Sole Purpose Of Being A Reserve

[RetroJunkie]

I completely understand the concept of a reserve in covering a duty which a duty holder is off for whatever reason, but what i want to know myself is the soul purpose of why Royal Mail do this, is it regarded as paying dues intill your able to build enough senority in order to become a duty holder ?

the reason im asking is basically because at certain times doing this for now 2 years, i do find it very stressful working blind,my prep rate dropping due to not knowing the frame, not knowing how to tie it up to correspond with safe drops to minimize dead walking, things of that nature.

the point im trying to get across is in no other employment would someone who just walked into a company be made to do what i consider the worst job, well prehaps you might but youd more or less consistently do the same thing, not, not knowing if your coming or going.

i suppose i should raise the question of how long was you a reserve before getting any kind of duty and in your experience did you also stuggle at times ?

i just find alot where i'm tryna get a feel for a walk on the first day, i make mistakes due to not knowing all the goings on of the walk as everything is always not straight forward on walks with many problems at times.

Im just really wondering what is the soul purpose of the company doing this and is it just soley paying dues ?

[olilew]

been a F/T reserve for 7 years and still am! not any full time duties have become available in our office for years but to be honest i quite like the variation. not as mundane as the same duty day in day out, year in year out.

[RetroJunkie]

been a F/T reserve for 7 years and still am! not any full time duties have become available in our office for years but to be honest i quite like the variation. not as mundane as the same duty day in day out, year in year out.

whoa wait so by full time duty would that suggest you have duties that are for part time staff ?

reason i ask is im part time and cover litreally anything my name is put to in the office and there is no such thing as part time duties.

[muzzy]

I'm part time and was given a duty on my first day and been doing it for 3 months. All the new starters since have also had their own duties.
It seems the ones that have been around a few years are reserves and cover our days off doing a different round everyday.
Having said that there are also duty holders been doing the same one for over 4 years

[NewPostieUK]

I've been a part time reserve / sometime floater for four years. I never do any walk I'm not trained on. I never do any 'blind'.

Yes, I'm slow when I've just been trained up on a duty, and am for quite a while if I just do every now and again, but doing walks you've never been trained on? I don't get that at all.

[bedfordrl]

I completely understand the concept of a reserve in covering a duty which a duty holder is off for whatever reason, but what i want to know myself is the soul purpose of why Royal Mail do this, is it regarded as paying dues intill your able to build enough senority in order to become a duty holder ?
Yes, but by then you know too many duties and are more useful as a reserve

the reason im asking is basically because at certain times doing this for now 2 years, i do find it very stressful working blind,my prep rate dropping due to not knowing the frame, not knowing how to tie it up to correspond with safe drops to minimize dead walking, things of that nature.
It has got a bit easier on unfamiliar frames with sequenced mail

the point im trying to get across is in no other employment would someone who just walked into a company be made to do what i consider the worst job, well prehaps you might but youd more or less consistently do the same thing, not, not knowing if your coming or going.

i suppose i should raise the question of how long was you a reserve before getting any kind of duty and in your experience did you also stuggle at times ?

It has taken me nine years to get a duty and I may lose that when we go into our revision in July as we have at least one high seniority transferee coming into our office and yes I struggled ,it was worse at Christmas where I would be thrown on a round I had not done in years and everyone would be out the door whilst I had trays of mail still to throw in

i just find alot where i'm tryna get a feel for a walk on the first day, i make mistakes due to not knowing all the goings on of the walk as everything is always not straight forward on walks with many problems at times.
Sounds like poor training and if so you cannot be to blame

Im just really wondering what is the soul purpose of the company doing this and is it just soley paying dues ?

[MinisterofCucumber]

The purpose of reserves is to cover absence like annual leave and sick. Say RM allows for everyone taking 6 weeks holiday and 2 weeks sick, each reserve should cover 52/8 duties. That means that for every 6 full time members of staff, there should be one reserve.

If you are covering more duties than other reserves, then this is not a fair distribution of the reserve work. Favouritism is the enemy of trade unionism because it undermines union solidarity.

[Royal_Fail]

You should be doing same 5 walks every week?

I'm leave reserve and cover different walks every week (for full week)which isn't so bad with P&L since your buddy always knows the crack so your not blind.

[olilew]

perhaps should've added i cover mostly drivers but if none off i cover walks. (we are not P&L)

[RetroJunkie]

You should be doing same 5 walks every week?

I'm leave reserve and cover different walks every week (for full week)which isn't so bad with P&L since your buddy always knows the crack so your not blind.

having the same 5 walks with us are known as "float sections" they all went aswell in the resign, ive done about 16 different walks this year alone.

[MinisterofCucumber]

In RM, there is a thing called "Reward and Recognition".

It seems to have been decided that CWU grade work is a dead end job. This is evidenced by the overuse of part-timers and casuals and by the use of a graduate entrance program to recruit for head office jobs. Promotion is not available to CWU grades as management vacancies are filled by surplus managers from units that have closed, regardless of their suitability.

As promotion is not an option, "Reward and Recognition" has been invented to motivate the sort of behaviour that is desirable from CWU grades. Other than promotion, it is difficult to see what sort of rewards can be offered that could not be classed as favouritism. Allowing one person to always get their first choice of annual leave weeks but not another, giving one person more overtime than another, giving one person a day off and expecting the others in his/her section to absorb the work but not letting another person get a day off when they want it are all examples of favouritism.

How do you get a reward?

You could do higher grade work for lower grade pay, you could be very productive and be willing to do lots of overtime, you could be lazy yourself but bully more work out of others and ingratiate yourself with management, you could club together with others to bully your union rep into making agreements that give your group more than your fair share of benefits or you could simply just bully your manager into letting you get what you want.

[Judgee]

Every company I have ever worked at has been run on the basis that you start at the bottom and work your way up.

I was a reserve for 2 years when I started then signed for the worst walk in the office just to get a regular duty. Any time I manage to sign for a half decent walk they seem to have a full office resign and I'd lose it again. Such is life!

There will always be a need for holiday/sick cover people. Your time will come if you stick it out, just don't expect to walk into a cushie regular round before you have put in the graft. Not that there will be many cushy walks left soon, just the choice between bad, very bad and bloody awful rounds!

[flaminmoses]

been a F/T reserve for 7 years and still am! not any full time duties have become available in our office for years but to be honest i quite like the variation. not as mundane as the same duty day in day out, year in year out.

yeah that was a point when i was a postie.
but with walks gettinh longer id still come across walks which i hadnt done or had changed so much it was almost like doing a new walk.

still getting sacked for being a reserve with a knee isuue on such a walk sort of sums royal mail up.
willfull delay....what a bunch of jokers

lets hoe the judge sort the ***** out

[clashcityrocker]

Every company I have ever worked at has been run on the basis that you start at the bottom and work your way up.

Every company I have ever worked at has trained people to do the job properly.
A building company doesn't expect the labourer to start laying bricks without being taught how to do it.

[Judgee]

Every company I have ever worked at has been run on the basis that you start at the bottom and work your way up.

Every company I have ever worked at has trained people to do the job properly.
A building company doesn't expect the labourer to start laying bricks without being taught how to do it.

First off a labourer wouldn't be laying bricks that would be the brick layer!

You learn on the job, little bit here and there while you knock up several tonnes of muck and haul hundreds of bricks around. You earn your knowledge through hard graft in a job like that and many others.

Let's be honest, being a postman doesn't require a degree in rocket science does it? Just how much training should it take to be able to stick a letter through a door or knock with a parcel?