Swings and Roundabouts

[theeggster]

Hi went to book overtime extended delivery basically my second 20 minute break and my manager said I would have to wait till tomorrow as it might be Tuesday light mail and I will finish earlier... Being a bank holiday mail will be like one day behind basis... I asked if swings and roundabouts are official and he said yes. I work in West Midlands area.

[Son Of God]

Was you asked to Flex?

[osgoody1970]

no banking of hours, your dom is at it.

[Lincox]

Ask him to provide you with the document signed by the CWU that is in agreement with banking of hours. Flexibility does not permit Royal Mail to bank hours. It allows them to ask you nicely if you are prepared to work over by up to half hour, once a week, should there be an unforeseen circumstance such as a van breaking down or unforeseen excess mail arriving. They must give this time back to you IF YOU ARE PREPARED TO FLEX. It is your right to refuse such a request as you may have alternative arrangements on that day.
They cannot refuse to pay you overtime that you have done, on the basis that you MIGHT finish early later in the week. Or vice versa, they cannot refuse to pay you overtime, or insist that you make up any hours later in the week. It is for Royal Mail to provide you with sufficient work to cover your contractual commitment on any given day. It is your contractual commitment to work those hours on any given day. If there is insufficient work you should notify your manager and he should make a decision on whether to allow you to go home early or to ask you to do extra work to fill up your time, either on delivery or back in the delivery office.

[Pat Ostman]

no banking of hours, your dom is at it.

Perish the thought. (seriously though it's true)

The only swing is in RM's favour and if you do not agree you'll soon enough find yourself on the roundabout towards the door.

[TrueBlueTerrier]

Hi went to book overtime extended delivery basically my second 20 minute break and my manager said I would have to wait till tomorrow as it might be Tuesday light mail and I will finish earlier... Being a bank holiday mail will be like one day behind basis... I asked if swings and roundabouts are official and he said yes. I work in West Midlands area.

Swings and roundabouts are part of the flexibility agreement, which is voluntary so you should have been asked before - its not retrospective as far as I know.

http://www.cwu.org/assets/_files/docume ... ment20.pdf" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

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Still at least you can finish earlier tomorrow without any comeback if you don't want to contest it.

[OnAFlyer]

We work like this at our office, it's miles better than having to work dead on time every day or sitting at frames if back early etc. if it's way too busy then we'll cut off, but 15-20 mins here and there and we'll do it without claiming as you can go home whenever you finish early.

Anyone that does want to flex up and works over their 39hrs is automatically paid it off the time sheets by the manager, no arguments. There's no issue if you make some time overall, most of us make a bit over the week.

I'll stress again, it's not a case of working miles over even if you don't want to - it's a bit of give and take done voluntarily by both us and managers, and it makes the office a nicer place to work. Nobody has to work over their time if they don't want to, and most rarely work over more than once a week.

[Lincox]

Thats fine if you are all singing from the same hymn sheet. However there are many offices where this is far from the situation and when someone does not wish to work beyond their hours, they are virtually forced to by irresponsible use of the flexibility come swings and roundabouts agreement. If they refuse to flex having advised the manager that they will be unable to complete, they receive all manner of unwanted grief, such as individual change of start times, forced meal breaks after only just starting shift, individual indoor work monitoring, individual outdoor monitoring including street checks.Threats of being moved to another office. This amounts to bullying and harassment, but any b&h claim put in is automatically reduced to grievance procedure as HR regard it as a procedural matter, and we all know what a farce the grievance procedure is within Royal Mail.

[mojothefishmo]

Thats fine if you are all singing from the same hymn sheet. However there are many offices where this is far from the situation and when someone does not wish to work beyond their hours, they are virtually forced to by irresponsible use of the flexibility come swings and roundabouts agreement. If they refuse to flex having advised the manager that they will be unable to complete, they receive all manner of unwanted grief, such as individual change of start times, forced meal breaks after only just starting shift, individual indoor work monitoring, individual outdoor monitoring including street checks.Threats of being moved to another office. This amounts to bullying and harassment, but any b&h claim put in is automatically reduced to grievance procedure as HR regard it as a procedural matter, and we all know what a farce the grievance procedure is within Royal Mail.

Ill point out we have a strong union rep too which does help ,i work with Onaflyer

[NewPostieUK]

Mine tried that. I told him I worked overtime and will be paid for it. If not then I'll not work any more overtime. I was paid.

If he wants you to flex, he can ask you beforehand, not wait until you've done some overtime.

[broughts]

Easy or not just come back on time tomora simples

[OnAFlyer]

Some of the above posts are why people come on here moaning about managers making them stay until time every day including Saturdays. By all means do it by the book and stick to the flexibility agreement rigidly, but don't expect anything back.

[Lincox]

Who is expecting something back? If you regard a manager allowing you to go home early as some kind of reward for completing your round regardless of volume, then that is very sad. Work your time, do it to the book, do not expect anything, then you wont have to give anything. It,s a job not a game.