Union Pacific Employee Reviews about "benefits and retirement"

Pros

The pay is hard to find with no experience necessary. The benefits are not bad and you pay a flat rate no matter how big your family is. Railroad Retirement. Sick days can be taken by going online or calling an automated system.

Cons

The management treat "rank and file" employees like school children, and rule with intimidation. Many managers have never worked in train service and just make rules up. There are rules for every thing, so if you are hurt is is your fault. Work by the phone for many years and can be called in without notice. Depending on business, you may be working over 70 hours a week or close to 0. Work life balance is horrible. No match on 401k.

Pros

Great retirement benefits 100% pay of top 5 years for employee and about 50% pay for spouse. medical is great based on contract negotiations between union and company.

Cons

Upper Management, no individual bonuses or incentives unless your a supervisor on up. Seniority based employment meaning your first few years could involve a lot of traveling or no work at all.

Pros

company pays great and has great benefits

Cons

quick relocation and not so great moving benefits

Pros

Good benefits and the people you work with(not for) are typically great.

Cons

The company doesn't stick to agreements and doesnt pay the employee if they violated an agreement. Everyone in management only cares about numbers for those big bonuses they get. Safety has went down a lot in the past 2 years. They may be making record profits and that's only because they're cutting out a loot of their work force. They're driving away businesses and many seasoned employees. Theyre wanting to have only 1 man crews on a train in the next 20 years or so and eventually noone on a train at all...

Pros

The checks don't bounce. One of the few jobs out there where those with no skills/experience/education (Pick 1 or all) can make enough to support a family. Many love the pay but when one adds up all the hours on the train or away from home you are lucky to break $20/hour, this of course depends on your run/area. My advise is try to find a railroader ask them about the run/time off before taking a job. Sometimes you get lucky and work with a crew you really enjoy, it makes the trip shorter. Health benefits are still excellent but there are rumblings that they will be a major bargaining issue and may get gutted. The actual work itself isn't hard, stressful, but not hard. A portion truly love the job (10-25%). Safety, up to the point that it prevents the company from being sued is important.

Cons

Management is compartmentalized have no real purpose other to test and fire. They are very much like the government idiom, "We are here to help" they show up and then things get ridiculously messed up as many have no railroad experience. There is no schedule or any semblance of a schedule, you have a vague notion when you are supposed to work (+/-12 hours usually) so you are fixed at home and rarely get the chance to go anywhere/do anything that takes time. You will miss birthdays/dates/parties/sporting events, in essence the company believes that they own you completely. Don't forget a weekend to the railroad is Friday-Monday and sometimes Thursday, and every holiday is the day (or two) before and after the actual holiday. If you need a day off during these times you will have to lay off sick and/or get in trouble for attendance so while the rest of America generally gets 104 weekend days and 10+ holidays off, a new hire will get 2 personal leave days in compensation. The Union is completely ineffectual and is mostly used by officials as a method to have time off (or make money if one is high enough in the structure), and we all get to pay $100+ every month to give them that luxury. I understand how some people could drink the kool-aid, or have this as their best job ever, but frankly we are treated poorly, work every day, have zero time off, are never rested, and miss everything else life has to offer. I am a short puller and I hate it.

Pros

The pay is great when they don't lay you off twice a year so that they can make their yearly dollar amount. Those high and mighty people in the company have to get their million dollar bonuses each year which means that the ones who really run the company, engineer's, conductors, etc get laid off around Thanksgiving and stay that way until after the first of the year. The medical benefits are great as are some of their other little perks to working there. Other than what I have posted so far they are a good company to work for if you are just starting out and have the patients that it takes to hold onto your job during the layoffs that they have each year.

Cons

During these said layoffs employee's have lost their homes, cars, marriages just to name a few. Think about the many Christmas's that they have had to nickle and dime themselves just to put a toy under the tree for their child who doesn't understand what is going on.

Pros

Employee stock purchase program is one of the best benefits I have ever received working at a company.

Cons

I worked in fast food prior to joining the military. At UP I worked for one of the worst managers I have ever had.

Pros

Good benefits (although insurance is going downhill in recent years by getting more expensive and having higher deductibles.)

Cons

After 16 years on the same job, it's still unpredictable enough that it's almost impossible to plan a life outside the job. Covid-19 vaccine mandate. Very greedy company, so much so that they try to weasel out of paying you for "extra" work that they required you to do, but that you have to "file a claim" for to get compensated for--and they often deny paying the claim on technicalities that they don't explain to you. They're constantly making changes that more often than not don't improve anything.

Pros

The pay is good and despite the slow erosion of benefits they are still good.

Cons

The company attempts to implement various new safety, productivity, efficiency, and disciplinary standards with little to no success with too much frequency. Too many programs have been tried without addressing the root cause of issues faced by labor. Management turn over has gone from bad to worse with each successive change becoming a new nightmare. Utilizing employees creativity in finding solutions has completely stopped and innovation is stifled. Too many protections for problem employees (often with higher seniority) have led to significant losses of skilled trade knowledge. The company has drifted far from the days when family values extended into the workplace. Workplace harassment is swiftly brushed aside or ignored altogether. There are so many unaddressed complaints about bad processes, safety in the yard, contractor immunity, and government regulation violations it is innumerable. I fear for my health and safety by continuing to work for this company. The measure by which certain departments are deemed productive uses false and inapplicable points of productivity.

Pros

the benefits and retirement where great with double pension one for you and the other one for your spouse. it is a 30/60 retirement plan. 30 years of service/ 60 years of age. company takes out their employees out to eat or bbq once a month

Cons

the bumping system was the deal breaker for me. you never know when your last day of work would be. some one could bump you out of your position with higher seniority than you then u have 15 days to bump someone else with less seniority than you and if u dont have no one under you then you are going home. it could take months to return back. if u cant catch a bid on a position within a year of your last day working they will let you go.