If you are one of the ACRE members that did not receive an acceptable vacation pick for the past couple of years, a possible contributing factor, is a factor incorporated into the vacation pick process without the ACRE members' prior knowledge or agreement.

Beginning with the vacation pick in 2002 for vacations scheduled for 2003, ACRE has withheld some of the allotted weekly slots for vacations from the pick so that these slots could be used for vacation changes (swaps) during the calendar year. The actual number of slots withheld average 4 per week for train service and 2 per week for engineers. Prime weeks generally are supposed to be picked with the full number of slots available, but this is a secret ACRE agreement with the company. So who really knows what is going on?

If you are one of the growing number of ACRE members in train and engine service that could not pick a week past January to March, other than the draw week, or found out that you could not pick weeks that you could previously hold last year, how well do you think you could have done if all of the allotted slots were available for the pick?

If all of the available weeks were used for the vacation pick, this would of course reduce ACRE's hold on their membership in need of vacation changes. What message does this policy say about ACRE members' seniority? ACRE is deliberately interfering with their members' seniority rights and their seniority order when picking vacation time.