New National policy - DPR loading Vans

[Clappedoutpostie]

We can't just bring back what we don't fancy delivering like you lot do with non-tracked mail. We have to stay out until it’s all delivered because it’s all tracked. Basically we have enforced overtime which most of us don't want to do. I'd rather finish on time. But if I start bringing loads back they'll start looking for ways to manage me out of the business. No such thing as cutting off in dpr land.

You don’t have to stay out and do enforced overtime, your finish time is still your finish time. We have tracked coming back with cut offs most days, as long as you inform management you won’t have a problem, yes you won’t be popular but that’s about it.

[menditsa]

Nonsense? How? Speaking for myself, I have reached the point where I know our duties inside out, backwards, forwards, sideways.

Numbering parcels has nothing to do with whether you know your geography. This isn’t about being able to deliver a York’s worth of large for a duty or paired duty just from your scribbled crib sheet. This is about being able to load a van to the ceiling with 150+ parcels in strict numerical order, maximising every inch of van space, and setting yourself up for an efficient run.

What you and your legacy colleagues are suggesting here is akin to just throwing your mech boxes of mail in the back of the van and delivering straight from them as you go round rather than throwing them off into the frame, bundling up, etc.

100%

Also when I start my shift there are never any PDA's or vans to use.
Going to be fun with yorks sat out in the rain today

[yellowbelly]

I'm on new contract so have no choice but to reluctantly do a Sunday once a month, cos I have no real idea where I'm going I find it a lot easier to number them, any parcels I have left or address I can't find I just mark up as no answer or inaccessible

Surely should be 'Delivery not attempted' scan ????

[menditsa]

Surely should be 'Delivery not attempted' scan ????

Try doing that and a LM will go mental.

[fadetogrey63]

Surely should be 'Delivery not attempted' scan ????

Try doing that and a LM will go mental.

Yep, this is true!

[Flashman_]

We were told to load the randomly sorted packets into the van directly, and I did it for months. It simply is a moronic idea that creates more work.

However I now number all packets in the depot, loading a york with 20-30 packets, depending on how much room I have/number of repeat addresses. I then take it to the van and it takes no more than 5 mins per york to load as they are partially ordered by that time.
I have found doing it this way I can save around 20 minutes on doing it their way.

If instructed I have no problem going back to loading directly into the van, but I will be doing 20 minutes less packets each day, as I was before.
I have had no complaints from management doing it either way, and I follow the PDA timings outdoor and finish when I am due, whether or not they have over allocated too many packets or not.(ie I just bring it back if they gave me too many)
Just do what they tell you and work at a steady pace, The Pda is your friend in this as it shows you are doing it correctly.

[yellowbelly]

Surely should be 'Delivery not attempted' scan ????

Try doing that and a LM will go mental.

Yep, this is true!

As per the OP - if it's because you don't know where you're going or you run out of time then that's a training or resource issue - ie the responsibility of the manager who is going 'mental'. Do it quite regularly in our office. A different scan is just hiding their incompetence.

[TopperGas]

I always feel like taking longer to do the van loading/numbering thing takes a bit longer to get out, but saves time once you're out.

If I just load up the van in terms of streets/walks I always need to keep stopping to have a tidy - and quite often I've missed something and have to go back somewhere.

So true. It saves masses of time — to the extent you can deliver twice as much in a day as the guy next to you who slings it all in the van, slams the doors, leaves an hour before you, yet you’re back two hours before him! I I number and sort mine every time. Failing to prepare = preparing to fail.

Nonsense if you know the duty you just put them all in house/street order in your van in 15 mins, only somebody who doesn't know the duty/duties needs to spend an hour numbering them and then putting them in number order. Do you think a postie doing a van share or rural numbers their parcels up every day?

Nonsense? How? Speaking for myself, I have reached the point where I know our duties inside out, backwards, forwards, sideways.

Numbering parcels has nothing to do with whether you know your geography. This isn’t about being able to deliver a York’s worth of large for a duty or paired duty just from your scribbled crib sheet. This is about being able to load a van to the ceiling with 150+ parcels in strict numerical order, maximising every inch of van space, and setting yourself up for an efficient run.

What you and your legacy colleagues are suggesting here is akin to just throwing your mech boxes of mail in the back of the van and delivering straight from them as you go round rather than throwing them off into the frame, bundling up, etc.

Nothing random about loading the van, if I've got area's A, B & C to deliver I put all the parcels for C at the rear of the van in the order they are going to be delivered, then area B and finally area A, as I've already said if you'd been doing a rural for 5 years would you seriously number each parcel every single day before loading them in your van, if you did that all the other posties would have left the DO an hour earlier than you and most likely back an hour sooner. I accept if you don't know the area(s) then numbering them helps.

[kazardaimenu]

It’s a waste of time handling them indoors and again whilst loading the van, much better and far quicker doing it as u load the van.

why wouldn’t you.

Hanging it out so they can either do less parcels or book more docket at a guess.

We can't just bring back what we don't fancy delivering like you lot do with non-tracked mail. We have to stay out until its all delivered because its all tracked. Basically we have enforced overtime which most of us don't want to do. I'd rather finish on time. But if I start bringing loads back they'll start looking for ways to manage me out of the business. No such thing as cutting off in dpr land.

