08/07/26 Mount Pleasant Bulletin

[jimallen]

Hi, here's the Mount Pleasant bulletin of 8 July... comments welcome.

TEMP GOES UP, SHIFT LENGTH COMES DOWN
Another week, another heatwave. It's difficult for us
on days to sleep at night. But for those on nights,
sleeping at home during the hottest part of the day is
impossible!
And since we're going to be struggling to get
enough sleep, shortening the night shifts is what we
need! In fact, medical research has shown that the
max length for night shifts should be 6 hours with a
break in the middle - and shorter still, when it's this
hot!

AIR CON SLOW-DOWN
Most of the vans used in Deliveries have very poor air
con - and in some DOs the old vans only have fans
which blow hot air. With the heat returning this
week, we're taking a leaf from the World Cup and
taking extra "hydration breaks"... No matter how
much more undelivered mail we might bring back...

WE CAN STOP TOO
The Parcel Sorting Monster gave up and broke down
last week. But we're not surprised. The Monster
seems to go on strike a few times every month,
considering managers squeeze everything they can
out of it, 24/7. In fact, they try to squeeze just as
much out of us - until we decide to stop, just like the
Monster does!

IT ISN'T DEAD... YET
And what can the engineers do when replacement
parts have to be ordered and delivered, knowing how
c**p RM's "tech" is and how "prompt" their deliveries
are? We're in fact amazed the Monster has survived
this long!

DUMP THE TRASH
These scanning in/out machines don't work – they
regularly fail to register our cards when we scan
them. But then the shift manager comes complaining
to us, warning us that we'll be disciplined if we don't
scan!
Why bother us with this? It's obvious it's the
system at fault. If they don't want to throw it out, we
can certainly help with that!

SLOW AND STEADY
One of the broken lifts finally came back to life last
week - we've lost count of the number of times one
or other has gone out of service! And we don't see
the bosses in a rush to fix them like they are when
the PSM breaks down… so we won't rush either.
We'll just wait for a working lift to arrive, no matter
how long it takes. Because we definitely aren't
climbing the stairs!

STOP THIS CAROUSEL!
Managers are getting used to thinking that they can
move us to whatever duty they like during our shifts -
some of us are moved to 3 or 4 different duties within
a day! We know union officials gave up the 5.1.8 -
but we didn't - and we aren't all "spare"!

BREAKING COVER
We've noticed managers have called in fewer casuals
lately. Do they think we're going to cover for the
vacancies? That's not going to happen! No way will
we help them get away with their de facto job cuts.

NOT OUR PROBLEM!
In Parcel Processing, we can't believe how poor
Amazon's packaging has become. Parcels are falling
apart, goods are spilling everywhere... and it's not
just the odd parcel either! If Amazon chooses to cut
the quality of its packaging materials, that's their
problem - we won't be taping up Amazon's parcels!

PASSING THE BUCK
The number of mis-sorts has gone through the roof,
and it isn't just because of the chaos in Processing.
We also see "mis-sorts" coming back from DOs, we
then sort them correctly (again!), only for them to be
sent back, again! What on earth is going on? Are
DUMs sending back undelivered items, claiming
they're mis-sorts?!

BOLT CUTTERS, ANYONE?
It seems royalty has arrived in the male cleaners'
changing room… and a special "throne" has even
been reserved for somebody! We didn't realise we
didn't have "royal assent" to sit on it. But to our
surprise, we see it's now been secured with a chain
and padlock! These wouldn't be the first chains
we've broken.

OUR TIME IS PRECIOUS!
It's been a real pain having to walk all the way from
Angel and back over the last 2-3 weeks, because the
bus stop was closed. Managers tell us to use a
different bus stop and take another route (thanks, we
couldn't have figured that one out!). But why not
start and finish our shifts earlier to make up for the
extra time it takes? And RM could provide a shuttle
service. Why should this inconvenience come out of
our time?

WELCOME TO HMP
We're happy to see new workmates, who've started
in Processing on Earlies in the last few months. So
welcome to the mad Mount! And if the way things
are run here don't make much sense to you, don't
worry, it's not you that's gone mad!

[Tman]

Managers tell us to use a
different bus stop and take another route (thanks, we
couldn't have figured that one out!). But why not
start and finish our shifts earlier to make up for the
extra time it takes? And RM could provide a shuttle
service. Why should this inconvenience come out of
our time?

Is it criminal naivety or subtle p*ss-taking humour that causes the author to write this stuff?
The Socialist diatribe add-on was good for a laugh too.

