National Joint Statement Doorstep Scanning of Products

[TrueBlueTerrier]

No. 666/15 Ref: 530 Date: 14th October 2015
To: Branches with POSTAL Members

Dear Colleague

Royal Mail & CWU National Joint Statement Doorstep Scanning of Products

Branches and Representatives will be aware that Royal Mail is introducing barcodes on more and more of the parcels that are handled across the business. As such Royal Mail have been working with all their customers and access channels, including Post Office Limited to introduce ‘smart’ 2D barcodes which will be scanned at key points in the pipeline.

To support this Royal Mail is adding background software to the current PDA’s to enable them to scan the new ‘2D Barcode’s’ before the roll out of the next generation of PDA’s takes place during 2016.

The operational impact is relatively straightforward and there are two main changes:

• Customers will apply a 2D bar-coded label at the time of posting within Royal Mail’s agreed barcode range to standard parcels and these items will travel through the normal standard pipeline. Some of the existing products such as Tracked and Special Delivery will also feature 2D barcodes.

• OPGs will need to start scanning the new 2D barcodes that will be on parcels. Items that contain only a 1D barcode should be scanned as before.

For standard parcels that now feature a barcode a first scan will be captured at the first point of acceptance, this means in the main at Mail Centre’s or RDCs on the Outward operation and a final scan will be undertaken on delivery routes at the point of delivery.

No signature is required on the newly barcode standard parcels (existing products such as Special Delivery, Signed for and Tracked Signature still need signatures on delivery). The items will arrive into the Delivery Offices with the rest of the parcels and large letters and will not be segregated into the tracked pipeline.

The scanning of items with 2D barcodes will commence from Monday 19th October 2015 in the Cheshire and Merseyside Delivery Director Area and nationally from the 25th January 2016.

A WTLL brief has been produced along with necessary communications to explain the change and these will be communicated from commencing during October 2015, information on 2D Barcodes and Scanning will be displayed across all units.

All employees will receive training from local management on the process and how to distinguish the labels with support from their Workplace Coaches. Handouts have also been produced and they will be given to support the training and answer any questions.

Royal Mail and the CWU both understand the importance of being able to offer customers the ability to track their items through the network and the introduction of 2D barcodes is the first stage of providing better information.

In addition following deployment both parties will after 3 months review whether there has been any effect on the operation in terms of additional workload and time associated with the new process, particularly as volumes grow and more business is generated.

Any enquiries to Bob Gibson’s Office, quoting reference 530
Email address: Mstewart@cwu.org

Yours sincerely

Mark Baulch
Acting CWU Assistant Secretary

[Lounge Lizard]

"The scanning of items with 2D barcodes will commence from Monday 19th October 2015 in the Cheshire and Merseyside Delivery Director Area and nationally from the 25th January 2016."
So those that avoided delivering the free Sun door-to-door have to do all this three months before everyone else.

[A2B]

"The scanning of items with 2D barcodes will commence from Monday 19th October 2015 in the Cheshire and Merseyside Delivery Director Area and nationally from the 25th January 2016."
So those that avoided delivering the free Sun door-to-door have to do all this three months before everyone else.

No different from the areas that trialed the Amazon scanned deliveries before everyone else

[IloveMYredTROLLEY!]

And let me guess, depots in the Cheshire and Merseyside Delivery Director Area will report that this takes no extra delivery time, so no walk reductions are necessary.

Just like how attempting to deliver to neighbours takes no extra time.

Just like emptying letterboxes with supposedly less than 50 letters while on delivery, takes no extra time.

So we still have spare duty time to take a bundle (or more) of lapsing.

Yes, my workload is a bit lighter than it was ~2 years ago, when we were delivering Amazon "Delivery Scan" parcels. However, all it means is that I typically need ~75mins overtime to complete, instead of ~100mins overtime. Even Tuesdays are usually achievable without WTLL!

Can we please have a joint statement on improved over-running procedure, as well as walks of non-Cuckoo Land size, fit for purpose in this modern RM age and take account of these new procedures reasonably?

[The_Wax_Man]

[quote="TrueBlueTerrier"]

The scanning of items with 2D barcodes will commence from Monday 19th October 2015 in the Cheshire and Merseyside Delivery Director Area and nationally from the 25th January 2016.

In addition following deployment both parties will after 3 months review whether there has been any effect on the operation in terms of additional workload and time associated with the new process, particularly as volumes grow and more business is generated.


Ok. So if I am reading this correct. RM have come up with this idea, fronted it to the union and said guys, this is going to happen whether you like it or not. We are not going to tell the staff, we want you to do it.

My take on RM's view in reality. I may be wrong..... hmmmm

Following on from the test areas in Cheshire and Merseyside, we will announce that it has been a success, adds no extra time to delivery and is now a mandatory part of delivery. We will do a review, well kind of half hearted for the sake of sakeness as it will add the rubber stamp on it, however, we already know that's what we are going to do and absolute no time whatsoever will be allocated as extra into delivery, as if pfffft. We will hail it as a success and initiate it as part of the way forward agreement.

We can pat ourselves on the back that we have added this into delivery whilst bearing no cost to the business bar a few disgruntled OPG's and of course we can place this into our 'savings initiated bonus awards fund' Keerching.

[Newbie001]

Quite a few letters seem to have the 2D bar-code as well. Soon we'll have to scan these as well, I presume.

[halfull]

And where is the time to scan even more items when we are over our time everyday now? Cheers CWU your the best!

[k979aaa]

It's more work for the business and revenue for them too but hang on there good old BOB GIBSON why not talk with the staff who do these duties and get more hour's in if needed not just kowtow to royal mails it must be done at all costs to the workforce for management benefit and the bonus culture!

[SpacePhoenix]

Doesn't matter if either RM or the union don't like it, they've basically got to do it, RM is the only courier firm out there that doesn't track every last item in its system. If I was the person of an online shop who was resposible for shipping stuff, one thing I would insist on is the ability to track an item at every stage

[IloveMYredTROLLEY!]

But all the other couriers are not delivering letters to 500+ addresses as well as parcels.

If RM want us to scan all parcels, they need to stop fantasizing about how many things we can do inside our contract time. For many of us, this means reducing the number of calls per walk and either employing more PT to mop of these calls, or offering PT improved contracts to mop up these excessive delivery points.

[meercat]

If I was the person of an online shop who was resposible for shipping stuff, one thing I would insist on is the ability to track an item at every stage

Well the Amazon packet I saw left on a door mat in the hall way of a block of flats today might have been tracked at every stage but some carriers don't seem to take mail security seriously so who gives better service? I've had 2 Amazon packets miss-delivered to neighbours on different days this week too believe it or not. 100% True.

[NewPostieUK]

Can we please have a joint statement on improved over-running procedure,

Yes, this is long overdue..

[oypostie]

If I was the person of an online shop who was resposible for shipping stuff, one thing I would insist on is the ability to track an item at every stage

and we have a service that can provide this. What we need to do is make sure that our tracked service is made available to everybody and then customers can choose the service they want (normal, tracked, special delvery) and pay the appropriate price

[Gilly856]

Must be missing the point of the moaning, we become a more proffesional company probably providing more work with overtime( if you want it) Got to be a good thing.

[TrueBlueTerrier]

Must be missing the point of the moaning, we become a more professional company probably providing more work with overtime( if you want it) Got to be a good thing.

I agree you are missing the point.