Ontario Reaches Two-Year Deal with AMAPCEO

Highlights of the Association of Management, Administrative and Professional Crown Employees of Ontario’s (AMAPCEO) new collective agreement include:

Term — The agreement is in effect for a two-year term beginning on April 1, 2012 and ending on March 31, 2014.

Salary and Wage Freezes — There will be no across-the-board wage increases during the term of the agreement. Any additional merit pay earned by employees will be funded through cost savings achieved elsewhere in the collective agreement.

Compensation Option Credits — Employees will not accumulate Compensation Option Credits for 2013 and 2014.  These credits provide additional days off over and above vacation entitlements. AMAPCEO members receive six of these credits per year in addition to their vacation entitlement.

Short-Term Sickness Plan — The short-term sick leave plan has been restructured so that effective April 1, 2013, pay for any absence over and above six days of illness is reduced from three-quarters to two-thirds of full pay.  Employees suffering from a catastrophic illness or injury continue to receive payment at three-quarters of their full pay.

Pay for Performance Bonuses — The agreement eliminates annual lump sum payments for employees at the maximum of the salary range, effective April 1, 2013.

Early Retirement (Surplus Factor 80) — Surplus Factor 80 has been eliminated for employees who receive notice of layoff after March 31, 2014. Surplus Factor 80 is a mechanism that allows eligible pension plan members who are permanently laid off to retire early with an unreduced pension if their age plus their credit in the pension plan total 80 years or more when they are laid off.

Enhanced Surplussing — Efficiencies will reduce the time it takes to search for alternate positions when employees are surplussed out of their existing positions from 10 months to six.

Job Classification — Effective Oct. 1, 2013, a new job evaluation system will establish eight classification levels and salary ranges to replace all the current classification levels and salary ranges, making the system more consistent, fair and equitable to employees.