When Efficiency Can Turn Bad

[TrueBlueTerrier]

http://www.hellmail.co.uk/postalnews/te ... 1&zoneid=3

05 September 2008 by Steve Lawson - © Hellmail.co.uk

You could either say Royal Mail is having teething troubles or merely finding its feet, but I've experienced a definate downward trend in the quality of service where I live since Royal Mail started to make so many savings in the local delivery office. That and the closure of so many post offices which has also removed what were once important 'safe drops' (temporary mail storage points), is all taking time to sort out.

Unfamiliarity of postal delivery walks that have been extended or amagamated sometimes results in misdelivered mail. I say that because it took weeks to iron out these problems in my own area and for quite a long while I found myself swapping mail with someone several streets away. Neither of us could understand why it was happening and the only common theme was the house number but the road name and postcode were entirely different. We just figured that it was a case of letting our posties find their way around and hope that the problem was eventually resolved. That appears to have been the case, even if the safety of our mail has been compromised in the process.

The posties on delivery are doing their best to adapt to taking on streets that were never part of their original walks so its hardly their fault. That said, it does pay to keep posties on walks they know rather than constant reshuffling. Some delivery rounds have little nuances of their own where house numbering differs and certain properties are tucked away in areas that aren't immediately obvious.

At this point it starts to get complicated as nearly all delivery routes are being run through computer programs to calculate the best and fastest way to do them. On the one hand you could see it as a way to improve efficiency but with a job that requires a good deal of walking, and unsupervised, I'm not sure I'd be comfortable with my day mapped out by a piece of software and besides, the investment in such software isn't to make life easier for postal workers, its to save money.

'Taking out walks' is a common trend at the moment. Around 50 have gone here according to my local postman. Essentially the delivery office manager is required to make as many local savings as he can and taking one or several walks out entirely by allocating parts of the round to delivery workers on nearby routes is commonplace. He may even face more pressure from his area manager to make savings beyond what he feels comfortable with. Whilst there is clearly a need to run things efficiently, increasingly it means deliveries tend to arrive later and if you're a small to medium sized business, that can be make or break, particularly where cheques are involved. Royal Mail will always point out that those keen to get their mail early can actually collect it, but theres a charge for that and besides, postal delivery is postal delivery surely - not 'pick it up yourself'.

Nationally, many of the changes being implemented work quite well but not everywhere, and the CWU has for some time now, been pushing workers to do things by the book and that means not using cars on delivery, taking proper meal breaks and ensuring that rules on health and safety are adhered to. That seems a wholly reasonable viewpoint given the pressure delivery workers are now under. For Royal Mail, under pressure from Postcomm to perform like a commercial enterprise running on a shoestring, theres a fine line between efficiency and providing a rotten service and small businesses frequently complain that mail now arrives so late, its not possible to deal with queries that day, reflecting on their own ability to provide a prompt and reliable service.

In more recent years, with the abolition of second deliveries, postal workers had a vested interest in getting their work done quickly as it meant they could go home, and the culture of using their own cars on deliveries was created because of that. However, that presented problems in itself since many posties only had private car insurance which meant that in the event of an accident, technically they were not insured. Royal Mail sent out memos to remind staff that business insurance was essential but in the end, both Royal Mail and the CWU felt that postal workers using their own cars was a bad idea and certainly some delivery offices have banned the practice altogether, on top of a CWU drive to persuade workers from doing it. After all, if the service is to be streamlined, postal workers own petrol should not be part of those savings.

To my mind, the drive for efficiency is so near the wire, very often the quality of service can suffer and normally in a competitive market, the consumer would have choice and be able to decide who they use to collect and deliver mail. Unfortunately for most people, unless you're a bulk-mailer, that choice isn't there and the driving down of Royal Mail's operating costs means that the country's postal service (and remember that the universal service is still wholly in Royal Mail's domain) is not as good as it used to be. Here I'm sure is where supporters of liberalisation will roll out the quality of service figures, but arguably the goal posts on quality have already shifted somewhat and Postcomm have already mooted the idea of lowering delivery targets. With no more money to save, dropping delivery days altogether or mail delivered even later, is likely to be the next phase of 'modernisation' along with the loss of thousands more jobs at Royal Mail.

Of course the defence for a drop in standards of service will be explained away by the decline in stamped mail and a need to reduce costs and introduce more automation, but the biggest drop in standards has come about through cutting costs to bring Royal Mail in line with a cut-throat era of competition (which hasn't actually taken off as well as it might), not through falling mail volume which seems to hover around the 2.5%-3.0% level annually.

