Sprint merger jeopardizes LV jobs, union charges

Grace Leong

Friday, March 17, 2000 | 11:06 a.m.

A Las Vegas union is accusing Sprint of threatening the jobs of local union members because of its proposed merger with MCI WorldCom.

The International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers Local 396 said it fears local sales positions may be displaced in a bid to boost Sprint's bottom line ahead of the completion of the $115 billion merger.

Sprint expects the proposed merger to be completed by the second half of 2000 -- though critics predict the merger will be blocked by antitrust regulators.

Sprint is the dominant local phone company in Las Vegas.

It announced in early March it plans to open a call center, which takes orders for products and services, in Medford, Ore.

"Sprint is moving the gravy of the business -- the call center which is where the most money is made -- to Oregon," said Jim Anzinger, head of Local 396, who fears that up to 300 local union members will be displaced by the move. "Telephone equipment, recording machines, caller ID and voice mail, that's where the bulk of recurring revenues are."

"Up to 300 jobs could be affected if Sprint decides to transfer around 150 customer representatives out of Las Vegas, in addition to the 150 sales representatives," he said.

Rob McCoy, a Sprint spokesman in Las Vegas, denied allegations of job cuts, saying jobs won't be diverted from Las Vegas to the new Oregon center.

He said that while several of Sprint's local functions have been moved to its Westwood, Kan., headquarters and other states, the affected workers are being relocated to other divisions within the company in Las Vegas.

"The accounts-receivables group in Las Vegas, for example, was transferred to Indiana, but not one of our local employees lost their jobs. They were given positions in the customer care division," he said. But the union remains skeptical, claiming it saw Sprint's implementation of a sales performance plan in November 1998 without holding any negotiations with the union as a move aimed at scaling back local operations. The union accused the company of violating labor laws and creating what it calls "sweatshop" conditions for its 327 customer service and sales representatives in Las Vegas.

McCoy dismissed the union's fears as unfounded, saying Sprint has a history of "solid working relations" with local 396, noting union membership at the 1,900-worker Las Vegas operation has climbed to 1,500. This compares with 1,420 members since Sprint's 1993 acquisition of Centel, a local telephone operation that served Las Vegas.

But Anzinger disagreed.

"Given the growth in this town, we should have well above 2,500 bargaining unit employees and we would have if Sprint didn't farm out some of its functions to other states."

McCoy, however, maintains that he doesn't see any changes in the current structure of the local telephone division in Las Vegas. "The local telephone division is a very attractive piece of the puzzle to this merger."

"And we are adding jobs as shown by the 40 new positions we created with the Hispanic bilingual call center in Las Vegas, which opened last year," McCoy said. This center handles bilingual calls for Nevada, Nebraska, Kansas, Wyoming, Oregon, Washington, Texas, Missouri and Minnesota.

"In fact the combined companies are expected to have tremendous growth potential. The new company is expected to offer even better services and more exciting products."

"The new company, WorldCom, will need an additional 8,000 employees a year globally to achieve an annual revenue growth target of 20 percent," McCoy said, declining to predict how many new positions will be added in Las Vegas.

Las Vegas is one of Sprint's largest local telephone operations with 900,000 residential and business access lines. Clark County contains more than 11 percent of all of Sprint's local telephone lines across the country. In 1998, it accounted for 7.7 percent of local telephone service revenues at Sprint and 3.3 percent of operating income. Its local infrastructure now carries a value of more than $1.3 billion.

But Anzinger disputed McCoy's views, saying Sprint will likely sell its local telephone operations in Las Vegas and other locations if the merger is approved.

"If the merger is approved, Sprint will likely sell its distribution centers, (which produce and distribute dial-tones) in 18 states, and there will be other major phone companies buying them," he predicted. "This is because MCI doesn't deal with local telephone services. There's more profit to be made in the newer technologies like cellular phones, Internet services and wireless technology."

MCI has a business products sales force based in Las Vegas. Nineteen of the company's 58 Nevada employees are based in an office complex at 1771 E. Flamingo Road.