Strike action why?

[angryconsumer3384]

We have all heard and been effected by this strike action recently but no-one seems to be able to tell us why you are striking?

[TrueBlueTerrier]

Hello and welcome angryconsumer3384. Sorry if you have been affected by the strike as nearly everyone must have been. However the reasons for the strike are complicated but in a nutshell:

Royal Mail offered us a 2.5% pay rise which would make us £8 a week better off. If they had left it at that I think 60-70% would have accepted it.

However, they added strings (22 in total) which affected the service we would give to customers and would have made me personally £30 - £40 a week worse off.

We therefore rejected the offer and asked the union to negotiate. They approached Royal Mail Management who do not wish to negotiate they only wish to reiterate their offer and are not willing to budge.

Since the strikes started it has also come to the unions attention that Royal Mail want us to increase the amount we pay into our pensions, but the value of the pensions would be affected negatively, they have also attempted to raise the retirement age of the fund from 60 to 65.

[rhino49]

Royal Mail employees, from your local delivery postman to the guys who drive the network trucks that distribute mail throughout the country have always had a pride in their work and the fact that Royal Mail was a unique public service that truly served the public - all 60 million plus in the UK and millions abroad who communicate with friends, relatives and businesses here.

That pride and service is under attack from a government and it's appointed company management that sees the future of Royal Mail as a business run for profit with a poorly paid and consequently unskilled and uninterested workforce.

Over the last few years many parts of the service have been reduced in the form of fewer deliveries and collections and less access to post offices for many who need them. It is Royal Mail's intention to reduce those services further and in doing so reduce it's workforce by approximately 40,000, whilst also replacing as many full time jobs as they can with part time ones.

The main effect of the above will be a relatively unskilled delivery system that doesn't know it's customers and will not be able to compensate for senders mistakes, for example, to ensure letters get to the right address when wrongly addressed.

An opening gambit to the present dispute was for Royal Mail telling it's workforce that it must accept a well below inflation rise of 2.5% whilst £40 million in bonuses were paid to it's managers.

We are taking industrial action to preserve our jobs and standard of living and last but far from least to preserve a unique public service - please remember that we are customers too and we wouldn't use anyone but Royal Mail because we know how hard our colleagues work for you.

Please support us and read some of the threads in these forums to get a true taste of what is going on - particularly from the news forums that collate all relevant newspaper articles - you will see that we do not work for the most caring and supportive employer you ever met but we are determined that our business and your service has a future, for the benefit of all concerned.

[BELIAL]

sorry angry consumer but my boss Allan Leighton told me you were not our customers anyway,banks;utillity companies and sky TV are. As for decline in service levels/ quality and PO closures my immediate boss assured me that you the public will get used to it,and if we the posties dont like it we can leave.Oh sorry HELLO.

[johnnyp]

Hello and welcome to RMC angryconsumer3384
My colleagues have answered your question