Blue shirts, be afraid, be very afraid.

[BettySwollocks]

If life is sooo good at Hermes why are u posting here ?
sounds to me like u are a gaffer there on a recruitment drive, and where better to recruit from than Royal Mail ?
not a chance in hell do u get £2 a parcel,
i used to do a bit of parcel force delivery, and the accepted target was 12 an hour, although u could easily get beyond that,
so potentially, i could be on £24 an hour minimum before costs ?
don't make me laugh, no company is gonna pay a delivery driver that kinda money,
the video that Fishtank posted spells it out.

[sidewinder]

Agreed Betty. My sister has worked for them, with a gem of a area that has a seriously large amount of packets/ parcels and she didn't get anywherenear £2 per item.

[savo]

If life is sooo good at Hermes why are u posting here ?
sounds to me like u are a gaffer there on a recruitment drive, and where better to recruit from than Royal Mail ?
not a chance in hell do u get £2 a parcel,
i used to do a bit of parcel force delivery, and the accepted target was 12 an hour, although u could easily get beyond that,
so potentially, i could be on £24 an hour minimum before costs ?
don't make me laugh, no company is gonna pay a delivery driver that kinda money,
the video that Fishtank posted spells it out.

Agreed Betty. My sister has worked for them, with a gem of a area that has a seriously large amount of packets/ parcels and she didn't get anywherenear £2 per item.

Postie for 5 years, and have a few mates who still do the job, so i take an interest in whats going on in RM..

Recruitment drive ? Do me a favour bud

In some of the patch i do, theres no way i could do 12 an hour, if i have a remote spot to get to, it could take me 30 mins off the "main rd " then 30 mins back again for maybe 1 drop.

Yes, you have sussed me, i made up the £2 rate You obviously know all about me and my life......

If it makes you happy, ill wont post on here again, you can wallow in your misery, ill just count my money

[fishtank]

I do get the £2 rate if you are on what amounts to a rural delivery savo because your earning capability is reduced.
I don't get the £2 and 50 parcels a day combo though.
If it was you wouldn't get near that route because the other other guys wouldn't let a newbie have it.
I hear it's a dog eat puppy world at Hermes.

[savo]

Not 50 every day, today was only 30, which was nice as i got home in time to see the Gold Cup..

The 50 parcel days, i left house at 10:30 ish and didnt finish till 6PM, though it takes me 30 mins to drive to starting point..

The previous person who did round, now working for different section, doing the real large items, never met or knew him/her so no idea how good/bad he/she was.

The patch is VEWY WUWAL ( as Roy Hodgson would say ) I could do with a Tractor rather than a Van

I did Rurals 90% of time at RM, but spend a lot more time now driving on dirt tracks and narrow country roads, but thats obviously because its a lot bigger patch than a "normal " RM rural.

Biggest rural at my old place in terms of miles driven per day, was 40 miles, whereas now some days i cover 80 ish miles, especially if i have to visit the remote coastal spots..

The rate is what it is, i have no reason to lie, why would I ? if i wanted to make up a fantasy ego trip salary, im sure i could think of something a lot more impressive.... but after looking at some of the youtube Hermes stuff, i can understand why most/all on here are sceptical, honestly if i had seen that stuff, i wouldnt even have bothered applying for the job ( advertised in local paper )

Ill still look into RMC regular, but i wont post any more on this subject, its getting into a bit of a saga, and i'm sure there are more interesting subjects for you lot to discuss.

[krussel]

i'm sure there are more interesting subjects for you lot to discuss.

I do find it quite interesting in what you do as i have a nasty feeling that if RM gets broken up then we will be offered something the same

Do you think Hermes charge the customer more to deliver to a rural address than a town. They are paying you £2 and others 45p so if its the same charge they must be losing money or earning very little on the rurals

[savo]

I dont know krussel, i know that Next charge customers £4 for delivery, but i'm not sure if thats per parcel ?

Some places i go have 4 or 5 packages at a time from NEXT, nice for me, but i dont know whether customer gets stung for £4 for each package.

Thats why i can get 45-50 parcels some days, you only need 2 or 3 customers to be ordering a few items at once, and it soon bumps the numbers up. I expect people are ordering things in different sizes/colours etc to try on at home. I do have to collect a fair amount of stuff as well, some is on the system at start of day, others are ad-hoc, where people phone you and arrange collection. Only £1 a throw for collection, but often you are delivering to the address anyway.

