Runners moaning about lapsing.

[greengiant]

And the runners moan about the lapsed walks not being ready yet, so they have to wait till it is prepped before taking their lapsing (or more usually, ignore it still getting prepped, and take their loops out of the frame anway....

[bustedflush]

Personally I think its encouraged by having a job and finish system. Its weird and inefficient:

1) You don't get the most out of efficient workers because they finish and they go home!
2) It encourages people to break the rules to finish quickly because that's the only extra compensation they can get out of the system.

Other places I worked, you couldn't just go home when your work was done. They gave you more work! And the guys who did the most work got rewarded with bigger bonuses at the end of the year... in the thousands of pounds in some cases.

It would be interesting if RM made everyone wait till the end of their contracted hours before they were allowed home, even if it meant they sat in the office twiddling their thumbs. I bet the quality of service would quickly shoot up, people would take their breaks etc. People who were genuinely fast could be made to do a bit more work, maybe a lapsed walk outside the office and get rewarded for this with a bonus at the end of the year that could be withheld if doorstepped parcels went walkies etc. Less pressure would be put on slower staff (generally older / fatter / newer) etc.

The place would collapse if that was tried. Think about it! Runners would go slow if they weren't allowed to go home early, they'd refuse OT as if not part-ghosted it would become unattractive and the DIM would never hit delivery targets if sick rounds couldn't be covered by this OT. 'Faster ones doing more work' would be very unfair and would never happen as they would rightly state they weren't doing more than others for the same money, they'd slow down to match them and thus the office becomes LESS efficient. Remember, trying to make 'everyone equal' would have the same failure as communism - rather than raising standards everything quickly slides to the lowest common denominator as incentive is removed. Humans need incentives whether it's ghost OT or early finishes. Leave 'em to it. They're happy rushing, you're happy making your work fill your time.

It's not ideal I admit, but it's the happiest and most workable medium there is. It's evolved because that's where the dust has naturally settled. If there was a better or more practicable alternative you'd have seen it ages ago. I rarely did OT despite finishing early 75% of days I worked, but I had nothing against those that finished quicker and earned a bit extra some days taking docket out. In fact I admired their energy, they deserved their rewards. If it wasn't for them you'd have regularly had mail being delivered after 15:00 in urban or 16:00 rural, which I understood to be a failure.

[DB1100]

To be honest I don't think anything will stop the runners coming in early and wrecking the job,give them more work and they will still come in even more early.

[DB1100]

Does anybody take note of what Dingo say's on this forum,well worth a read,runners and ghost overtimer's beware.

Looking for it - link?

http://www.royalmailchat.co.uk/communit ... 15&t=77836" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[jetblack]

Remember, trying to make 'everyone equal' would have the same failure as communism - rather than raising standards everything quickly slides to the lowest common denominator as incentive is removed.

The Russians had a counter incentive/disincentive that you didn't mention Busted - it was called hard labour in Siberia Worked like a treat.

Agree on most everything else in your post.

[citypostie]

Does anybody take note of what Dingo say's on this forum,well worth a read,runners and ghost overtimer's beware.

Looking for it - link?

http://www.royalmailchat.co.uk/communit ... 15&t=77836" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Reading that, the interesting bit is about performance standards for outdoor work! Looks to me like if you're given x amount to deliver and take longer than what the standards say it should do they only want to pay you for how long it should have took according to the standards. Also all the PDA monitoring will be used on the people claiming overtime and saying they can't do lapsing etc. I don't think it will be the runners who get the worst out of the stuff being talked about there. Like dingo says they are saying you don't have to do lapsing if you don't want but the subtext will be if they think you had time that day they don't want to pay you the full days hours!

[woopesh]

'Faster ones doing more work' would be very unfair and would never happen as they would rightly state they weren't doing more than others for the same money, they'd slow down to match them and thus the office becomes LESS efficient.

It's not ideal I admit, but it's the happiest and most workable medium there is.

The faster ones get a bonus for their extra work to be paid at the end of the month (or whatever suitable period) on the condition parcels don't go missing through doorstepping etc. You still earn extra but are encouraged to do your round to time, which would encourage people to not take short cuts etc. increasing quality of service.

Ghost overtime done with time gained through taking shortcuts helps no on other than the postie who is ghosting. Poor quality service will piss off customers and the apparent speed of completion will encourage RM to extend the walks even more. Does RM want to pay people for doing no work? I don't think they do. Hence the SUPER LONG walks of recent revisions that even the runners taking shortcuts find hard to finish ontime.

Anyway, just a thought. Was making everyone stay to time actually tried? Would be interesting to know what happened. I don't for one second believe Royal Mail has been managed / run with efficiency in mind. It has been chronically underinvested in for years. Parcel sorting machines brought in in 2017? Last time I looked, parcels took off with the internet sometime in 2005. I also find it shocking what the old timers could get away with in the 80's regarding ghosting / overtime. It was a charity!

