A union in Seattle has filed an unfair-labor-practices complaint with the National Labor Relations Board against the Hertz car rental company, after 34 Somali Muslim shuttle drivers at Seattle-Tacoma International Airport were suspended for praying on the job.
According to Hertz spokesman Rich Broome, a settlement two years ago created a rule that requires workers to clock out before praying. “We felt it was reasonable for our Muslim employees who need to pray a couple times during the workday to clock in and clock out,” Broome said, according to the Seattle Times.
Teamsters Local 117, which represents the workers, filed the complaint, and said that the contract doesn’t specify about clocking in and out.
From the Times:
And the workers and their union said Hertz had previously not required that workers clock out for prayer. The union said it has filed an unfair-labor-practices complaint with the National Labor Relations Board against Hertz for failing to notify the union in advance of what it called a policy change.
Broome argued that the policy was to make sure workers were not taking breaks — which are paid — for longer than 10 minutes. He pointed out to the Times that Muslim workers who did clock out were not suspended.
