The grounds for granting an appeal are set forth in Section 2423.11(e) of the General Counsel's's Rules and Regulations. An appeal may be granted if it establishes at least one of the following grounds:
Your appeal must address the reasons why you believe one or more of the above five grounds have been satisfied. Appeals that do not establish at least one of these grounds are denied.
You will receive written notification that your appeal has been received. The appeals review will be conducted by a Regional Office within the Office of the General Counsel, which did not investigate your case. The appeal review includes a review your appeal and the evidence in the file obtained during the investigation. The Regional Office conducting the appeals review will submit a recommendation to grant or deny the appeal to the General Counsel. You will receive a written decision letter signed by the Deputy General Counsel on behalf of the General Counsel which: 1) grants your appeal and orders further investigation of specific factual issues or issuance of a complaint over a specific violation; or 2) denies your appeal because none of the grounds for granting an appeal have been established.
If your appeal is denied, you may receive an appeal denial form letter. Issuance of the appeal denial form letter reaffirms the Regional Director's decision and informs the appealing party that the appeal did not establish grounds for remand or reversal of the decision. When the Regional Director's analysis and determination are deemed correct, it is not necessary to restate in the appeal determination the factual and legal basis for the dismissal or the reasons why the Regional Director's decision was correct.
Our goal is to issue a decision on your appeal within 90 days or less of the date on which your appeal is received.
The decision on the appeal is final. Section 2423.11 of the Rules and Regulations sets forth the appeals process. Paragraph (g) of this section provides that the Charging Party may file a motion for reconsideration of the final decision if it can establish with particularity extraordinary circumstances which are supported by citations to Authority case law. The motion must be filed within 10 days after the date in which the General Counsel's decision is postmarked. The General Counsel's decision on a motion for reconsideration is final.
No. All of the evidence that you gave to the Region during the investigation is in the investigative file and will be reviewed. You do not need to submit any evidence you have already given the Region during the investigation. However, you may refer to that evidence in your appeal.
No. No new evidence will be considered unless you can establish in your appeal that the evidence either did not exist during the investigation or that you could not have reasonably known about the existence of the evidence.
No. The appeal process is not an investigative process. The decision will be based on your appeal and the investigative file. The Office of the General Counsel will notify you as soon as a decision is reached. If your appeal is granted, the case will be returned to the Regional Office and you will be contacted by the Region for further processing of the case.
Historically, since the enactment of the Federal Service Labor-Management Statue in 1979, the Office of the General Counsel has granted about 5% of the appeals of Regional Director's dismissals of unfair labor practice charges. Of the 495 appeals decided during Fiscal Year 1998, approximately 27 or 5% of the appeals were granted.
Regional Directors make initial decisions on unfair labor practice charges using essentially the same evidentiary and legal standards that are applied during a review of that decision on appeal. Appeals are granted only in those cases where the appeal establishes one or more of the grounds listed above, that the Regional Director's decision to dismiss the charge should be revised or remanded.
If you have further questions about the appeals process,
please contact
any Regional Office, the Office of the General Counsel, or
visit the FLRA website at www.flra.gov.
Office of the General Counsel
Federal Labor Relations Authority
Internet Version Rev. 1/1/1999