this months courier page 11

[bitchface]

if ever you need re assurance of the ostrich like tendencies of royal mail management look no further than the rubber band article.

to sumerise,they have been sent more and more letters from postie complaining about the uselessness of the bands.
the first question is about what three such letter have been saying.they break and arnt fit for purpose,arnt up to scratch and bring back the brown bands

all completely ignored by the manager

who say they should last on average 12 months depending on how well they are looked after.
lets just think about that delivery guys..there average life is 12 months..managment said so.
i reacon when banding up in the morning ,25%of my brand new bands break going around.most hurting like hell for a few seconds.so thats nought seconds life for 25% whilst out id say at least 25%or even 50% break whilst pulling letters from the bundles.most landing who knows where as ive no time to retrive them unless i spot where they land.so atleast half dont make it one day.yet this pleb says 12 months average,that means the remaining 25-50% really last 2 years..only a royal mail manager would say this.

next letter said they should only be used once as one snapped in his face,and thus are dangerour to reuse.

again manager completly ignores this to say we should look after them better,and change them periodiclly.


now can anyone guess why we now buy twice as many bands as before?because they are s**t?no because we dont look after them right.big fooking suprise.
lets see,i go to the box grab a fist full and attempt to use...where do i go wrong.should i carry them one by one

now i know what the term"going postal mean"
lucky the have banned handguns. i bet he got his bonus for cutting the cost of the bands,even though we now buy double

[OnAFlyer]

I was pretty p*ssed off with that article as well. They have obviously had hundreds of letters from posties about how sh*t these bands are, but totally ignore them and tell you to store the bands in a sealed container.

What's so difficult to understand, THEY ARE SH*T!

[chunk]

Rubber bands naturally degrade when exposed to sunlight they become more brittle less elastic.
we all know these red ones are borderline to begin with. so virtually any exposure to sunlight will quickly make them unusable.
No prolonged use is achievable unless you keep them in the dark!

[eian687]

i took 2 handfuls of bands and put them on my frame for the 1st 2 days they were fine but by the end of the week they started breaking,
they are crap

[postghost]

What really gets me is that RM are paying this clown to be the "rubber band man"

How much do you reckon this guy earns??

[eian687]

what really p*sses me off is when they snap when in your pouch and you have to try and get the mail out without it going all over the effing place

[clashcityrocker]

what really p*sses me off is when they snap when in your pouch and you have to try and get the mail out without it going all over the effing place

Surely when they are in the pouch they are not exposed to sunlight and if they are in a drop box they are in the dark,so why do they break even in these circumstances?They are just useless.

[anTi]

A few weeks ago there was a box with extra long red bands, they were perfect to put long ways round the bundle after 2 regular sized ones round width ways. I asked my manger when we were getting some more as they were great...his responce was "oh they were ordered by mistake". I'm still using the same ones. their looking a bit ropey now tho ...

[smokerjim]

Message to all OPGs, all of the bio-degradeable red bands supplied to staff for the temporary bailing of mail items have been certified to last no less than 12 calander months, and frequently last a significant amount of time beyond this period........how else could we justify keeping them on a dusty shelf in a warehouse for 2 years, before sending them out to DOs, M.C.s, etc?

Yours condescendingly

D. Head

Executive Director of Procurement

[lazyjack]

I've started collecting and using all the brown bands that come with the bulk postings and the bundled mail in the morning, last a lot longer and are just the ideal size

The only decent thing we get from RM now is the footwear, Uniform is an absolute joke, cheapest of the cheap, You just need to wash the trousers twice and they start fadeing

[Spedley]

I use 4 bands per bundle now. I've had too many band snap on me in the pouch and I end up resorting the letters in the middle of the street. I've also found that if you use two bands where you would normally only use one, when one breaks the other stops the whiplash from it.

I reckon each band lasts me about 1 week. I replenish 80% of my bands from the bundles of mech' and I spend 5+ minutes per day searching the office for the other 20%. We last received a box of bands over two months ago and that was only because the managers were doing deliveries.

They are useless. On the plus side, don't bother picking up any you drop on the pavement - not only are they probably useless but they bio-degrade which I believe is the point of them!

[robmacca]

RM started using the red bands because they thought they could save £££ - chances are they have. Although they might well break after a few days, chances of getting a manager to supply you with fresh ones is almost impossible = cost savings

(no wonder the public complain about red bands being found on the street )

[chunk]

What really gets me is that RM are paying this clown to be the "rubber band man"

How much do you reckon this guy earns??

The main problem is the inability of RM to listen to its workers and admit error.
This elastic band thing typifies how Royal Mail managers never accept responsibility for failure.
To use a chidren's storybook analogy of the "kings new clothes" It is a good way way of describing how complaints fail to reach upper management.
a manager in fear of his job will never tell the one above that his targets are unreasonable.
they reassure each other that everything is looking good.

[red72]

I want to be in charge of rubber bands , what a satisfying job that is.

[stokes11eg]

Ach-who needs or reads the Courier anyway----we have "Royal Mail Chat! Remember when they used to do the other mag, it was far better than the courier, and usually biased in favour of US. Then of course, on cost grounds they decided to dispense
with either it or the Courier. If memory serves me well, we were asked which one we would like to keep, we all said the other one--we got the Courier!!!