Until now, Mayor Bloomberg’s catchall city helpline, 311, has received nothing but gushing praise, as it’s provided New Yorkers with information about everything from trash pickups to alternate-side-of-the-street parking.

Labor organizers are now alleging that a private company that fields a portion of the daily barrage of calls is stymieing its employees’ attempts to unionize.

“We all understand why operations are privatizing,” a field organizer for the Communication Workers of America Local 1180, Chris Aiken, said. “We just think this is an extreme example of corporate greed that is being subsidized by New York City taxpayers.”

Mr. Aiken said King TeleServices, which holds a year-long contract with the city worth up to $9 million, has launched a “vicious anti-union campaign” and is “picking off” union supporters. The company employs roughly 150 call operators for 311 at its headquarters in Long Island City.

Management, Mr. Aiken said, has been conducting private meetings with employees who supported the union drive. Employees have, one by one, withdrawn their “show of support cards” after those meetings, without explanation, he said.

The chairman of the company, Peter Harkins, denied that King intimidated employees or even met with employees individually to discuss the union. Doing so, he said, would violate rules of the National Labor Relations Board and would not be tolerated.

During a phone interview late last week, Mr. Harkins acknowledged he wants to keep a non-union shop, but said any dwindling support for the union was simply a matter of decreased interest among employees, who at the outset didn’t have all of the facts.

In four memos circulated to employees in the past month, management has made its case against the union. One of the memos said: “We strongly urge you NOT to sign or return any union petition or card provided to you by the CWA or anyone else.” The memos have also said Local 1180 interfered with work at the Long Island City business and explained that employees would be turning over their negotiating autonomy to the union if it came in.

“We think their problem is that the majority of our employees do not want union representation at King,” Mr. Harkins told The New York Sun. “The fact is that we haven’t violated any rules. It’s that the employees here don’t want them.”

The mayor, who went to lengths to make sure his Bloomberg News workforce did not unionize when he ran the eponymous media giant before taking office, has touted the 311 operation from its inception in March 2003 and will probably begin referring to it more often as this year’s mayoral race progresses.

The commissioner of the city’s Department of Information and Technology & Telecommunications, Gino Menchini, stressed yesterday that the dispute did not involve the city and said he was unaware of the specific allegations. But he said the right of employees to affiliate with unions should never “be tinkered with.”

“I happen to believe that any group of employees simply has a right, a legal right,” to organize, Mr. Menchini said. “It’s not something King or any other company has the latitude to impede. There’s a right for workers to unionize, there’s a process for it, and that’s not something that should ever, ever be tinkered with.”

“All of our contractors are required to conform to labor laws, and if there’s an allegation, CWA should make those allegations toward the appropriate overseeing authority,” Mr. Menchini added.

The union, which also represents some of the city employees at 311, has not filed a formal complaint about King with the NLRB. Mr. Aiken said doing so is difficult because it requires an employee to go on the record and report alleged intimidation.

The local filed an application for a union election but withdrew it Dec. 22 – a fact management says is an indication of drooping support. Mr. Aiken said that the union had the required 30% backing needed to qualify for an election, but that winning the 50% of votes needed for the election would be tough, given the diluted support.

Besides the local’s loss of support from a handful of workers who withdrew from the pro-union column, he said, King has hired between 20 and 25 new employees for 311 who have no interest in the union. Mr. Harkins denied that as well, saying the recruit classes are never so big and the company has not changed its hiring practices or asked prospective employees their views on unions.

King fields about 50% of the 40,000 daily calls to 311, but all of those calls are “tier one” calls – basic calls that do not require extensive expertise in a specific area. A source in the Bloomberg administration, who declined to be identified by name, said the city has no intention of privatizing more of the 311 operation and instead plans to shift volume back to the city’s site at Maiden Lane, which is currently undergoing an expansion due to be completed in 12 to 18 months. Officials expect to double the size of city government’s 311 workforce to 400 employees.

A spokesman for the Bloomberg administration, Jonathan Werbell, said that when the 311 helpline was launched two years ago it was difficult to gauge how much staff would be needed. It has exploded in popularity and receives millions of calls a year. King was hired to increase the capacity of the fledgling operation and to help with call spikes during unexpected events, such as the August 2003 blackout.

Mr. Aiken, the union organizer, said 311 employees who work for the city at its Lower Manhattan call center earn far more than their counterparts in Long Island City and get a competitive benefits package. A union, he said, would help the King workers win comparable compensation for doing the same work.

The city employees answering calls can make up to $32,000 a year, according to Mr. Menchini. Operators at the King 311 center generally make $10 an hour, Mr. Aiken said.

Ironically, employees at King have phoned the helpline to lodge hundreds of complaints about the situation at their office. Mr. Menchini said 311 has received more than 200 complaints on the matter. Union officials are now waiting to see whether either the city or King will take action on those calls.