authority found that the Agency engaged in an unjustified or unwarranted personnel action under the Back Pay Act.