Under the Railway Labor Act (RLA), a dispute concerning the selection of an appropriate representative for negotiating and administering a collective bargaining agreement. Representation disputes typically begin when a group of employees of a rail or air carrier, or a union, files an application for a National Mediation Board (NMB) election. The NMB has exclusive jurisdiction to determine which union, if any, represents groups of a carrier's employees, called crafts or classes, for collective bargaining about:

Representation disputes are distinguishable from three other types of disputes flowing from the RLA:

For more information, see Practice Note, Railway Labor Act: Overview.