Employee Information Bulletin #2 - January 14, 2026
To: All Whiting Refinery Employees
The purpose of EIB #2 is to make you aware of progress made during the past several days of negotiations and to answer key Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) that have arisen from the Field.
The Company and Union have met over the past several days and discussed, in detail, the Company’s proposals including the new Operations, Maintenance & Lab job structures and associated training, the new qualification and competency-based job progressions, employee upskilling, seniority provisions, etc. Throughout, the dialogue between the parties has been very constructive.
The below Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) help answer common questions we have received about proposed changes in Operations. We will address questions within Maintenance, the Lab etc. in future EIBs.
Question 1: What is a duty station? How does it differ from the current Operator Process Qualifications (OPQ) model within Operations?
Answer: The use of a duty station model is common within industry and would replace the OPQ system (which is unique to Whiting) to make job responsibilities and expectations clearer and directly tied to the actual posts staffed each day. Duty stations are the specific operating posts (e.g. Field or Board) within each complex, each with clearly defined responsibilities, equipment scope, and training requirements.
With respect to the proposed Operating Technician classification, employees would qualify on each duty station through structured training and assessments, and their job and pay progression would be based on the number of duty stations learned and maintained, rather than time-based progressions like today’s 5-year progression. The objective would be to have all employees become and remain fully qualified on the duty stations for their complex.
Question 2: Within Operations, how many duty stations would be required to be fully qualified?
Answer: An employee would need to be qualified on all “Field” duty station requirements within their complex to become and remain an Operating Technician 3 and similarly all “Board” duty station requirements within their complex to become and remain a Board Technician. The Company’s proposal also includes re-balancing job responsibilities among duty stations within a complex to more equally distribute work. Similar to today, the number of “Field” and “Board” duty stations would continue to vary by operating complex.
Question 3: Within Operations, how long would it take for a new hire to reach the proposed Operating Technician 3 top rate of pay?
Answer: For new hires the Company’s proposal anticipates a 36-month progression beginning with entry level training like today and a structured duty-station based learning progression through Operating Technician 1, 2 and 3 to become a fully qualified Operating Technician 3. The Company’s model as proposed would also facilitate employees reaching top rate of pay more quickly than today’s 5-year progression.
Question 4: Within Operations, we don’t effectively rotate employees today to learn or keep qualifications. What would change in the future and who would decide the rotation?
Answer: Today, there are several challenges to effective employee rotations including restrictive and complex contract language, which limits flexibility in job assignments. In addition, there is no current requirement to hold all complex duty-station qualifications, which further limits the ability to rotate. This means some employees hold multiple qualifications, while others hold only one or two, creating gaps that prevent smooth rotation throughout all job assignments.
Under the Company’s proposal there would be a requirement to become fully qualified on all duty stations within a complex. Additionally, under the Company’s proposal, Board Technicians would not have “Field“ responsibilities and would only rotate among the “Board” duty stations within their complex.
Question 5: Why is the Operator Specialist Field (OSF) role not part of the proposed operating job structure?
Answer: The OSF role is unique to Whiting within the bp refining system. The Company has proposed a simplified two-job duty-station based qualification model that aligns with industry best practices. Additionally, under bp’s implementation of a new electronic control of work system, Area Authority, which is currently distributed among salaried and hourly responsibilities within the refinery, would be transitioned to a defined salaried role. This is similar to the way Area Authority functions in our Maintenance organization and is designed to help ensure clear and focused accountability. The new model also would help to ensure we maintain strong operational expertise and coaching/leadership expectations within all members of the crew while enhancing safety and modernizing the progression framework to support flexibility and competitiveness.
We will continue to share more updates as negotiations progress.