MBTA battles rampant absenteeism
BOSTON --MBTA officials say rampant employee absenteeism is eroding the quality of their service and hurting agency finances by forcing it to pay overtime.
In 2004, about 35 percent of the MBTA's roughly 6,000 employees were absent 11 or more days and 16 percent were absent 26 or more days, The Boston Globe reported.
An employee is counted absent if they call in sick after using up their annual allotment of 10 sick days, if they're more than two hours late, if they give less than an hour notice before calling in sick or if they have unexcused absences.
Earlier this month, the T started a new policy that targets chronically absent employees and tracks worker attendance more closely. Under the new system, the T enters attendance into its computerized payroll system, which alerts managers to excessive absences.
Daniel Grabauskas, general manager of the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority, said excessive absenteeism, which the T classifies as 11 or more days a year, leads to overworked drivers and safety concerns.
In a Jan. 9 memo to employees explaining the new policy, Grabauskas also said the absenteeism forces the authority to drop scheduled train or trolley runs, which cost "us the good will of our customers who rely on our published service schedules, which in turn costs us lost revenue at a time when we can least afford it."
Ridership on the T hit its lowest level in a decade during the first half of last year, with average weekday boardings of 1.12 million, down 8 percent from a high point in 2000.
MBTA union officials dispute the past absenteeism statistics, but support the new policy. The policy wiped the attendance slate clean for some 1,000 employees who had been disciplined under a prior policy that was instituted in April and was about to go to arbitration.
Stephan MacDougall, president of the Boston Carmen's Union, said the new policy is fairer than the previous one, which targeted large numbers of employees to root out abuse. He said the new policy gives some leeway to veteran employees with good attendance records.