This year will almost certainly see a return to strikes and backlogged mail as the CWU prepares to fight back hard on the closures of so many sorting offices, accusing Royal Mail of implementing changes without consultation that could see rapid job losses. Few could be in any doubt that jobs will go with the introduction of automation, but no one seems able to say for sure whether postal services are actually a public service or a business.

Postcomm regulates postal services to ensure that certain standards are met but these are incredibly expensive to provide, particularly when the most profitable work is being snapped up by European competitors. The timing of industrial action could be crucial for the communication workers union as at least one report on the state of postal liberalisation in the UK is expected next month.

There is still no word on the abolition of the VAT advantage that Royal Mail enjoys over its competitors but its something that will need to be addressed if postal operators are to compete on equal terms. Where we go from here is the next question. Postcomm may just relax the service targets to give Royal Mail more breathing room but that could see the quality of postal deliveries drop to an all-time low and one from which it might never recover.

© Hellmail.co.uk - Postal Industry News

Hellmail content is covered by copyright and may not be reproduced without a return link to the article.

[trythat]

Bloody hell, not a bad article, I thought I was hallucinating, the same as being told the mail is going down, but taking longer to deliver.
There wasn't really much to disagree with in the peice, lets hope for more like this.

[POSTMAN]

trythat,not too fast dude,now where's norbs...................

the CWU has for some time now, been pushing workers to do things by the book and that means not using cars on delivery, taking proper meal breaks and ensuring that rules on health and safety are adhered to. That seems a wholly reasonable viewpoint given the pressure delivery workers are now under.

Norbs pleeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeease tell me you've got a copy of the 'Weigh your bags brigade' article of a few months back!!
If not i'm sure you can remember it!

[norbert]

trythat,not too fast dude,now where's norbs...................

the CWU has for some time now, been pushing workers to do things by the book and that means not using cars on delivery, taking proper meal breaks and ensuring that rules on health and safety are adhered to. That seems a wholly reasonable viewpoint given the pressure delivery workers are now under.

Norbs pleeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeease tell me you've got a copy of the 'Weigh your bags brigade' article of a few months back!!
If not i'm sure you can remember it!

I can remember it and I certainly remember the tone of the article - there was a dig at the weigh your bags brigade and the usual platitudes that we've become accustomed to -

but I've not got it as I'd to do a reinstall due to corrupted software trying to get a mate a dodgy copy of Photoshop on Limewire .

They did another one comparing DO's to be like something off "On the buses " - then there was the one about skivving dawdling postmen stroking cats WTF - then there was the other one about postmen being either paranoid or solely concerned about early darts and wage packets .

The latest journalistic masterpiece is Postman Glitter .


I'm sure the author will be sent to a darkened room to recover and will receive counselling

[Night Tonic]

Lawson generally writes some good stuff but I agree with what others have said, forming opinion means taking on board views from more than one source. Tabloids are no better. Depends who writes what on what day but I don't stop buying a paper just because I don't like one article. I don't mind the chalk and cheese approach of the press. Be dull otherwise.

[POSTMAN]

Fair enough nighty,but they seem to change their views with the weather!!

They're so f***ing easy to pull up and all,and as for the spelling............

[TrueBlueTerrier]

trythat,not too fast dude,now where's norbs...................

the CWU has for some time now, been pushing workers to do things by the book and that means not using cars on delivery, taking proper meal breaks and ensuring that rules on health and safety are adhered to. That seems a wholly reasonable viewpoint given the pressure delivery workers are now under.

Norbs pleeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeease tell me you've got a copy of the 'Weigh your bags brigade' article of a few months back!!
If not i'm sure you can remember it!

Found it:

http://www.hellmail.co.uk/postalnews/te ... 0&zoneid=3

The ' Weigh Your Bags' Brigade At Royal Mail

31 October 2007 by Mark White - © Hellmail.co.uk

Royal Mail has had a large proportion of militants in its workforce for years but the arguments against flexible working, have in some quarters, reached an all time low. By low I mean bordering on absurd. There seems to be an aversion to anything that might actually make the business efficient and damn it, save jobs, and a real drive to work more slowly in defiance at Royal Mail's plans to modernise the business. Unfortunately, few outside Royal Mail will buy that argument and it would inevitably paint a picture of a union that is simply backward in its thinking - if it hasn't already done so by losing the little support that postal workers had from the public by bringing Britain's mail system to a virtual standstill.

