Update

[SpacePhoenix]

The other thing that grinds my gears is all talks are basically about what is going to happen and change on walks well some of us work in Processing

That's because the major attacks are as usual on delivery.
You're not going to be told to walk the streets in the pissing rain and snow until all the work is done no matter how long that takes or what time of night it is.
You'll get to scan out at your finish time.

Finish times in MCs are determined by final dispatch times. Would you rather we kept going and then send the stuff out later to DOs?

[Woody Guthrie]

The other thing that grinds my gears is all talks are basically about what is going to happen and change on walks well some of us work in Processing

That's because the major attacks are as usual on delivery.
You're not going to be told to walk the streets in the pissing rain and snow until all the work is done no matter how long that takes or what time of night it is.
You'll get to scan out at your finish time.

Finish times in MCs are determined by final dispatch times. Would you rather we kept going and then send the stuff out later to DOs?

What are you on about SP?
It doesn't matter when your finish time is, the point is you get to finish on it, we won't.
Since you're so obsessed with delivery I could try to work a transfer for you, it's piss easy and we're all in the pub for 9am mate.

[antcpfc]

I can’t remember one transfer from a mail centre to my delivery office in 38 years. Plenty the other way though.

[aiden01]

The other thing that grinds my gears is all talks are basically about what is going to happen and change on walks well some of us work in Processing

That's because the major attacks are as usual on delivery.
You're not going to be told to walk the streets in the pissing rain and snow until all the work is done no matter how long that takes or what time of night it is.
You'll get to scan out at your finish time.

Finish times in MCs are determined by final dispatch times. Would you rather we kept going and then send the stuff out later to DOs?

Seriously wtf does anybody actually care anymore what time stuff is dispatched at we have a start time an finnish time let the managers worry when it fails.

[Gasman11]

If these changes come in and you work in delivery there'll be days when you don't have a set finish time with the commitment to deliver bollocks. Don't get me started on that annualised hours bull either, thats even worse.

[wandle]

Pidleypoo yes I know what we want and don’t want. We are certainly not going to agree no finishing times and Royal Mail’s annualised and flexi hours approach.

However in rejecting what they want we all have to recognise that traffic is not the same 52 weeks per year. Remember if you have the same amount of hours when traffic is lower as you do when it is higher your productivity drops and therefore lasping / absorption increases to plug that productivity drop.

Therefore if we don’t want annualised hours / no finishing times or banking then we have address the fundamental issue which is if you have 30 walks when traffic is high , do you need 30 walks in the summer when traffic is less ?

Remember Royal Mail are totally obsessed with PDA OA data they have annualised the summer PDA OA with the winter and that is why they have come up with their unacceptable plan.

However in making sure we defeat their annualised hours plan we have to also find a solution to the fact that traffic drops in the summer and therefore how do we plug the drop in productivity without unacceptable absorption levels.

I’m not against annualised hours done correctly at fixed times of the year and could actually be beneficial to us in the summer months.

Compulsory banking of hours is a massive no but in certain circumstances, if you want to “ bank” your hours for extra leave then if it’s an individuals choice.

My issues are that commit to deliver coupled with compulsory baking of hours is just open to such abuse.

I have a chronic illness , I have to plan my day to manage it correctly and if these changes come in , I cant manage it.

The banking of hours concept has one major problem (even if it wasn’t unacceptable in the first place). It’s winter. If this was part of a final deal, and came in before Christmas, people would be banking hours every day. But what happens if volumes don’t drop enough to ever take that accrued time off? Let’s say a new strain of Covid hits, and online orders start to surge again. When are you ever going to take that time off? If too many people want to be off at the same time, who gets first choice, and who is the decision maker? Who do you appeal/complain to if you are treated unfairly?
Any agreement that includes this concept in any shape or form will get a big fat NO on my ballot paper.

[Pidleypoo]

Pidleypoo yes I know what we want and don’t want. We are certainly not going to agree no finishing times and Royal Mail’s annualised and flexi hours approach.

