Wells Fargo Bargaining Update: Rounds 1, 2, & 3

This report consists of all 9 bargaining sessions held to date.

November 5, 6 and 7, 2024

The lead bargaining table is made up of six CWA Staff Representatives assigned by their District Vice Presidents. There are also currently five Wells Fargo employees who have been elected by their peers to be at the lead bargaining table. Our goal during negotiations is to get a national contract for all the unionized Wells Fargo Branches.  

Many weeks and zoom meetings were held prior to bargaining to prepare our initial proposals that we would present to the Company.  

The lead table kicked off November 5, 6 and 7, 2024 in Alburquerque, New Mexico. The first session was spent mostly discussing housekeeping parameters and the Union presented 44 proposals. We led off with the 44 proposals, with an acknowledgement that we would present additional proposals as we move through negotiations.  

The Company brought ten upper management to the table, which consisted of a mix of Labor Relations, HR, Internal and External Attorneys).  Tanja Thompson from the Littler Law Firm, an external attorney, is the Company’s Lead Negotiator in Albuquerque. They also have an additional team of employees, including attorneys, HR and Labor, in a caucus room working behind the scenes during negotiation sessions.   

In the interest of stalling by the Company, they insisted that every proposal be read aloud, questions and discussion took place with each proposal.  This process took all of November 5th and half a day on November 6th.  The rest of the time, while we were there, was spent with the Company countering on the “Union Rights” Article.  They attempted to re-create the intent of that article.  The CWA bargaining team held strong on the intent and interpretation of that article and to date we have held to our proposal.  This Article covers bulletin boards, the unions right to choose stewards, bargaining committee, communication and trainings.   

We ended our first 3-day bargaining session on November 7th.  

December 11, 12 and 13th, 2024 – 3-Day Bargaining 

Prior to going back to the table in December the CWA bargaining team prepped and strategized to move more proposals forward so the Company could not continue their tactic of stalling on one Article. 

This approach opened some good back and forth discussions, however the Company continuously proposes language to limit each Article and subsection around 1 specific Branch, which is stalling further movement.

On our first day in December, we presented more proposals to discuss and force responses from them. We, the CWA bargaining team, maintained command of the table throughout the 3 days and kept control of our proposals by moving the Company to review, discuss and counter more of the initial proposals.  As they countered, we adjusted where appropriate or maintained our position. 

We have made some advances on the proposals, with the exception of their inclusion of “Eldorado Branch” in each article and section.  We have clearly stated our goal to bargain one national contract.  The Company has taken the position they are bargaining for the Eldorado Branch and that they will bargain Branch by Branch for individual contracts.  In each Article and Section, they counter with “Eldorado Branch”.  The Company has asked several times if they put “Eldorado Branch” in would we reject every time.  I believe the Company is trying to call an impasse on us, so my response is, we are seriously considering every counter you present to us.  

We ended the 3-day session on December 13th in the late afternoon.  

January 7, 8 and 9, 2025

Prior to bargaining in January, the Company was told that we would be setting up a zoom option for the Staff on the committee who would not be able to make it to this session due to weather related cancellations of flights and illness. They were not happy, but they did not stop us from doing the zoom as they had in the previous sessions. 

We began bargaining on January 7th by passing proposals across the table and responding to their counters we received at the end of the day December 13th.  

On January 8th we received flowers and a box of chocolates from Local 7108 in Waterloo, IA as a show of support to the bargaining committee. This was clearly noticed by the Company’s bargaining team. 

We have been able to get closer on the main concept with some proposals, however the Company is still continuously adding language to specify the exact location of the Albuquerque Branch. This time around the Company also passed rejected proposals across to us, which included proposals that are already written policy.  

The Union continues to push for one National Contract and Wells Fargo is using this as a bargaining technique to stall, even though it makes sense for both parties.  To this date we have passed about a third of our proposals across the table, discussed, countered, and modified as needed to continue the process of bargaining each article and section put forward.  

We still have issues getting all our Wells Fargo employees, who are on the bargaining team, off work to attend in-person bargaining sessions.  The company continuously finds reasons to not release employees from the various unionized Branches.

A bargaining demand letter was sent on January 3rd for all other unionized branches. Our ultimate goal is still to achieve one National Contract. More WF Branches have unionized since our initial bargaining kick off.  Members and Staff that are assigned to those Branches will be included in communications going forward.  As we schedule bargaining at the individual Branches they will be included in the coordination of those sessions.  

More information will be coming soon.

In Solidarity, 

CWA Staff - National Bargaining Committee
Bonnie Wither, Steve Deianni, Kisha Haynesworth, Chase Odle, Adrian Acosta, Jar ’La Evans