And on the odd occasion I do finish early they send me out to deliver bags of mail that the legacy posties can't be arsed to do

Just scan the excess no answer/ inaccessible and take it back to keep the managers off your back. Either that or have a raging argument with them before going out setting out your limits.

[kazardaimenu]

How are 9 Yorks getting loaded into a van?

[Smoothbackground]

Nothing random about loading the van, if I've got area's A, B & C to deliver I put all the parcels for C at the rear of the van in the order they are going to be delivered, then area B and finally area A, as I've already said if you'd been doing a rural for 5 years would you seriously number each parcel every single day before loading them in your van, if you did that all the other posties would have left the DO an hour earlier than you and most likely back an hour sooner. I accept if you don't know the area(s) then numbering them helps.

We’re seemingly at cross purposes. A rural, as you describe, is a walk’s worth of parcels and packets, perhaps two walks’ worth at most. It is in no way comparable to a stack-‘em’-high parcel route. Indeed, I would probably dispense with parcel numbering myself for a rural - even if I didn’t know the geography at all - as the parcel density and need for precise loading isn’t there.

[Smoothbackground]

How are 9 Yorks getting loaded into a van?

I assume they won’t all be full to the top. And of course it depends on the contents of the yorks as well. That said, I recently got five full yorks’ worth of parcels and packets into my trusty Expert. For anything more than four I would normally take a Boxer LWB but all our big Boxers are being monopolised in the afternoons due to us now collecting all the oversized PFW stuff from the POs.

[kazardaimenu]

How are 9 Yorks getting loaded into a van?

I assume they won’t all be full to the top. And of course it depends on the contents of the yorks as well. That said, I recently got five full yorks’ worth of parcels and packets into my trusty Expert. For anything more than four I would normally take a Boxer LWB but all our big Boxers are being monopolised in the afternoons due to us now collecting all the oversized PFW stuff from the POs.

5 Yorks into an Expert is doable but anything more than that you’re running short of capacity.

[Jonathan Alsatian]

It’s a waste of time handling them indoors and again whilst loading the van, much better and far quicker doing it as u load the van.

why wouldn’t you.

Hanging it out so they can either do less parcels or book more docket at a guess.

We can't just bring back what we don't fancy delivering like you lot do with non-tracked mail. We have to stay out until its all delivered because its all tracked. Basically we have enforced overtime which most of us don't want to do. I'd rather finish on time. But if I start bringing loads back they'll start looking for ways to manage me out of the business. No such thing as cutting off in dpr land.

And on the odd occasion I do finish early they send me out to deliver bags of mail that the legacy posties can't be arsed to do

Just scan the excess no answer/ inaccessible and take it back to keep the managers off your back. Either that or have a raging argument with them before going out setting out your limits.

There's one manager who insists to do an honest scan of "delivery not attempted" whilst others prefer "inaccessible" and a third who says phone them and they'll say what to do .... Sometimes they'll send someone to do the last few. An angry customer confronted me today on her doorstep because someone yesterday scanned her parcel "no answer" while she was in the house all day. Shes screaming "tell those liars I've got CCTV" . I'm stood there in the pouring rain so wasn't going to give her an in depth explanation of why that might have happened. Just said feel free to make a complaint before turning my back on her and walking off. I felt like that Postman Plod cartoon in Viz comic years ago, just shrugging and walking off, but my patience with the rudeness of punters was wearing thin today. She'll probably complain about my attitude but her rudeness warranted it in my opinion. My only regret is I forgot to add her address to my "s**t list" who will get 739s in future on every occasion

[menditsa]

Nothing random about loading the van, if I've got area's A, B & C to deliver I put all the parcels for C at the rear of the van in the order they are going to be delivered, then area B and finally area A, as I've already said if you'd been doing a rural for 5 years would you seriously number each parcel every single day before loading them in your van, if you did that all the other posties would have left the DO an hour earlier than you and most likely back an hour sooner. I accept if you don't know the area(s) then numbering them helps.

It's ok for you as your delivering on a condensed area of 2 walks that you do day in day out and know it well.
We mainly have small Nissans that we fill front to back, Bottom to top. I've tried all things over the years and have found the way I work to be the best way. Once I wheel my yorks out to load it takes 5 mins per york to load and it's loaded in such a way that if I do get any load shift I'm not wasting time trying to find packets.

I covered one section for close to 4 years, walks and packets and know it like the back of my hand.
When doing DPR in that section it was the same 8 walks I covered (Combination of 2+2)
I was on a singleton duty taking out all mail and parcels for a year and just scanned to core, never used DPR as I knew the walk inside out.

For reason's unknown since moving to a 13.30 start my new LM has refused to put me on the area I know well and I have been thrown out on area's I know not at all and because you are allocated a diff route everyday it's impossible to learn them ( We have 30 afternoon DPR drivers )

Since all AM DPR dutys were removed from our DO all oversize and LAT's now don't go out until 14.30 including schools and business's.

Our DO's biggest problem is agency are given a DPR route to scan to and they are told just scan X amount from these yorks until 5 hours is on the gun.
So for example today drop 88 of 100 was 3.8 miles away from the area I was covering and the PDA said 10 min round trip, it actually took 30 mins due to traffic. Drop 76 customer says your the 3rd RM driver to deliver to me this afternoon. Drop 4 scanned to a residential address. Just a few examples.

This isn't a pop at you, just explaining how our working system at my DO has been decimated in the last 4 months from a working system for years to a complete farce and shambles for both customers and employee's.