However in rejecting what they want we all have to recognise that traffic is not the same 52 weeks per year. Remember if you have the same amount of hours when traffic is lower as you do when it is higher your productivity drops and therefore lasping / absorption increases to plug that productivity drop.

Therefore if we don’t want annualised hours / no finishing times or banking then we have address the fundamental issue which is if you have 30 walks when traffic is high , do you need 30 walks in the summer when traffic is less ?

Remember Royal Mail are totally obsessed with PDA OA data they have annualised the summer PDA OA with the winter and that is why they have come up with their unacceptable plan.

However in making sure we defeat their annualised hours plan we have to also find a solution to the fact that traffic drops in the summer and therefore how do we plug the drop in productivity without unacceptable absorption levels.

I’m not against annualised hours done correctly at fixed times of the year and could actually be beneficial to us in the summer months.

Compulsory banking of hours is a massive no but in certain circumstances, if you want to “ bank” your hours for extra leave then if it’s an individuals choice.

My issues are that commit to deliver coupled with compulsory baking of hours is just open to such abuse.

I have a chronic illness , I have to plan my day to manage it correctly and if these changes come in , I cant manage it.

The banking of hours concept has one major problem (even if it wasn’t unacceptable in the first place). It’s winter. If this was part of a final deal, and came in before Christmas, people would be banking hours every day. But what happens if volumes don’t drop enough to ever take that accrued time off? Let’s say a new strain of Covid hits, and online orders start to surge again. When are you ever going to take that time off? If too many people want to be off at the same time, who gets first choice, and who is the decision maker? Who do you appeal/complain to if you are treated unfairly?
Any agreement that includes this concept in any shape or form will get a big fat NO on my ballot paper.

I’ve said all along that it would have to be done properly but there’s no faith in rm that it could be.

[wacko74]

Hopefully posties will now finally realise that the union are in no way acting in the best interests of it's members.

All the union is interested in is keeping it's membership as high as possible

Both things I would imagine are pretty much inseparable.

I don't delude myself that the union is trying to protect my terms and conditions out of some kind of mission for the greater good of the working classes.

They do it primarily out of a sense of self survival, no members means no union.

I'm happy with that, survival is a much better focus than idealism.

Protecting existing T&C's is one hing but the union are resisting any attempts to modernise working practices and downsize the workforce, they won't have any members as there won't be any RM if the union were to get their way.

All the union are interested in is keeping it's income from membership as high as possible by resisting any attempts by RM to modernise working practices and downsizing the workforce, particularly in the event of a reduction in the 6 day is USO, and it's purely an act of selfishness on the part of the union.

I'm sure tens of thousands of posties would be only to keen to accept even minimal VR but the union will fight tooth and nail to prevent their members from having this opportunity because all they (the union) are interested in is RM continuing with outdated, inefficient working practices and an unnecessarily bloated workforce purely so their membership numbers and income from subs stay as high as possible.

[Slim2none]

If by "unnecessarily bloated workforce" you mean long serving full time employees, then you'll surely be surprised at how bloated that workforce is going to need to be to get the job done once it's all part timers.

Wacko, how long were you in for and how long did you accept the benefits of union efforts whether you were a member or not? You seem to have a very anti-union stance, so it seems a fair and genuine question.

[Murdoch]

I can’t remember one transfer from a mail centre to my delivery office in 38 years. Plenty the other way though.

We've had two (one went sick and then left), the other guy is really struggling and extremely slow. Looks absolutely f****d if I'm honest.

They are totally different jobs, anybody that thinks "delivery is easy", probably should try it first. It's a significant adjustment for most people.

[Woody Guthrie]

they won't have any members as there won't be any RM if the union were to get their way.....

....... All the union are interested in is keeping it's income from membership as high as possible

You do realise how contradictory your argument is?
The union actually can't control the size of the workforce, the business churns around 5-10% of its staff every year and the union cannot force them to replace those staff so within 3 years RM could reduce its workforce by around 20,000 if they really wanted to and beyond moaning about it there's little the union can do.

The fact that RM has so many agency staff on the books tells its own story, not just right now but all through the year.

