Working Your Day Off

Post by **baldrick** » 13 Sep 2008, 20:42

Agencies charge RM around £17 per hour for staff, but only pay them about £7 ph if they're lucky, and sometimes only minimum wage.

Broxi51 · Post by **Broxi51** » 13 Sep 2008, 22:37

Let them pay agency prices if they want. You name your price as in 8 hours for a full shift or nowt, It's up to them.
Obviously at some point they will realise that they are paying through the nose for persons who have not the same local knowledge as the postie. Complaints will rise.
THEY NEED US MORE THAN WE NEED THEM & with the more and more couriers setting up this is more true than ever before.
Royal Mail posties are quite a prize commodity in the courier market because of their skill and local knowledge.

Post by **fosal29** » 15 Sep 2008, 19:53

silverback wrote:I continue to repeat this "A union is only as strong as its members". Get a local cwu meeting, all agree not to work your days off unless paid full hours. You might lose out for a couple of weeks...but when management cant get walks covered they will have to pay full hrs.

Last summer we were told 6 hours for working your day off. So we all agreed not to work our days off. Within a couple of weeks they were offering 8 hours again and this year its been 8 hours all the time. Goes to show if you stand together things can be done.

BELIAL · Post by **BELIAL** » 15 Sep 2008, 20:42

Try holding out again ,time and 1/2 is still less than agency rates

,Supply and demand,market forces ,not my rules but hey it's the world they want us to live in. Or does it only work one way?

majeed · Post by **majeed** » 15 Sep 2008, 21:01

Well, I am part-time and never know what my day off is: because I get put on a variety of walks, it doesn't follow-on the same as with full-timers or people who have their own walk, so it seems to happen that I will often go in on a Monday morning and find that Monday is my day off. I get paid for working my day off, plus any overtime.

Regarding what has been said in this thread about "part timers coming in at 8.15": it is usually the case that when I come in, I have to throw most if not all of my walk out (I have no problem with this), but to do so, I have to come in earlier than my official start time (I usually agree an earlier start time with my manager and get paid for doing so): if I came in at 8.15 with none of my frame thrown out, I would not get out on time.

I can only assume, therefore, that the PT's who are being talked about either have most of their walks thrown out when they come in on a morning or the walks are so light and/or small that they have enough time to throw in the outstanding mail.

In any case, I have heard that the frame which I first started on when I joined RM used to be a full-time duty and when the FT assigned to it left, they made it into a duty for a PT, though the size of the frame was not decreased.

robd · Post by **robd** » 15 Sep 2008, 21:55

In any case, I have heard that the frame which I first started on when I joined RM used to be a full-time duty and when the FT assigned to it left, they made it into a duty for a PT, though the size of the frame was not decreased.[/quote]

getting slightly off topic,but the size of the fitting has no bearing on whether your full or part time.
once again i have every sympathy with the part-timers,they cut your hours,but then expect you to help out as and when,because there isn't the resources to manage,if more people refused to come in until there time,the walks wouldn't get prepped.
with autumn pressure approaching,it would be ideal to make a stand,but RM bank on the fact that people need the money.
to borrow a phrase,it's win/win for them.

Spedley · Post by **Spedley** » 15 Sep 2008, 22:26

Our full timers are usually on 6 hours per day-off because they don't do the 2+ hours sorting.
Most walks were pretty much the same whether part time or full time and the difference being that the full timers do the IPS.
I have turned down 1/2 a walk before now because we get 3 hours per half walk and 2 hours prep' but only 6 hours for the whole of it!

I persoanally think that 3 hours per half walk is too much (at least in our office, max 3 miles cycle and then vans) and taht 2 hours prep' is too little. It was probably about right 20 years ago when mail volumes were half of todays but now I thin kthey should be 2.5 hours each - even if RM does save 0.5 hours.

majeed · Post by **majeed** » 16 Sep 2008, 05:02

robd wrote:getting slightly off topic,but the size of the fitting has no bearing on whether your full or part time.

...well, it should do, because it still takes the same amount of time to sort the mail and deliver it!

