Tl;DR I was basically told I quit my current employer because I didn’t show up to the shop this morning ready to work after I told them I did not want to work out of jurisdiction and they fired me without firing me.
A little information: I'm in a union and apprentices have the right to not work out of jurisdiction if they don't want to as per the contract, and I've also worked out of jurisdiction before and it didn't end well.
So it’s a long one get ready. I’m a 5th year electrician apprentice in the IBEW (a union for those don’t know) and I was terminated today because I didn’t show up to the shop this morning ready to work.
Three weeks ago I was at a commercial job that ended and the shop pretty much had nowhere to put me so I was off for a day and then was told that I would be working out of jurisdiction. TBF based on the contract I could have said I don’t want to go out of jurisdiction but I gave it a shot anyway despite what happened last time I worked out of it.
FF to Tuesday this week where I called my general Forman that oversees most of our jobs and told him that I did not want to work out of jurisdiction because it was too far for me and based on the last time this was not gonna work out for me. We'll call him Bob.
I call Bob and tell him Tuesday that I no longer want to work out of jurisdiction which this job is 1 hour 30 minutes away 1 way and through the dreadful Charlotte North Carolina traffic (if you know you know) for a 40 hour commercial job that they are only paying drive time and not IRS millage on my personal vehicle both of which is in the contract and should be payed to me which they did not. They are also known for not doing this as well.
I went to the job the next day as courtesy and worked just fine. I then tell my foreman that I will not be returning because I have already told the general foreman that I do not want to work out of jurisdiction anymore that night and got no response.
Now were here today and I did not go to the job site and I text the General Foreman “where am I at on Monday?” and he texts me this layoff slip that says I (QUIT VIA TEXT MESSAGE).
So I call the union hall today and told them I've been laid off, and everything was good. After talking to some of my brothers they said that because of what the GF wrote down as my reason for termination I will not be eligible for unemployment benefits. I call again and the Hall basically told me that there's nothing they can do about that except he's got some work for me in a week (maybe) all because of what he wrote on the layoff slip.
As of right now I am unemployed and red assed af.
management should be on top of everything and now im being punished because they can't get their shit straight. fuck them. It's not my job to put me somewhere and they know that. If there's any IBEW members that want to know who this contractor is DM me. Fuck them and stay away from them.