[Pompey Boy]

Great story in our office today. One of the worst runners and corner cutters was complaining about one of the competition. Apparrently he was expecting a package which he thought hadn't arrived. When he called them they said that someone with his surname had signed for the package. So he had a look around outside and the package had been thrown over his garden fence and presumably the deliverey driver had signed for it himself. Not saying it's good, but when you do it yourself can you really complain?

[WOBBLY]

i dont think its about showing which postie is best, i think in their head they HAVE to finish earlier than whatever time theyre supposed to finish to believe theyre getting something out of the job.

Spot on. We have runners that come in 1hr early at the start of the day to finish 30 mins early at the end of the day! They just can't see (or choose to ignore) they're working 30mins extra for free
I've given up worrying about them now, I just do my job properly in the time allocated, if I can't finish in the time given then it becomes the DOMs problem

[DB1100]

Does anybody take note of what Dingo say's on this forum,well worth a read,runners and ghost overtimer's beware.

Looking for it - link?

http://www.royalmailchat.co.uk/communit ... 15&t=77836" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Reading that, the interesting bit is about performance standards for outdoor work! Looks to me like if you're given x amount to deliver and take longer than what the standards say it should do they only want to pay you for how long it should have took according to the standards. Also all the PDA monitoring will be used on the people claiming overtime and saying they can't do lapsing etc. I don't think it will be the runners who get the worst out of the stuff being talked about there. Like dingo says they are saying you don't have to do lapsing if you don't want but the subtext will be if they think you had time that day they don't want to pay you the full days hours!

The reason now that DOM's are so reluctant to test anybody on outdoor work is for the simple fact that one size doesn't fit all,how can you judge a 20 year old on the same system as a 60 year old and using the PDA's information gathering capabilities isn't going to change that,what I should imagine they will be looking for is a steady and consistent speed,we have walks now were one of the van share partners goes out in his own car,parks it on the round,the pair of them do the walk one goes home early in his car,the other takes the van home till finishing time and then takes the van back to the yard,they take it in turns to finish early often as much as 90 mins early,we have others that have breaks in the van then claim the break as overtime when they get back to the yard,other folk who do 1 loop as O/T then claim twice as long as it took them.

[citypostie]

Does anybody take note of what Dingo say's on this forum,well worth a read,runners and ghost overtimer's beware.

Looking for it - link?

http://www.royalmailchat.co.uk/communit ... 15&t=77836" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Reading that, the interesting bit is about performance standards for outdoor work! Looks to me like if you're given x amount to deliver and take longer than what the standards say it should do they only want to pay you for how long it should have took according to the standards. Also all the PDA monitoring will be used on the people claiming overtime and saying they can't do lapsing etc. I don't think it will be the runners who get the worst out of the stuff being talked about there. Like dingo says they are saying you don't have to do lapsing if you don't want but the subtext will be if they think you had time that day they don't want to pay you the full days hours!

The reason now that DOM's are so reluctant to test anybody on outdoor work is for the simple fact that one size doesn't fit all,how can you judge a 20 year old on the same system as a 60 year old and using the PDA's information gathering capabilities isn't going to change that,what I should imagine they will be looking for is a steady and consistent speed,we have walks now were one of the van share partners goes out in his own car,parks it on the round,the pair of them do the walk one goes home early in his car,the other takes the van home till finishing time and then takes the van back to the yard,they take it in turns to finish early often as much as 90 mins early,we have others that have breaks in the van then claim the break as overtime when they get back to the yard,other folk who do 1 loop as O/T then claim twice as long as it took them.

And right there is the reason some people need to be worried about the new pdas, that bit about taking the break and claiming is fraud and should get them sacked. If a manager offers you 45 minutes for a loop and you get it done in 25 whos at fault? If a manager is desperate to get some mail delivered I'd make them overpay or go do it themselves as well

[Pompey Boy]

45 minutes a loop!!! In my dreams

[Chewster]

And the runners moan about the lapsed walks not being ready yet, so they have to wait till it is prepped before taking their lapsing (or more usually, ignore it still getting prepped, and take their loops out of the frame anway....

A lot of that in my office too. Or they sneak round and take the mail and leave while whoever's prepping is fetching the packets...

[yellowbelly]

And right there is the reason some people need to be worried about the new pdas, that bit about taking the break and claiming is fraud and should get them sacked. If a manager offers you 45 minutes for a loop and you get it done in 25 whos at fault? If a manager is desperate to get some mail delivered I'd make them overpay or go do it themselves as well

Aren't both these scenarios fraud, irrespective of whether the manager says you could do it. If it came down to an investigation
as to why Postie A claimed 45 mins for doing 25 mins work 'because Manager B said I could', would you trust Manager B to cough up
with 'Yes of course I did!' And even if he did cough up, he would be in the poop and you might be too for being complicit. Manager
gets transferred with a slap on wrist, you get binned. Poop rolls downhill......