http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article ... stmen.html
Royal Mail told us to walk faster on rounds to save money, claim furious postmen
By Becky Barrow
Last updated at 8:08 PM on 11th December 2008
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Postal workers have complained they are being told to walk at the faster pace of 4mph as opposed to 2.4mph
It has long been the complaint of thousands of householders, why does their post arrive after lunchtime?
Now it seems the answer was very simple all along - our postmen simply do not walk fast enough.
An astonishing row broke out between Royal Mail management and staff today after unions claimed there members are being asked to walk at a speedy four miles per hour to deliver the post.
That is a little over the average adult walking speed of 3.5 mph - but without a postbag attached to your shoulder - and the same speed as as a canal boat or a travel mobility scooter.
Unions are blaming a new computer system for forcing postmen to deliver an 'unrealistic' amount of letters.
The Canadian computer system, called Pegasus, decides the most logical route for the postmen to deliver the mail on their round, known as a 'walk'.
On average, they have to deliver to about 400 to 500 addresses every day within a three and a half hour slot.
But the system dictates that they must be walking at an average speed of four miles per hour in order to deliver all the mail before the end of their shift.
This is simply not possible on most of the 66,500 'walks' in Britain, insists the Communication Workers' Union.
If they were just walking to the local shop or to visit a friend in the neighbourhood, they could manage it. But a delivery round is not so straightforward. It involves anything from winding garden paths to a long wait for a customer to sign for a recorded delivery.
If they have to keep up the pace for three and a half hours, the pressure is even greater.
One former Outward Bound instructor, Ian Blake, said he walks four and a half miles every day - and it usually takes one hour and 20 minutes.
He regards a speed of four miles per hour as 'trotting' - and this is a man who has 'walked 1,300 miles and done Everest twice' this year
The CWU is furious about the new system which it says is leading to its workers being 'bullied and harassed.'
It claims to have been 'inundated' by complaints from postmen who are trying, but failing, to keep up a pace which would make a fitness instructor struggle.
One postmen, who did not want to be named, said he is required to jog to deliver all the letters on his round.
Despite his exertions, he received two telephone calls from his manager by the end of his shift saying that he had 'not been quick enough'.
Postmen who fail to deliver all the letters within the strict time slot are being told off by their managers.
If they repeatedly return to the sorting office with a bag of undelivered letters, they are being subjected to disciplinary proceedings.
In the most extreme cases, this has involved workers being suspended.
Bob Gibson, a national officer at the CWU, said: 'Royal Mail is using this system to meet financial savings without considering the physical realities of delivery rounds.
'This is putting pressure on delivery workers and leading to bullying and harassment.'
The CWU says it has drawn up a map of 'failures' around the country where the system is causing mail backlogs. Problem areas include Watford, Enfield, Oxford, Coventry, Belfast, Cambridge and Evesham, Worcestershire.
But the Royal Mail says the union's claims are 'complete nonsense'.
It insists that the average speed is only two miles per hour, exactly half the speed claimed by the union.
A Royal Mail spokesman said: 'Royal Mail carefully plans every postman and postwoman's walk so that no one is asked to cover a greater distance or deliver more mail than they are capable of doing. It is complete nonsense and completely untrue to suggest otherwise.
'The speed at which we ask our postmen and women to walk is around two miles per hour and the systems we use to help us plan the most effective delivery walks are used in many other countries.'
The CWU insists that Royal Mail's claim of a two mile per hour speed is wrong.
It has slides of a presentation given by Royal Mail managers which refer to a walking speed of 6.44 or 6.19 kilometres per hour, or four miles per hour.
- there's also the don't strike boys article - you'll all lose money for nothing
