Specials and Warped Logic

[Lounge Lizard]

We are out till 3pm now on rural deliveries.

Ouch. I wouldn't know that, my office is in the middle of Urban sprawl![/quote]
Well up to 3pm on a good day, 4pm to 5pm with the Christmas pressure.
You townies, you don't know you're born.

[IloveMYredTROLLEY!]

Some of us are already doing our own walks until 1500 and even beyond Weds-Fri, due to starting at 0945, arriving at incomplete "double prepped" frames. Consequently, instead of being able to get specials and tie up before leaving depot no later than 1020, we are often leaving the depot at around 1045...

And that's without taking any meal relief (although I question the "I must take some meal relief before starting delivery on H&S grounds" when i've been at work a whopping 60 minutes)! Hands up if you arrive as a full-timer at 0600 and take half your meal relief by 0700! How about your manager? Thought not!

[singingpostman]

but until a few years ago ordinary Special Deliveries were guaranteed by 12 noon, not 1pm.

So according to the trend the time will be moved up to 2pm, just in time for when we are out until 3pm! Shows that the customer is always top priority for RM...oh...wait a minute...

We are out till 3pm now on rural deliveries. [/quote]
Ditto here mate, and almost everyday I have to break off to get specials delivered before 1pm, then somehow manage to work the rest of your delivery and colection around that, which invariably means box clearance fails because your timing is so much later than it should have been so it does'nt register on the system. As for 9 o clocks I've known guys go out specifically to deliver these and then come back to continue prepping the duty, these town boys dont know when they are well off !

[not me]

Having only been at RM for slightly less than two years i would be interested to see for how long the 1pm "cut off" time for Specials has been in operation. Why do i get the impression that only a few years ago the vast majority of posties routinely finished before 1pm? The cut-off time seems to me like a relic of bygone days when the postman got home before midday, and hasn't been corrected to suit today's typical routine. As you say, the time should correlate with the delivery span of the postman who has it in his bag. It will be interesting to see if the time will be increased to 3pm, the time we are soon expected to work until, although i suspect that the excuse of "increased mobility" will be the norm when the shared vans come in. Also, i can hardly see a 3pm cut-off time going down well with "customers".

On another note, has anyone else had to deliver election material in the form of a special? One walk in my office had one pretty much every day for the MP's office on busy strip of shops and businesses in the run up to the local elections. To those unfamiliar with "election specials" you are allowed to rip the special open and feed the contents through the letter box, one by one if neccessary. No signature required. Makes you wonder what the point in sending it via special delivery is? Is it subsidised somehow? It's another special delivery procedure that seems to defy logic as well as defeats the whole purpose of the service. On the plus side, it's quite funny to see some of the looks from passers-by as you are tearing into a packet with the words "Election material" in size 50 font printed on the side

its standard for some MPs parliamentry mail.
we have some Lord toffynose who gets them all the time with the teeny tinyist letterbox
even after opening its a struggle to get the stuff delivered

[Terry Butcher]

Well up to 3pm on a good day, 4pm to 5pm with the Christmas pressure.
You townies, you don't know you're born. [/quote]

Make sure the batteries in your torch are working...

"its standard for some MPs parliamentry mail.
we have some Lord toffynose who gets them all the time with the teeny tinyist letterbox
even after opening its a struggle to get the stuff delivered"

Yeah, same here, match-box sized letterbox!