Royal Mail in 11th hour bid to stop postal strike

[Lounge Lizard]

Royal Mail Tracked Plus, is a service available to Business Customers only (so far). Have you got those rectangular things hanging over the Bay Doors, and everywhere else that the Mail goes in and out of the building?
You should have by now.

They read the chips, in the Tracked Plus items. So they can track precisely when each item enters and leaves the building, and by which door. So it's far more accurate than the normal Tracked.

So far, there's only 2 Customers (to my knowledge) that use it so far. But it hasn't been around for long.

Andy, Thanks for that information. As we've not even got the PDAs in the vans yet it might well be some time until we have rectangular things hanging over the door. Which comes first, rectangular things hanging over the door or hot running water, is anyones guess.

[jcjd]

Good luck to you all.
We are all behind you

Its about time you all pulled your fingers out and done a decent days work, down in the south west we have made the changes and savings, so why cant the bigger offices and mail centres do the same. Id sugest that the managers started to manage, the workers started to work, then maybe we 'd get somewhere, its inevitable that jobs will go and more flexibility is required. Its annoying that the CWU seem to manage the big offices. Send up some managers from down here, I bet they would pull the hours out that are hanging from the wall.

Perhaps if you held the line your office wouldn't have given up the savings RM wanted and you know they will be back again next year for even more. By the way my office is not a "big office" that the CWU manage but an office where the staff stick together and hold the line and do the job properly

[rockytony67]

Good luck to you all.
We are all behind you

Its about time you all pulled your fingers out and done a decent days work, down in the south west we have made the changes and savings, so why cant the bigger offices and mail centres do the same. Id sugest that the managers started to manage, the workers started to work, then maybe we 'd get somewhere, its inevitable that jobs will go and more flexibility is required. Its annoying that the CWU seem to manage the big offices. Send up some managers from down here, I bet they would pull the hours out that are hanging from the wall.

Managers manage?

TWO senior managers have been suspended from work at the Edinburgh Mail Centre after tens of thousands of undelivered letters were found dumped inside a lorry trailer.

Royal Mail has confirmed that two workers at the Sighthill centre are under investigation, although they would not confirm the nature of the allegations against them.

We have heard on royalmailchat that there could be more managers involved,they have allegedly been falsifying figures for mail traffic,altering audit figures after the audits had been done,and encouraging delivery office managers to also cook their books traffic figures at nearby delivery offices as well.

And workers start to work?

In my office we are now into our SUMMER LAPSING duties...My duty takes 3 and half hours on a quite day (not many) and about 4 15 to 4 30 most days..Then they are asking me to take out a part of another duty which i refuse to do as my own duty takes me over my finish time...Problem now is CLAIMING OVERTIME..everyday this week getting grief about it but i refuse to move on the issue..Now they count my letters in the morning (which adds more time to my day) before i tie up..The situation is now getting farcical but i will not give in...The problem in the office is there are loads of guys like me but they are scared shitless to claim overtime because of the GRIEF they will get...sad but true.

http://www.royalmailchat.co.uk/communit ... 76#p167231

Send your managers from the southwest to London, we will welcome them with open arms

[DGP1]

Good luck to you all.
We are all behind you

Its about time you all pulled your fingers out and done a decent days work, down in the south west we have made the changes and savings, so why cant the bigger offices and mail centres do the same. Id sugest that the managers started to manage, the workers started to work, then maybe we 'd get somewhere, its inevitable that jobs will go and more flexibility is required. Its annoying that the CWU seem to manage the big offices. Send up some managers from down here, I bet they would pull the hours out that are hanging from the wall.

Managers manage?

TWO senior managers have been suspended from work at the Edinburgh Mail Centre after tens of thousands of undelivered letters were found dumped inside a lorry trailer.

Royal Mail has confirmed that two workers at the Sighthill centre are under investigation, although they would not confirm the nature of the allegations against them.

We have heard on royalmailchat that there could be more managers involved,they have allegedly been falsifying figures for mail traffic,altering audit figures after the audits had been done,and encouraging delivery office managers to also cook their books traffic figures at nearby delivery offices as well.

And workers start to work?

