Seniority - Is it Logical?

daveyeff · Post by **daveyeff** » 31 Mar 2016, 17:31

I cant see seniority being given up ever. especially if they had a mind to bring in compulsory redundancies.

hampshireman · Post by **hampshireman** » 31 Mar 2016, 18:07

ThatsNotPlumb wrote:
fishtank wrote:If you look at it logically from a business point of view based on efficiency it would make the most sense to put the "better", "faster" more "efficient" posties on the longest, hardest duties and definitely keep them as reserves.

Just saying....
That's more an illogical look at things that wouldn't help either business or employees.

If a DOM told his office this week they'll be judging each person on delivery based on their speed & efficiency with the findings of the results determining who will go on the perceived hardest, longest, most difficult to prep duties, then what do you think will happen? You'll have a whole office of postmen & postwomen looking to underperform each other in an attempt to secure themselves an easier duty.

How do you judge 'speed and efficiency'?

If I work with someone who is frantic at prep , and therefore is very very fast. Sadly his attention to detail is sadly lacking and therefore more missorts. Is he / she therefore a great postie.

I think not. But many in our office (and most others) rate 'speed as the key'

I despair most days on what I see.

Oh well.... what do I know

Post by **dark diamond1** » 31 Mar 2016, 22:58

I can only speak from my own personal experience of seniority, and yes its fair. Here's my story LOL

Worked only in delivery (so can't comment on MCs) for over 36 years, all in the same office, when I first started back in '79 I was the new 19 year old, done all deliveries in my office, sent away all over town to other DOs when no walks available in my office, this went on for 4/5 years until I eventually got my own duty/walk, was over the moon, never moaned once in those previous 4/5 years, I realised seniority was the only fair way to go.

Over the years when fellow colleagues retired we/I moved up the list got another walk, another walk etc.

Lets get up to date, well in the last 10 years or so, We all noticed that new starts (young and old), be it FT or PT only ever wanted to stay in the DO, kicked up a big fuss if it was even suggested they were to be sent away to another DO, they were livid that this could even happen, then when the big bad word of seniority came up, they wanted to know why seniority was used (it was never used for holidays, that was done on rotation), why certain people had certain walks etc. These individuals thought it was their right to have a walk and have it in that office !!! explaining to them why seniority was used and how it worked, as in when someone leaves you move up the pecking order it just went over their heads (even after explaining we all went through it), they just thought it was a given that they should have a walk before more senior colleagues.

Addressing other issues, if your performance level, time keeping etc (no matter how senior you are) is below what's expected then nobody should be immune from being taken down the performance/conduct code, sorry, but if you are no good you shouldn't be in the job.

Last couple of things, we had a guy in our office (BTW He comes in early, never takes his meal relief, takes his D2Ds home to sort, and runs around his delivery, this is a guy with over 25 years service), probably about 7th senior out of 25 guys, for the last few years anytime someone retired, he was like " that's an easy walk, when he retires I'm gonna have that walk" Well he used to take these walks, then when he got it, only took him a few months and moaned like F... that it wasn't that easy, every walk he has taken for years now he has moaned about, point being that a lot of us so called senior guys easy walks ain't that easy, its just that we are used to them (in my case I was on the same walk for 23 years with a lot of changes)

So....that's my take/story on seniority and why I think it's fair, was also a union rep and retired last April after over 36 years, glad I'm outta there, took evr at 55 and thankfully never have to work again, loved every minute of the job, apart from the last ten years, never heard as much moaning, especially the last 5 years.

Good luck for the future colleagues and would be interesting if my story is the same in other delivery offices.

Destiny · Post by **Destiny** » 01 Apr 2016, 11:04

Talking about this earlier, someone mentioned they (30+ years) thought it was wrong. His answer every two years all jobs & names go into a pot. Couldn't argue with the logic of that

indurain · Post by **indurain** » 01 Apr 2016, 16:37

dark diamond1

I take your point about a lot of senior staff also having walks that aren't easy, but perhaps if new starters didn't get shafted from day 1 on the hardest round they'd also have a chance to get used to the job? Both my Achilles and my left knee have suffered damage from getting thrown in like this, it's the same for many new starters everywhere.

You have heard a lot of moaning in the last few years? modernisation and privatisation? coincidence?!

Once again , rounds need to be analysed and evened out as much as possible. There was a guy at my old office who was well known by everyone there to waste time in his van to make his round seem longer, he had to drive straight through the top part of the round I was on, it could have easily been put on to his round and it would still have been miles easier than mine. My point is seniority maybe didn't used to be so unfair, but seniority when there is such a big difference between rounds is always going to mean someone is shafted.

motherhubbard · Post by **motherhubbard** » 01 Apr 2016, 17:09

indurain wrote:
but perhaps if new starters didn't get shafted from day 1 on the hardest round they'd also have a chance to get used to the job?

Once again , rounds need to be analysed and evened out as much as possible.

Point 1 - there is supposed to be a training programme for newstarts where they are kept on the same duty for at least 6 weeks.
I vaguely remember back in the day there being allocated training duties.

Point 2 - maybe the new PDAs will help with this as real time tracking will highlight those that are time wasting.

But in any case RM really needs to think long and hard about its induction process. They realise that money is being wasted on training because the number of newstarts that leave is far too high. No half-baked induction procedure that everyone ignores is going to help.
You can't take someone from a sedentary job and give them a 4+ hour delivery, even with vans and trollies it is too big a leap to make.

I think every office should have a half walk for training/rehab/ rep or WPC purposes as and when it is needed. (And lapsed when not?)

Barbel · Post by **Barbel** » 03 Apr 2016, 14:31

I've worked at some places but Royal Mail is like another world. It's like going back to the caveman days, even some of the people are like cavemen lol

indurain · Post by **indurain** » 21 Apr 2016, 20:05

I Was on it for a year, wasn't even where i was supposed to be based i never did see that office! the problem was it was the longest round at that office, so like you say , thrown straight in at the deep end from doing a shop job ( with to be fair quite a bit of walking/lifting/moving around) to pounding the streets for 5 or 6 hours a day, the body can't adjust that quickly.
The stupid thing is, at that office there was a 2 hour delivery part time round which i was told was a 'training round' so couldn't take anything off the long round. well i wasn't trained on it!?
barbel, it really is a caveman job i can't believe how backwards it is, well i can now, you know what i mean.

Nigel1505 · Post by **Nigel1505** » 22 Apr 2016, 13:12

Seniority is one way, but what it doesn't always do is put square pegs in square holes. Surely aptitude and attitude should be considered as well, vis a vis, one of our locker colleagues, who hasn't a clue about computers but had the seniority to get the job, so that is left to the other colleague to do.