The Boeing Co. is going forward with tuition cuts for its engineers union, the company said Tuesday.
Boeing announced last fall that it would make changes to its program to reimburse employees for college and graduate school tuition. The company implemented annual tuition caps and limited the courses it would reimburse employees for to subjects that pertain to the industry.
The Society of Professional Engineering Employees in Aerospace has fought Boeing over the cuts, saying the changes are a violation of the union’s labor contract with the company.
Representatives of Boeing and SPEEA have been meeting over the last week over the tuition program. Boeing agreed to hold off on implementing the changes for SPEEA members until today. However, SPEEA said Tuesday that Boeing’s decision to go ahead with the cuts is a surprise.
“We are having trouble reconciling the company’s claims of good-faith bargaining with this surprise, unilateral implementation,” said Ray Goforth, SPEEA executive director, on Tuesday. “Just yesterday, we spent three hours with the Boeing negotiation team and they gave no indication that implementation was imminent. In point of fact, the Boeing team still could not answer basic questions about the program.”
SPEEA said it’s willing to take legal action if Boeing begins its proposed cuts to the tuition reimbursement program today.
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