In my office we are now into our SUMMER LAPSING duties...My duty takes 3 and half hours on a quite day (not many) and about 4 15 to 4 30 most days..Then they are asking me to take out a part of another duty which i refuse to do as my own duty takes me over my finish time...Problem now is CLAIMING OVERTIME..everyday this week getting grief about it but i refuse to move on the issue..Now they count my letters in the morning (which adds more time to my day) before i tie up..The situation is now getting farcical but i will not give in...The problem in the office is there are loads of guys like me but they are scared shitless to claim overtime because of the GRIEF they will get...sad but true.

http://www.royalmailchat.co.uk/communit ... 76#p167231

Send your managers from the southwest to London, we will welcome them with open arms

You're going to need a bigger manager

[baldrick]

Send up some managers from down here, I bet they would pull the hours out that are hanging from the wall.

You could be right about that. I hear there are 15 managers who have been on paid 'gardening leave'
for several months, because there are no jobs for them in the MC. Could probably cut a lot of Managers
hours, as a lot of them just seem to stand around with their hands in their pockets, or chatting to each other.

20 RM Appeals Managers based at my MC were terminated last month though. So Managers shouldn't assume
they won't be culled, even if they parrot the RM line or act as strikebreakers.

[norbert]

Send up some managers from down here, I bet they would pull the hours out that are hanging from the wall.

You could be right about that. I hear there are 15 managers who have been on paid 'gardening leave'
for several months, because there are no jobs for them in the MC. Could probably cut a lot of Managers
hours, as a lot of them just seem to stand around with their hands in their pockets, or chatting to each other.

20 RM Appeals Managers based at my MC were terminated last month though. So Managers shouldn't assume
they won't be culled, even if they parrot the RM line or act as strikebreakers.

wasn't there a tribunal case with a sidelined shift manager ? , he'd been on "gardening leave" for 18 months , apparently RM wanted their gardening leave army to work voluntarily , charity shops - probably end up like that charity shop in " The League of Gentlemen "

Seriously it is laughable and hypocritical on RM's part as you've got a management system that operates sorely for the benefit of the managers inside it instead of running a business . It just sounds like RM are pretending to be private sector and doing it very badly . You've empire builders of the worst kind in charge by dicktat , then the British disease - middle management doing their bidding and their cronies doing their bullying for them to make them feel safe .

It sounds like " animal house management " clones and corruption - same problems as elsewhere but not taken to the literal extremes that RM specialize in .

[baldrick]

From what I've heard, the managers on gardening leave do not have to work
in charity shops or anywhere else - though perhaps they had to 'volunteer'
to deliver mail during the strike last Friday.
The only restriction on them is that they are not allowed to leave the country.

[damcka]

in all honesty i've read through pages and pages of posts on ths site, and really can't believe some of the nonsense written time and again.

Wake up call:

RM staff conduct themselves in a way that can't be compared to any other business in the UK. The attitude of staff, managers (esp. the ones who used to be on the post) is dreadful. It's a merry go round, many (not all, but most) staff dont perform and consistently (deliberatley...?) make monumental mistakes day in day out, both in M.C and in D.O. Problem with most managers is that they refuse to challenge staff on performance, attitude, or the way in which they are spoken to.

Being someone who came from an, lets say, "different" working background, I was stunned to see some of the practices within RM.

e.g First day on the job....

Manager: Hi, my name is _________, nice to meet you. blah, blah....listen could you strap that york up for me please?
Staff Member: "f**k off".
Manager: Excuse me? Think we should have a chat somewhere more private......(cut off)
Staff Member: "I don't have top go f***in' anywhere with you"
Manager: It's a reasonable request, i think you should maybe go and get your union rep and we'll all sit down.
Staff Member: (walks off.....still ranting and swearing)

Manager to CWU rep: Can i have a word with you in private about one of the guys? (explains situation)
CWU rep: not my problem....
Manager: in that case i'm going to take the individual down conduct and he has the right to representation.
CWU: There wont be a meeting, prove he said what he said. no proof, no meeting.

.....and so it continues. In the end they were both counselled officially. With one of the gentlemen now on a reprimand.

This is a disgraceful attitude from most staff and a situation that has repeated itself for my 8 months with royal mail. Its just as well i couldn't give a toss what the CWU think, and i'll challenge anybody i feel like on any issue i feel like....because i'm the manager, its my responsibility, my targets, my budget, my staff...not the CWU's.

4 grievances against me so far, not one has went anywhere.......

As for revisions and IA etc. The postal industry is like any industry, there will be progress......technological advances will be made and the requirement for full time staff will decrease. Thats not a prophecy, that's a fact, its happened to lots of different jobs in many different industries.

I read on the BBC website that a senior CWU rep claimed that RM had abandoned it's modernisation agreement.