Broxi51 · Post by **Broxi51** » 16 Sep 2008, 17:04

majeed wrote:Well, I am part-time and never know what my day off is: because I get put on a variety of walks, it doesn't follow-on the same as with full-timers or people who have their own walk, so it seems to happen that I will often go in on a Monday morning and find that Monday is my day off. I get paid for working my day off, plus any overtime.

You should be told by the Saturday what your day off will be next week. They cannot wait for you to come in on the monday and then tell you that this is your day off. You shoud see your union rep & fill in a grievance if it continues.

moggymoz · Post by **moggymoz** » 16 Sep 2008, 18:01

majeed wrote:Well, I am part-time and never know what my day off is: because I get put on a variety of walks, it doesn't follow-on the same as with full-timers or people who have their own walk, so it seems to happen that I will often go in on a Monday morning and find that Monday is my day off. I get paid for working my day off, plus any overtime.

Regarding what has been said in this thread about "part timers coming in at 8.15": it is usually the case that when I come in, I have to throw most if not all of my walk out (I have no problem with this), but to do so, I have to come in earlier than my official start time (I usually agree an earlier start time with my manager and get paid for doing so): if I came in at 8.15 with none of my frame thrown out, I would not get out on time.

I can only assume, therefore, that the PT's who are being talked about either have most of their walks thrown out when they come in on a morning or the walks are so light and/or small that they have enough time to throw in the outstanding mail.

In any case, I have heard that the frame which I first started on when I joined RM used to be a full-time duty and when the FT assigned to it left, they made it into a duty for a PT, though the size of the frame was not decreased.

I'm on a 30 hour contract, we start at 8am and finish at 2pm,

(6 hours a day) we have to throw all our walk in, do redirections, killoffs, tie up, 30 minutes break, 30 minutes traveling time,3.5 hours

delivery time, which leaves about 1 hour to throw all your walk in. I'm also a floater so I do a different walk every week so the first couple of days learning the frame is a nightmare.

Also we find out on friday what our day off is for the following week I think you need to have a word with your union rep.

majeed · Post by **majeed** » 16 Sep 2008, 19:20

Broxi51 wrote:You should be told by the Saturday what your day off will be next week. They cannot wait for you to come in on the monday and then tell you that this is your day off. You should see your union rep & fill in a grievance if it continues.

moggymoz wrote:I'm on a 30 hour contract, we start at 8am and finish at 2pm, (6 hours a day) we have to throw all our walk in, do redirections, killoffs, tie up, 30 minutes break, 30 minutes traveling time,3.5 hours delivery time, which leaves about 1 hour to throw all your walk in. I'm also a floater so I do a different walk every week so the first couple of days learning the frame is a nightmare. Also we find out on friday what our day off is for the following week I think you need to have a word with your union rep.

Thanks for that guys. I will now bear this in mind!

moggymoz - exactly the same here: I guess I'm a floater too, as I don't have my own walk. There's about six processes that you go through before going out from sorting to bundling to bagging -amazing when you break it all down. People just take it for granted: you just come in and do the work (I must admit, I used to). Then you go out and people think you're, "just a postman, delivering the mail - 'postman Pat' ".

DGP1 · Post by **DGP1** » 16 Sep 2008, 20:25

Broxi51 wrote:
majeed wrote:Well, I am part-time and never know what my day off is: because I get put on a variety of walks, it doesn't follow-on the same as with full-timers or people who have their own walk, so it seems to happen that I will often go in on a Monday morning and find that Monday is my day off. I get paid for working my day off, plus any overtime.

You should be told by the Saturday what your day off will be next week. They cannot wait for you to come in on the monday and then tell you that this is your day off. You shoud see your union rep & fill in a grievance if it continues.

Grievence procedure over here just leads to conduct code charges

the managers are just running around wildly trying to cover the work from one day to another (and sometimes from one hour to another)

majeed · Post by **majeed** » 16 Sep 2008, 20:46

Apparently, I heard recently that the retention rate is about 40%. At the moment though, it's a matter of covering sickness absence and annual leave. I like to help out where I can, for the collective good. The managers at my DO seem to keep a cool head, God bless 'em!

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