[banjo1t]

Savo,
One thing no-one has mentioned, I assume you are using your own vehicle,
what about all these extra miles your putting on it?
I can tell you from experience, I owned my own Airport Taxi firm, after a year a vehicle can clock up 50K miles
after this it's worthless, unless you run it into the ground.
Also business insurance is a damn sight more than private, you will probably need PLI also,
for those wondering this is Public Liability Insurance.
All these extra debts nibble away at what seems a good deal in the first place!!

[krussel]

Savo,
One thing no-one has mentioned, I assume you are using your own vehicle,
what about all these extra miles your putting on it?
I can tell you from experience, I owned my own Airport Taxi firm, after a year a vehicle can clock up 50K miles
after this it's worthless, unless you run it into the ground.
Also business insurance is a damn sight more than private, you will probably need PLI also,
for those wondering this is Public Liability Insurance.
All these extra debts nibble away at what seems a good deal in the first place!!

Thats very true but folks in my office use thier cars anyway One guy bought a van cause his car was too small and was driving 9 miles out and back to his delivery. I could see him snapping up the chance of being paid per item.

[savo]

The van i use cost me £2K ish from auction, actually i already had it well before starting with Hermes, as i needed it for a separate business venture, that my Mrs has now taken over.
Its only got 40K ish miles on now, but i know the extra mileage and type of roads i am using will run it into the ground, but i will offset the cost of van against earnings for tax purposes, and i am assuming i can do that again when the time comes to replace it.

I may look into leasing a van in future, need to do some research on that.

Already have PLI from other business, paid £88 per year, which includes membership of federation relating to other business, PLI and free access to tax lawyer, if getting investigation/hassle from HMRC.

My van insurance was quite expensive this year, but that was because i had not realised that i would lose my full NCB built up previously, as i had been a named driver on another policy for a few years, as we only needed one car between us.

[banjo1t]

Hi Savo,
It sounds like you have already done your homework!
Well done and I hope your new venture works out well for you.
Anything is better than staying with RM!

As for myself, I've only got a couple of years left and I'm retired, feel sorry for all those young un's
If your on 20hrs paid peanuts and treat like s***t!

[savo]

Banjo

Thanks for the good wishes, i know it wont be all plain sailing..

I had a couple of periods of being on the " rock n roll " after leaving RM, which took a chunk out of my savings, so this year i'm not taking any holidays at all ( apart from some of the bank hols that Hermes dont deliver on ) just gonna get my head down and gun it for rest of year and hopefully build up my cash again.

If i want to take time off, i have to have a reserve in place, couple of ex-RM mates would help me out, but as i say, just going for it and hopefully have a nice holiday early 2012.

Very best of luck with your last 2 years at RM, must make it a lot easier to bear having that light at the end of the tunnel.
Agree with you that the poor part-timers are being particularly badly treated, spoke to a FT postie on my travels recently, he said at his place the PTers were doing as much work as FTers, but obviously on less money, and getting the Billy and Dave pro-rata treatment on all the allowances and bonuses.

[REDLETTER]

The van i use cost me £2K ish from auction, actually i already had it well before starting with Hermes, as i needed it for a separate business venture, that my Mrs has now taken over.
Its only got 40K ish miles on now, but i know the extra mileage and type of roads i am using will run it into the ground, but i will offset the cost of van against earnings for tax purposes, and i am assuming i can do that again when the time comes to replace it.

I may look into leasing a van in future, need to do some research on that.

Already have PLI from other business, paid £88 per year, which includes membership of federation relating to other business, PLI and free access to tax lawyer, if getting investigation/hassle from HMRC.

My van insurance was quite expensive this year, but that was because i had not realised that i would lose my full NCB built up previously, as i had been a named driver on another policy for a few years, as we only needed one car between us.

The federation I had PLI with also did cheap AA cover! Just hope you don't ever need it! Good luck with it all.

[labbloke]

Careful Savo, many Hermes drivers do not have Hire and reward insurance, which is totally different from normal van insurance.I hope you are not one of them.

They are breaking the law and as such can and do get picked up by he old bill as no H&R insurance invalidates evertrhing else.

Check this out on a courier forum to see how expensive this is and the problems Hermes and other drivers have had who dont have it.

[Caniel]