Category: CWA

(NEW YORK, N.Y.) — As interpreters employed by French multinational TP (formerly known as Teleperformance) continue to fight for a union in the United States, the Communications Workers of America (CWA) released a new study, Speaking of Safety: Remote Interpreters Report Unsafe, Stressful Conditions and Burnout at French Outsourcer TP. 

The report, unveiled during a virtual press conference held on July 28, surveyed 245 TP interpreters across two TP subsidiaries, LanguageLine Solutions (LLS) and ZP Better Together, between April and June of 2026 on health and safety issues. Findings include:

• More than three quarters of respondents (76%) strongly disagreed that TP provides enough time between calls for workers to recover.
• More than seventy percent of respondents feel emotionally drained from their work either every day (51%) or a few times a week (20%).
• Nearly three quarters of respondents experience back or neck pain daily (41%) or at least weekly (32%).

“These constant back-to-back calls and sitting in my chair for a longer period of time make my body ache,” said Madhurima Ganguly, a Bengali LanguageLine Solutions interpreter. “I developed tailbone pain from sitting in one position constantly. I have to take pelvic floor physiotherapy, which is hard to find and expensive.”

“We help patients receive devastating diagnoses, families making life-changing medical decisions, victims reporting abuse, and individuals navigating emergencies and court proceedings,” said Yves Carmel Valerus, a Haitian Creole LanguageLine Solutions interpreter. “We carry those emotions with us from one call to the next, yet we are expected to immediately move on as though nothing happened. We are human beings, not machines.”

“I’m incredibly grateful for the work LanguageLine Interpreters do to help immigrant New Yorkers navigate our bureaucracy,” said New York City Councilmember Lincoln Restler. “The conditions outlined in this report are deeply troubling. As a holder of these contracts, the City has a responsibility to ensure workplace conditions improve. As Chair of the Committee on Contracts, I will do everything in my power to hold Language Line accountable.”

Interpreters at TP LLS demanded in April to establish an elected health & safety committee, but the company refused. A 2025 survey of LLS interpreters found that interpreters face stressful working conditions and low pay, leading to high turnover and putting at risk the quality of service they are able to provide.

Workers at LLS are organizing a union with CWA to address low wages and unsustainable working conditions, which also impact service quality for clients. In 2022, TP agreed with UNI Global Union to enter a Global Agreement on Social Responsibility, which afforded workers the right to organize a union free of management interference and intimidation. While TP implemented this agreement in other countries, the company has refused to fully implement the agreement in the United States and refuses to include the United States in any renewal of the agreement.

For a recording of the virtual press conference, please contact rentralgo@cwa-union.org.

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About CWA: The Communications Workers of America represents working people in telecommunications, customer service, media, airlines, health care, public service and education, manufacturing, tech, and other fields.

cwa-union.org @cwaunion

Press Contact

CWA Communications

(202) 434-1168

comms@cwa-union.org

San Francisco, Calif. — Wiki Workers United U.S. (WWU-US)/Communications Workers of America (CWA) has released the following statement after announcing today that it will file for a union election with the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) after the Wikimedia Foundation declined the union’s request for voluntary recognition:

We are deeply disappointed that the Wikimedia Foundation has taken the low road by declining our request for voluntary recognition, despite the fact that an overwhelming majority of employees have signed union authorization cards indicating support for the union. Thousands of workers across the tech and nonprofit sectors have achieved voluntary recognition through this “card check” method. Our demand of the Wikimedia Foundation was simply that they live up to their values and be the high-road employer that they purport to be. They refused.

While the Wikimedia Foundation touts to the public that they plan to take a neutral stance in our organizing efforts, they have already proven that not to be the case behind the scenes. When the Foundation rejected our request for voluntary recognition this week, they immediately sent out to employees and the public statements couched in classic union-busting rhetoric, rhetoric undoubtedly provided by outrageously expensive union-avoidance law firms. This insulting and wasteful use of Foundation resources is both an insult to Foundation employees and to the Free Knowledge Movement as a whole.

Insisting that our right to organize be adjudicated by the National Labor Relations Board is not a neutral choice; it has nothing to do with election procedures or employee choice. It has everything to do with delaying the process and stalling the vote in order to give time to the union busters to launch a potentially coercive anti-union campaign against Foundation employees. Nonetheless, we are proud of our colleagues for reaching this point, and we remain committed to securing our union through a traditional NLRB process.

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About CODE-CWA

The Campaign to Organize Digital Employees (CODE-CWA) is a network of worker-organizers and their staff working every single day to build the voice and power necessary to ensure the future of the tech, game, and digital industries in the United States and Canada. CODE-CWA is a project of the Communications Workers of America which represents hundreds of thousands of workers throughout tech, media, telecom, and other industries who stand together to fight for justice on the job and in our communities.

About CWA

The Communications Workers of America represents working people in telecommunications, customer service, media, airlines, health care, public service and education, manufacturing, tech, and other fields.

cwa-union.org @cwaunion

Press Contact

CWA Communications

(202) 434-1168

comms@cwa-union.org

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After nearly three years of negotiations, CWA Piedmont Airlines passenger service and ramp agents have reached a tentative agreement for a new union contract that covers 7,500 workers across the country. The newly proposed five-year contract includes a signing bonus with yearly wage increases throughout the life of the contract, expanded vacation and overtime accrual, and more.

Negotiations for a new contract began in late 2023 and progressed slowly until early 2026, when the National Mediation Board assigned a federal mediator in response to the company’s failure to negotiate in good faith over wages. Under the Railway Labor Act, which governs labor contracts in the transportation industry, contracts do not expire but rather become “amenable,” and the process to strike is lengthy.

“Throughout this process, CWA members at Piedmont Airlines demonstrated their commitment to improved wages and working conditions by organizing multiple pickets and actions at airports across the country,” said CWA Chief of Staff Sylvia J. Ramos. “This is a tentative agreement that delivers for both Piedmont Airlines workers and the flying public they serve.”

Details of the tentative agreement are being provided to Local leadership, and CWA members will vote on ratification of the agreement once the members have had an opportunity to review the details.

Workers across the tabletop and comics industry notched two big union wins last month.

On June 7, 78 workers at Dark Horse Comics won voluntary recognition of Dark Horse Workers United-CWA, making Dark Horse the largest comic book publisher in the country to form a union! They are joining Image Comics and Seven Seas Entertainment in CWA Local 7901. Workers cited layoffs, hiring freezes, artificial intelligence (AI), and return-to-office mandates as reasons they organized, writing to management that they were “seeking a democratic workplace.”

On June 23, Magic: The Gathering Arena workers at Wizards of the Coast won their union election with 83% voting in favor, forming United Wizards of the Coast-CWA (UWOTC-CWA). More than 40,000 players and supporters signed a solidarity letter urging recognition, but the company refused, hiring a union-busting law firm and holding weeks of captive audience meetings. Workers held strong, citing layoff and AI protections, remote work, and sustainable workloads as key issues. They credited the United Paizo Workers’ 2021 campaign for inspiring them to organize.

Congratulations to Dark Horse Workers United-CWA and UWOTC-CWA on their wins!