Lowe

Lowe’s agreed to pay more than $ 14,000 in lost wages to a Louisiana worker who said he was fired in retaliation for trying to start a union.

The payment to Felix Allen was part of a conciliation agreement between the Big-Box retailer and the National Board of Labor Relations, the Federal Agency that enforces the union rights. The NLRB prosecutor had accused Lowe’s of illegally monitoring pro-syndicates employees, preventing them from repairing union literature and ending Allen for their union activity.

Allen, 28, was fired in June 2023, so he states that security violations were selectively enforced. Months before, he had been gathering signatures to celebrate a union choice in the hope of creating the first unionized store in the chain.

In an interview, Allen said he had considered fighting for reinstatement, but decided that he would take too much time. Such cases often stuck for years in appeal while employers fight against charges, and Allen had submitted the case as an individual without a lawyer who represents it.

“I understand the limitations of what we are working on in the NLRB. I was surprised that something has been done, particularly with this rolling in Trump’s presidency,” he said. “It would have been good to have the possibility of being reinstated, but I know that I would have taken one or two years [it happened] at all.”

“Allen told News themezone that Lowe ‘flooded’ the store with supervisors from other places and corporate headquarters once the union effort was known.”

The agreement was reached at the end of May, but Allen waited to reveal it publicly until Lowe’s check clarified. As part of the agreement, Lowe’s also agreed to inform workers in the store in writing about their collective bargaining rights under the law, and ensure that the company would not violate them.

“I’m glad to have it wrapped,” said Allen, who built store exhibitions for Lowe’s and worked for the company for two and a half years.

Lowe’s did not respond to requests for comments on the agreement. The chain has more or less 1,700 stores In the United States, none of which is unionized.

The impulse of the Allen Union and his co -workers was one of the few independent organization efforts that rooted in Lowe’s and Home Depot stores in 2022, as News themezone reported at that time.

The campaigns were largely driven by the thin practices of chain staff. Customers often have difficulty tracking employees while looking for products or advice, leaving workers to deal with frustrated buyers.

The supporters of the Union in an Home Depot in Philadelphia obtained enough signatures to celebrate an election in their store, but finally lost 165-51.

Allen and his co -workers said they had gathered signed union cards of about 40% of the workforce in their New Orleans store, more than enough to trigger an election, but then they were forced to withdraw their request. Because it was an independent effort, they had neglected to include a union name in their cards. Allen called him “an extreme technical error.”

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At that time, Allen told News themezone that Lowe “flooded” the store with supervisors from other places and corporate headquarters once the union effort was known. “Clearly, if they can bring many people in advance, they have a lot of money for personnel properly in our store,” he said then.

Allen said in sworn statements subject to the NLRB that he had never faced Lowe’s disciplinary actions until he became the known leader of a union campaign.

His early infraction came when he got on a merchandise shelf to hang an exhibition, something that says he did before without problems. His second came when they told him to get on an lift truck and move a palette. It turned out that the lift truck that drove was labeled as out of service, although the key was still on. He says they told him the following week that his forklift license was being suspended and, later, that he was fired.

“I think the turning point was after presenting the petition,” he said in an affidavit.

Allen said that since he lost Lowe’s work that has been doing the work that took him to New Orleans in the first place: drums in the city’s jazz clubs. He has achieved enough work so that he has been able to share part of his Lowe settlement with the former co -workers. He heard a few after they received Lowe’s letters detailing their rights under the law, he said.

Although the store is not unionized, it still believes that the effort was worth it.

“Don’t regret it at all,” he said.