There has for some time, been a proportion of workers following a regime of 'weigh your bags, and work to your time' which far from 'making a stand' makes those particular workers look complete chumps - at least compared to any other industry. Of course the defence will be that they should not be contravening health and safety regulations etc etc, but like the main character in "I'm alright jack", there is something comical about a worker that adopts such a path when clearly his/her employer is having to do battle with other postal operators. Fine, postal workers should not be carrying more than 16 kilograms at any one time, but there are a select few who have adopted a regimented approach to doing the job which even includes repetitive checking of cycle lights - anything to slow the job down. It seems somewhat ironic that the 'Celebrity Postie Of The Week' on Hellmail should feature a character called 'Bob Bull' with his own rule book.

Someone recently asked why the focus in Hellmail news was always on Royal Mail and not other mail operators but the simple answer is that apart from the fact that Royal Mail is the UK's biggest postal operator and under enormous pressure to perform, Royal Mail's rivals are simply getting on with the job rather than bickering over the length of a tea break. Simplistic perhaps but more than an element if truth. Of course thats not to take anything away from postal workers concerns over the future of their pension scheme, but even that isn't a unique problem - all pensions have suffered from a change in life expectancy, pension breaks and even bad investments.

Britain's posties will tell you that their profession is plagued by knee and back problems, and one of their concerns is that flexibility will lead to a greater chance of long term back problems or knee injuries. However, Royal Mail isn't expecting its workers to work all hours for no pay - it simply wants it work the hours paid for and end the existing 'job and finish' culture that many postal workers have grown used to. The strongest argument from activists tends to run along the lines of "The pay deal isn't good enough" or "The union have sold us down the river" - and sometimes both arguments at once. Occasionally someone will pipe up with "Yes but we work in driving rain, freezing winter and baking sun" - but there is barely a year go by when I don't see some postman somewhere, strolling along in shorts as the gritter lorries take to the streets - besides, our climate rarely has sustained spells of any particular kind of weather these days. I know of no existing principle that sees postal workers as martyrs to some postal cause that we should all be in awe of either. Sure we love our posties, but not when they try to bully their way into bigger pay increases by simply refusing to deliver customers mail.

Flexible working is enjoyed by many people these days and much of the resistance to it within Royal Mail is based on assumptions and the loss of early finishes on full pay. Little in life stays the same, and if you're trying to compete in the postal business, the last thing you need is a workforce that can't respond to the ebb and flow of demand. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to work out that not only could it not succeed on that basis, postal workers are likely to be seen as lazy and irresponsible.

To be fair to postal workers, they do have few options available to them if they want to make a stand, but it is also at the very real risk of alientaing themselves from the rest of the population, becoming topical jokes, featured in cartoons and the CWU seen as incompetent. That has already begun to happen and whilst the public may sympathise on the one hand, patience is very much a virtue. The vast majority of Royal Mail's workforce understand that the business cannot continue to operate the way it is and I have never yet met a postal worker that didn't care about the job they do or wasn't prepared to go that extra furlong to help a customer. Its that approach that will ultimately win the contracts and restore confidence - but continually disrupting the mail service and fighting against efficiency will have the opposite effect.

It is important that people stand up for what they think is right, but with Royal Mail presently seen as inefficient and unreliable, any return to industrial action will simply prompt the public to demand that Royal Mail is broken up or privatised - effectively undoing any gains made by the CWU. Certainly for the union, most of its leaders feel that there is no scope to push any further with industrial action. It has at least secured some involvement with the modernisation plan even if only at local level, but with members leaving the CWU in droves, it simply doesn't have the support it would need to get the government to rethink its plans to reshape the UK's postal service. It also has to protect its own funds. With Post Offices already closing and Royal Mail losing business every week, the battle against modernisation is already over - now postal workers have to adapt and get on with the job - or lose everything.

Here in France, La Poste is still dragging its heels on Liberalisation, but like the rest of Europe, it can only move in one direction or be overtaken by rivals.

© Hellmail.co.uk - Postal Industry News

Hellmail content is covered by copyright and may not be reproduced without a return link to the article.

[POSTMAN]

Teebs,you're a star!!!

There has for some time, been a proportion of workers following a regime of 'weigh your bags, and work to your time' which far from 'making a stand' makes those particular workers look complete chumps

the CWU has for some time now, been pushing workers to do things by the book and that means not using cars on delivery, taking proper meal breaks and ensuring that rules on health and safety are adhered to. That seems a wholly reasonable viewpoint given the pressure delivery workers are now under.

[Night Tonic]

White's articles no doubt. Depends how bothered you are by it. We seem able to slag RM off but can't handle a return delivery. Still think its a good site for info though and grown a lot in the last year plus a few good articles by posties on there. Todays one was really good. Made a lot of the points we been making for ages.

