The Teamsters and UPS announced Tuesday morning that they had reached a tentative deal in what had been contentious negotiations — and not a moment too soon. The Teamsters’ contract with United Parcel Service (UPS) — covering some 340,000 U.S. workers — expires in around a week.

The tentative agreement, which must be ratified by a vote of Teamsters members, includes what the union describes as ​“historic wage increases” for full-time and part-time UPS Teamsters; the end of a despised two-tier wage system among delivery drivers; the creation of thousands of new full-time union jobs; the targeted installation of air conditioning in new package cars (purchased after Jan. 1, 2024) and other measures to protect drivers against the heat; limitations on forced overtime and Martin Luther King Jr. Day as a paid holiday, among other measures.

“We demanded the best contract in the history of UPS, and we got it,” Teamsters General President Sean M. O’Brien said in a news release following the announcement of the deal. ​“UPS has put $30 billion in new money on the table as a direct result of these negotiations. We’ve changed the game, battling it out day and night to make sure our members won an agreement that pays strong wages, rewards their labor and doesn’t require a single concession.”

“We’ve changed the game, battling it out day and night to make sure our members won an agreement that pays strong wages, rewards their labor, and doesn’t require a single concession.”

Teamsters General President Sean O’Brien

UPS also confirmed the tentative deal Tuesday morning. ​“Together we reached a win-win-win agreement on the issues that are important to Teamsters leadership, our employees and to UPS and our customers,” Carol Tomé, UPS’ chief executive officer, said in a news release posted on the company’s website. ​“This agreement continues to reward UPS’ full- and part-time employees with industry-leading pay and benefits while retaining the flexibility we need to stay competitive, serve our customers and keep our business strong.”

Representatives from the Teamsters’ 176 UPS locals will meet on July 31 to review and may then recommend the tentative agreement to their locals, which rank-and-file union members would then vote on in the coming weeks, according to the news release. Members will also vote on their region and local-specific supplementals, which must be approved before the national contract can go into effect. Union membership voting will begin on August 3 and conclude on August 22.

At the time this article was published, it was largely unclear how the larger membership views the tentative agreement; members will receive a list of contract changes, and locals will conduct member meetings to go over them.

The tentative deal on the five-year collective bargaining agreement comes on the first day both parties returned to the bargaining table after negotiations broke down on July 5.

Several of the union’s key demands had been addressed prior to Tuesday’s announcement. The specific language of the tentative agreement has not yet been released publicly, but according to the union, UPS had already agreed to removing a second tier of lower wages for drivers working Tuesday to Saturday and agreed to begin air conditioning and cooling its vast fleet.

“Together we reached a win-win-win agreement on the issues that are important to Teamsters leadership, our employees and to UPS and our customers.”

UPS CEO Carol Tomé

But several items remained on the bargaining table, including surrounding the wages of part-time workers. According to the Teamsters’ news release, full-time and part-time workers’ wages would immediately hike by $2.75 per hour, and workers would see a total of $7.50 in general wage increases over the course of the five-year contract.

Existing part-time workers would immediately see their wages raised to no less than $21 per hour, which would be the new base rate for part-time package handlers and would increase to $23 per hour by the contract’s end, according to the union. Part-timers who already earn more in wages from the company’s location-specific market rate adjustments would receive general wage increases, and long-time part-time workers would also receive longevity, or ​“catch-up,” wage increases up to $1.50 per hour (in addition to the new hourly raises).

According to the Teamsters news release, ​“General wage increases for part-time workers will be double the amount obtained in the previous UPS Teamsters contract — and existing part-time workers will receive a 48% average total wage increase over the next five years.”

In addition to the general wage increase, full-time drivers would also see their average top rate moved to $49 per hour from $42, and all second-tier delivery drivers would be reclassified as regular package car drivers and placed into seniority.

A spokesperson for UPS was not able to immediately confirm the accuracy of the details in the Teamsters news release.

This post was originally published on The Real News Network.