MY STORY TO NINA

[frazbaz]

hi nina......my name is mike im from plymouth....well done on you for posting what your angard experience has done for you.....like you and many hundred or thousand other poor souls i am having the same experience....i applied for a royal mail xmas job back in early september ....i completed the online tests , over the phone interview,,,produced my documents ,paid for 2 photos....and attended the so called interview with angard......after i produced My documents and attended the interview i was told i would have a position within royal mail for xmas subject to security checks being ok......the security checks came back ok , but this was only after many phone calls to angard to chase up my application.....on the 17th november i recieved an e mail with a contract attached to sign and send back to angard.....upon reading the contract i was stunned to see they have put on a 50 week FLEXIBLE CASUAL EMPLOYEE CONTRACT.......allthough this was greatly recieved by me thinking that i would get 50 weeks employment out of them ,,i have still not recieved any phone calls or e mails to do a single shift.....i like you have rang them many times to see what is going on, and on the last time i did manage to speak to them they told me xmas worker contract people would get the xmas work before the flexible workers,, allthough i originally applied for just xmas work...... i was made redundant from my last employer in august 2011 after 25 years service......i was so hoping this royal mail job would turn out to be a positive stepping stone in getting back to work, but like many hundreds of other people , angard has dashed my hopes of gaining some work within royal mail,.... heres hoping someone from the big towers of royal mail reads this story and takes note of what is going on within there own in house agency......mike (still unemployed..plymouth)

[markadam1962]

Hi Nina. I was a retained Christmas casual from 2010 one of a few that were kept on by the mail centre to cope with the post Christmas backlog. We were then offered work upto March on an adhoc basis maybe 2/3 shift a week on average. We then had a 12 week contract that was renewed every 12 weeks (with a forced 2 week break in between) all went well until our contract with RM was terminated in September (mine had until Oct to run) and we were all signed over to Angard with new contracts (unseen) and a new security badge.

We were on a rate of pay with RM at the time of £5.95ph and an allowance of £1.76ph for working nights. This was cut to min wage PLUS 50pph

Whereas before work for RM could have been a phonecall with an hours notice to cover a busy shift. Angard didn't work like that and any casuals had to be booked in advance which as nobody was there at the Angard office at 9pm at night rather defeated the object! The upshot was I lost work, my MC did not have cover!

Contact with Angard was frustrating with either a phone call to my mobile from a blocked number which unless I had the mobile to hand 24/7 I could not always get to. OR a text message. The shift offered were often in MC's or delivery offices miles from me and often only for 3 hour shifts. Two people who were "retained" Christmas 2010 casuals were turned away back in Sept were mucked about turning up for shift that offices knew nothing about....it was going on months ago!

I managed to speak to Angard to ask why I was not being offered work at my MC for nights. I was told my records would be amended to show this preference. I went for 3 weeks without a single shift at the MC although I was still getting calls and texts...obviously my records were not amended.

Upshot of it all was I sent an email to my old manager and begged for work. I got a shift that same night! He apologised and said that from now on myself and the other casuals affected would be contacted as before and they would deal with Angard afterwards.

Its worked, I have work and have been busy for the last 3 weeks solid. I sign a sheet every shift, It has my name on it and I have been paid. (albeit less than before)

At the end of the day I'm still a casual working for Angard but have seen it from a slightly different angle and can confirm that they have been a shoddy organisation from the word go!

Why do I do it? any moneys better than no money, any jobs better than the dole...and I actually like the work and the people!

Blimey I feel like I just had a therapy session