[norbert]

There was those vague & obscure union bashing charges at Burslem namely " Encouraging staff not to cooperate with Management " , "Misuse of Union position " . Even the investigating manger couldn't elaborate as to who , what , when etc - he was merely following Senior Management Orders .

Then there was the snotty letters from Area accusing postmen of deliberately dawdling and going on go slows in London - that was such a resounding success in a Employment Tribunal .from the CWU - "RM's case collapsed " .

If you watch " I'm Allright Jack " it is a satire on late 50's British Industry in General and the spivvy bosses - sometimes trying to orchestrate strikes and disputes are just as culpable as Fred Kite the shop steward .

I remember all that nonsense about "Bob " and his rule book .

From Unite Leaders - hardly the 5th Column ? representing it's manager members - complaining about a arrogant we know best approach from Senior & Area & only we ( the royal we ) have the answers to RM's problems / issues taking RM backwards and reaching the end of the line due to no imagination & vision , and a marked increase in bullying and H&B claims .

I also remember this bit about these terrible postmen that think they could run RM DO's but in reality couldn't - the irony is that at one time there was many that could ; as they were NCO's or CO's in the services - there's also reps that know the job inside out too .

The real issue is union bashing - that site writes articles that'll appeal to certain RM managers , they get clicks for the advertising .

I got a book from the library written by the former general manager of the whole region in a ex nationalized industry - he said the equivalent of perhaps Division / Regional Rep would take me apart and put me together again as to why something wouldn't work and they had the industries interests at heart .

He went up in my estimation .

However he said his managers and executive board were replaced by a new breed that thought the union was comprised of reds under the bed and were preconcerned with petty vendettas .

Quell surprise - he swapped sides and campaigned with one of the unions against privatization - you guys are lucky even with the CWU's shortcomings - try working in a industry with three unions !.

[norbert]

White's articles no doubt. Depends how bothered you are by it. We seem able to slag RM off but can't handle a return delivery. Still think its a good site for info though and grown a lot in the last year plus a few good articles by posties on there. Todays one was really good. Made a lot of the points we been making for ages.

You could also argue it's a case of some very thin skins and fragile egos elsewhere on the three w's .

He's a good stirrer / rabble rouser , bit like Richard Littlejohn , internet version of The Daily Mail and the Sun , their readership like their prejudices confirmed - serves a purpose of a sort .

The Union have got the likes of the SWP to do that against RM , politics goes round in circles and you can meet the other side round the back , same mindset - only different politics .

[Night Tonic]

Well put Norb. Might explain the differences of opinion from writers. Our own opinions are usually a mix of things anyway. Nothing is black and white. More like murky grey.

[dpb]

quote
"there is still no word on the abolition of the VAT advantage that Royal Mail enjoys over its competitors but its something that will need to be addressed if postal operators are to compete on equal terms."


My understanding is that the VAT exemption is a trade off for performing the U.S.O. So competing on equal terms with competitors means what exactly?

[BELIAL]

Fair enough nighty,but they seem to change their views with the weather!!

They're so f***ing easy to pull up and all,and as for the spelling............

And lets not forget where we are right now, and ,why some voices might spout a certain line.We are all about to embark on "phase three",(sounds a bit germanic,)the biggest independent platform for dissent has been neutralized for two months;it makes perfect sense to attempt to win the confidence of new viewers with the voice of sweet reason. Win their trust and sow the seeds of doubt when IA kicks off.I predict they will revert to type as soon as the strikes loom, and i'll bet my last home grown "tomato" that my prediction proves more accurate than RMC " was almost certainly dead after the first hack"

[andy2007]

Fair enough nighty,but they seem to change their views with the weather!!

They're so f***ing easy to pull up and all,and as for the spelling............

I've only really started taking them seriously for a few months. But in that time, I've noticed that the tone of their articles, varies dramatically. Depending on who wrote them. I gave 2 examples, in another Thread. One (which I provided a Link for) which was a very insightful. And one (which I couldn't bring myself to provide a Link for) which used out of context quotes, from a PMC Thread about covering for each other. To create the illusion, that we were all a bunch of workshy layabouts. Who objected to having to work for a living. Quite frankly, I found it highly offensive.

The point is: I don't think that Hellmail have any particular bias. As a result. You never know, whether an article will be pro RM, pro CWU, pro Posties, or simply an unbiased account of what's happening in the Postal Industry.

Personally, I'll continue reading them quite often. Just because some of the articles are objectionable, doesn't mean that we should count them out completely. Particularly when they often have very good articles. Besides. I never rely on just one source of information.