[Jefferson Starfish]

Mount Pleasant sounds like British Leyland in the 70's.

[SpacePhoenix]

TEMP GOES UP, SHIFT LENGTH COMES DOWN
Another week, another heatwave. It's difficult for us
on days to sleep at night. But for those on nights,
sleeping at home during the hottest part of the day is
impossible!
And since we're going to be struggling to get
enough sleep, shortening the night shifts is what we
need! In fact, medical research has shown that the
max length for night shifts should be 6 hours with a
break in the middle - and shorter still, when it's this
hot!

You can dream on if you think that night shifts will ever be made shorter. If you want shorter shifts, find another job.

DUMP THE TRASH
These scanning in/out machines don't work – they
regularly fail to register our cards when we scan
them. But then the shift manager comes complaining
to us, warning us that we'll be disciplined if we don't
scan!
Why bother us with this? It's obvious it's the
system at fault. If they don't want to throw it out, we
can certainly help with that!

We don't have any problems with the system it works just fine and we use the very same system. It's simply staff there failing to scan in/out.

STOP THIS CAROUSEL!
Managers are getting used to thinking that they can
move us to whatever duty they like during our shifts -
some of us are moved to 3 or 4 different duties within
a day! We know union officials gave up the 5.1.8 -
but we didn't - and we aren't all "spare"!

Everyon'e's 318 (if they still exist) has something like "or as directed". Management are quite within their rights to move any staff member to any section at any time providing there's no H&S or training issues. Any other firm does the same. If you don't like it, find another job.

NOT OUR PROBLEM!
In Parcel Processing, we can't believe how poor
Amazon's packaging has become. Parcels are falling
apart, goods are spilling everywhere... and it's not
just the odd parcel either! If Amazon chooses to cut
the quality of its packaging materials, that's their
problem - we won't be taping up Amazon's parcels!

How hard is it to put them into a damaged bag? It's just bone idle laziness.

[TopperGas]

Re Amazon it's about time RM just started sending anything poorly packaged back to them rather than on to DO's to deliver.

[ted_e_bear]

Re Amazon it's about time RM just started sending anything poorly packaged back to them rather than on to DO's to deliver.

I thought that a while ago, at whatever point in our system the parcel falls apart it gets returned.

I'm guessing RM are scared of jeopardising the scraps that Amazon send our way, they shouldn't be, it quite often overloads us, I wonder if anyone knows what sort of price they actually pay for us doing the stuff that's uneconomical for them to do themselves.

Maybe some day they'll realise that "pile it high and sell it cheap" doesn't work for us there's always a knock on effect that affects the service we provide which is usually mail taking a back seat

[yellowbelly]

NOT OUR PROBLEM!
In Parcel Processing, we can't believe how poor
Amazon's packaging has become. Parcels are falling
apart, goods are spilling everywhere... and it's not
just the odd parcel either! If Amazon chooses to cut
the quality of its packaging materials, that's their
problem - we won't be taping up Amazon's parcels!

Must be the first time I've agreed with something in the MPB!

The number of boxes that come through falling apart is crazy. We've stopped bagging or taping them and just tell the customer to raise it with Amazon if something is missing or damaged. Don't have bags big enough to put the larger damaged ones in.

[SpacePhoenix]

Re Amazon it's about time RM just started sending anything poorly packaged back to them rather than on to DO's to deliver.

I thought that a while ago, at whatever point in our system the parcel falls apart it gets returned.

I'm guessing RM are scared of jeopardising the scraps that Amazon send our way, they shouldn't be, it quite often overloads us, I wonder if anyone knows what sort of price they actually pay for us doing the stuff that's uneconomical for them to do themselves.

Maybe some day they'll realise that "pile it high and sell it cheap" doesn't work for us there's always a knock on effect that affects the service we provide which is usually mail taking a back seat

If something falls apart, if the address is intact then it just goes into a repair bag and sent on. Amazon are probably a big customer for RM.

NOT OUR PROBLEM!
In Parcel Processing, we can't believe how poor
Amazon's packaging has become. Parcels are falling
apart, goods are spilling everywhere... and it's not
just the odd parcel either! If Amazon chooses to cut
the quality of its packaging materials, that's their
problem - we won't be taping up Amazon's parcels!

Must be the first time I've agreed with something in the MPB!

The number of boxes that come through falling apart is crazy. We've stopped bagging or taping them and just tell the customer to raise it with Amazon if something is missing or damaged. Don't have bags big enough to put the larger damaged ones in.

There are big enough bags available, just needs whoever in your office to order them.