## Facts

- A union represented employees in Fairmont General Hospital, Inc.’s Medical Records Department.
- A transcription backlog developed in the department, reaching roughly six months of untranscribed medical-record dictation.
- The backlog posed a risk to the hospital’s accreditation because it exceeded the turnaround time required by the relevant accrediting commission.
- Physicians had complained about transcription delays, and the accreditation review was scheduled about a month after the backlog became an acute problem.
- The hospital contacted an outside subcontractor, which indicated it could transcribe the backlog before the accreditation review.
- The collective-bargaining agreement (CBA) allowed the hospital to contract out bargaining-unit work in some circumstances.
- The CBA also required the hospital to use bargaining-unit personnel when reasonable and practical and to meet with the union in good faith to avoid contracting out unit work.
- The hospital met with the union to discuss subcontracting the backlog work.
- The union asserted that unit employees could meet the deadline by working overtime.
- The hospital responded that employees had months to complete the transcriptions and had not done so, even with overtime.
- The hospital proceeded to subcontract the transcription work and had the backlog completed externally.
- The union filed a grievance alleging the hospital failed to comply with the CBA’s contracting-out provisions and argued those provisions required union consent to contract out bargaining-unit work.
- The hospital contended union consent was not required; it needed only to confer with the union in good faith, which it maintained it did.
- The dispute was submitted to arbitration and is reported at 105 Lab. Arb. Rep. 247 (1995).

## Issues

1. Under the CBA’s contracting-out clause, did the hospital violate the agreement by subcontracting medical-record transcription work to address an accreditation-threatening backlog without obtaining the union’s consent?
2. Did the hospital satisfy contractual conditions that limited subcontracting, including using unit employees where reasonable and practical and conferring with the union in good faith before contracting out?

## Decision

- The published arbitration award resolves a grievance challenging the hospital’s decision to subcontract transcription work under the CBA’s contracting-out language.
- Publicly accessible summaries identify the dispute, the parties’ positions, and the contractual themes (reasonableness/practicality of using unit staff and good-faith conference with the union).
- The arbitrator’s ultimate disposition (whether the grievance was sustained or denied) and the specific remedy, if any, are not available in the non-public portions of the referenced secondary summary and are not reproduced in the materials provided here.
- As a result, this brief reports the verified factual background and the framed contractual questions, but does not state a winner, a definitive interpretation adopted by the arbitrator, or any ordered relief.

## Legal Principles

- In labor arbitration, contracting-out disputes are governed primarily by the CBA’s text, including any management-rights and contracting limitations.
- Where a CBA permits subcontracting but conditions that right, common decision points include: (a) whether it was reasonable and practical to assign the work to bargaining-unit employees (including overtime) and (b) whether the employer met any procedural duties to meet and confer with the union.
- A “meet and confer in good faith” requirement typically focuses on the employer’s process (timely notice, meaningful discussion, and consideration of union proposals) rather than a requirement that the union agree to the decision, unless the CBA expressly gives the union a veto.
- Time-sensitive operational pressures—such as accreditation deadlines tied to record-completion standards—may be raised as justification for temporary subcontracting, but the controlling standard depends on the negotiated limitations in the CBA.
- The union’s claim that internal overtime could have solved the problem and the employer’s claim of prolonged noncompletion by unit staff present a factual dispute relevant to whether subcontracting was “reasonable and practical” under the agreement.

## Conclusion

Fairmont General Hospital, 105 Lab. Arb. Rep. 247 (1995), concerns a union grievance over the hospital’s subcontracting of medical-record transcription work to eliminate a large backlog that threatened accreditation; the dispute turns on the CBA’s contracting-out limits—use of unit employees where reasonable and practical and a duty to confer with the union in good faith—and on whether the agreement required union consent or only consultation, but the arbitrator’s final disposition and any remedy are not available in the accessible record provided here.
