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The NAPS DDF—A Benefit of Membership

The NAPS DDF—A Benefit of Membership
By Chuck Mulidore
NAPS Executive Vice President

One of the many great benefits of your NAPS membership is the NAPS Disciplinary Defense Fund (DDF) that represents working NAPS members, as well as retired members in good standing at the time of their retirement. This is found in Article 9 of the Bylaws portion of the NAPS Constitution & Bylaws:

“Section 1. NAPS is committed to representing its membership in all areas, including adverse action. The Disciplinary Defense Fund (DDF) was established by the membership, for the membership, to provide representation for NAPS members in appealing adverse actions, RIFs and debt collection actions taken against them.”

The DDF will represent you in any type of adverse action, reduction in force (RIF) or debt collection notice you might receive in your managerial career, as long as you maintain your NAPS membership. An adverse action is defined under the Employee and Labor Relations Manual (ELM), Section 651.71, as “… discharges, suspensions of more than 14 days, furloughs for 30 days or less, and/or reductions in grade or pay.”

This means that if, by chance, one of these unfortunate actions should happen to you, NAPS will be there to defend you. Best of all, that defense will not cost you a penny out of your own pocket! Your right to be defended by the NAPS DDF is a benefit of membership in NAPS.

Now compare that to the other management organization that asks you to pay thousands of dollars up front to even be considered for representation under its disciplinary fund. Imagine being in a removal situation or RIF and you have to pay that organization several thousand dollars out of your own pocket just to be considered for representation!

That is not right, but, then again, that organization does not have the financial wherewithal to defend you as a benefit of membership. But NAPS does! Obviously, we hope you never get into that type of situation, but, if you do, NAPS will be there to defend you.

One of my jobs as your executive vice president is to administer the DDF on behalf of NAPS members. I thought I would provide you an update as to the types of cases, the numbers of the various types of cases and our NAPS DDF successes in defending our members in these types of cases.

NAPS’ fiscal year runs from June 1, 2022, through May 31, 2023. Thus, through February 2023, NAPS has received 51 DDF cases, including MSPB, debt collection and ELM 650 cases for those who currently do not have MSPB rights under the law. (On a side note, as part of NAPS’ legislative agenda, we continue to lobby Congress to pass H.R. 595, which would grant MSPB appeal rights to those EAS employees currently who do not have them.)

The average total cost of these cases is just under $2,300 per case. And again, none of that cost is borne by the member being represented by NAPS. Of the 42 MSPB cases, only two have been lost. The remainder were either wins, settlements or are still pending.

Our positive results are reflected in our debt collection and ELM 650 cases, as well. Not only does NAPS represent you in these types of actions at no cost, but we also do a great job in achieving positive outcomes for our members!

You may be wondering what types of DDF cases NAPS receives. I encourage you to protect yourself from these types of issues in your career: falsification (12 cases)—in the period ended February 2023—and performance (14 cases) are the most prevalent, but attendance, theft and sexual misconduct issues also are significant. In any of these situations, you can avoid adverse actions by simply following one rule: Always do the right thing!

You know what is right. Do not allow your boss or coworker to influence you to compromise your integrity. I can promise you that, when push comes to shove, they will not stand by you. But NAPS will—now and always!

Thus, as you can see, NAPS membership is the best insurance policy you ever will have for your career. We hope you never will need the NAPS DDF, but if you do, we will be there to stand and fight with you.