If you believe RM is bloated and overstaffed start a poll on here.

Is your unit running below agreed headcount?

[Pidleypoo]

they won't have any members as there won't be any RM if the union were to get their way.....

....... All the union are interested in is keeping it's income from membership as high as possible

You do realise how contradictory your argument is?
The union actually can't control the size of the workforce, the business churns around 5-10% of its staff every year and the union cannot force them to replace those staff so within 3 years RM could reduce its workforce by around 20,000 if they really wanted to and beyond moaning about it there's little the union can do.

The fact that RM has so many agency staff on the books tells its own story, not just right now but all through the year.

If you believe RM is bloated and overstaffed start a poll on here.

Is your unit running below agreed headcount?

You won’t need a poll because most places will be like mine and it goes like this…. Revision last summer to take the shoebox size and up off us.

Rounds made bigger to accommodate the parcels being taken off us.

Rounds in the main were then totally unachievable as they were way too big.

20 plus vacancies that won’t be filled and now , in January, the large parcels are going back to the duties as it does not work but the deliveries are staying the same size

I have never walked as far in this job as I have the last year and half.

For people to call us a bloated workforce either works in an office of about 3 people or they’ve never done the job.

[postslippete]

Throw in the issue of Annual Leave especially as Royal Mail looks to have you book your Leave 18 months in advance how the hell are you supposed to do that if you don't know exactly how many hours you will need for a weeks leave . The other thing that grinds my gears is all talks are basically about what is going to happen and change on walks well some of us work in Processing where people are already working 5 out of 6 Sundays and would snap your hand off for 1 in 4 but as usual we are secondary in the CWU's thoughts as for SISO well welcome to the modern workplace where 37 hours means 37 hours actually means 37 hours

I've no idea what its like on processing and I don't like to make comparisons but I've no problem with working my 37 hours atm.


It was the Union who wanted a Shorter working week for us posties because they anticipate that more work is being automated and that posties will be spending more time out on deliveries.

So the idea of working 40+ hours and only get paid for 37 is bang out of order and I really don't know why its up for debate. We already do extra loops of lapsing unpaid during the summer when traffic is lower - so why is the business also trying to force us to work more hours in the winter as well? That on top of later finishing times does not make sense.

I'm sure Martin is aware of this

[wacko74]

they won't have any members as there won't be any RM if the union were to get their way.....

....... All the union are interested in is keeping it's income from membership as high as possible

You do realise how contradictory your argument is?
The union actually can't control the size of the workforce, the business churns around 5-10% of its staff every year and the union cannot force them to replace those staff so within 3 years RM could reduce its workforce by around 20,000 if they really wanted to and beyond moaning about it there's little the union can do.

The fact that RM has so many agency staff on the books tells its own story, not just right now but all through the year.

If you believe RM is bloated and overstaffed start a poll on here.

Is your unit running below agreed headcount?

It's not me or my argument that's contradictory, I agree with you the union can't control the numbers in the workforce... but someone needs to tell them that, because they seem to be under the misguided belief that they can force RM to remain a bloated, overstaffed company (or ''service'' as the union keep incorrectly referring to RM as) continuing indefinitely with outdated, labour intensive and inefficient working practices.

When I say bloated, overstaffed and inefficient I mean compared to what RM could be if modernisation was introduced, parcels were made top priority (especially the ability to compete in the next day delivery market) and the USO is reduced.... all of which the union are vehemently opposed to.

[priority102]

Yes, I do agree that the CWU must stop calling Royal Mail a "service" - every member knows it is no longer that and it's time Ward accepted it and moved on.

It WAS a service until it was almost criminally sold off by Cable in 2013, from that point on it became a BUSINESS.

Shareholders bought in to the BUSINESS to make money and as every employee past and present since 2013 will know, it has all been about profit, cut backs and customer "service" (if we dare to still call it that) has declined to levels that would make posties sadly no longer with us turn in their graves.

We all knew that things would never be the same again after privatisation....but did ANYONE foresee it dropping to the gutter levels it is in today?