As far i know they agreement (go and read it), was to allow the business to modernise via the introduction of new automated sorting methods, to reduce headcount through natural wastage, and to modernisse the way that Delivery offices are run.

There is a shiny new iLSM capable of HUGE throughputs currently being tested in the Mail centre in my area, with another 5 expected over the next two months. Most of the units in my area have undergone VR strategy and revisions, which have went well.

With this in mind, Can anbody tell me what part of the agreement RM has abandoned?

I recently chatted to a number of staff in my local area, and questioned them about their strike action (which is over revision), to which 4 out of 5 said they felt the revison was "the right thing to do", "it had made their delivery easier", but "the CWU didn't agree, so that why we're out". that makes sense.......what the hell sort of business is this?

we'll see what happens when the strike goes national, and staff start losing more than a couple of hours pay while managers up and down the country get double time for doing the "postie's work".

I don't think RM will be the first to break...

[POSTMAN]

This should be interesting,please before you reply to the above post read my global announcement!

http://www.royalmailchat.co.uk/communit ... 18&t=16942" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[TrueBlueTerrier]

With this in mind, Can anbody tell me what part of the agreement RM has abandoned?

No action on Phase 4 apparently no talks either

5. PHASE 4

To assist development of a fourth Phase of Royal Mail modernisation, consultation and negotiation will now take place in the following working groups. The intention is for these joint working groups to develop national agreements, where appropriate, by no later than the end of April 2008, to be deployed as soon as possible thereafter.

Joint Working Group 1 – Relationships. will consider how to improve industrial relations within Royal Mail, including arrangements for negotiation, consultation and decision-making, the management of change, personnel procedures and practices covering issues like attendance, conduct and performance management.

Joint Working Group 2 – New Reward Framework will examine pay simplification possibilities (within the existing pay bill), a new pay and reward package, different pay models, reviewing on what the local element of the ColleagueShare dividend for years 2 and 3 will be based and MTSF. The Group will also consider how to implement monthly pay. It will also review annualised hours or banked hours, flexible working, and possible changes to attendance patterns that could both benefit the business and employees and is in line with the company’s family-friendly policy. The group will decide whether it needs to operate sub groups for any element of this.

Joint Working Group 3 – Future working. This group will look at the business’ future mail centre / delivery / network strategies and have an opportunity to input to them.. It will develop proposals on how the business will best capture the benefits of new technology, whilst continuing to consider the implications for job security, and job design and the new delivery model. It will also look at the strategies needed to grow and develop the business in a changing, competitive environment

[PARCELHORSE]

If your managerial skills are as good as your grammar and spelling no wonder Royal Mail is in such a mess . Troll alert I think!

[norbert]

I'm sorry but this sounds like something from a area manager or paraphrasing for somebody even higher - I agree about command and ignore , the culture is not always good and there are stereotypes & mirrored cultures , but it was RM that stated that many of our managers do not have the skills to take our teams forward & operate on a command & ignore basis , they will have to be retrained or if that fails - paid up , the other one was Adam Crozier at the Business Insider Awards - " one third of our managers are below average , another third are average " .

It sounds like a glossy version of a union hostile - managements right to manage and it's in some areas , too simplistic , nothing personal but I've seen vaguely or broadly similar things during the 2007 IA in " comment on this " whilst doing Google searches .

Sorry but a lot of us have been around too long , seen too much and tend to be cynical . Unfortunately RM tend to lay things on too thick

As Hooper said , RM senior managers have failed to take their staff with them and lack the expertise to run a postal operation .

[axeman]

just about to make a similar comment ' parcelhorse '
A walkout just waiting to happen with idiot managers like this with an obsession to do lil ad's bidding for a few extra brownie points no wonder mandy said there was no managerial skills in this country sometimes i think he's on the money with the likes of this guy

[damcka]

If your managerial skills are as good as your grammar and spelling no wonder Royal Mail is in such a mess . Troll alert I think!

um.....i'm on my day off and a came across this site while browsing the web, and thought i would offer a different view point. Didn't have time to thoroughly check for spelling and grammatical errors.

Like i say, this is a message board and i'm hardly going to spend as much time as i dedicated to spell checking my PhD thesis, as i did to my last post.

Try me............

My point was not that im a s**t hot manager, the point is that while i agree that there are some really crap managers within RM, the culture within RM doesn't help as there are staff who want to make life as difficult as possible for managers and their colleagues.......

oh..and also that there is a need for change....whcih will come whether you or I like it or not.

[TrueBlueTerrier]

Change the culture of Management versus Union into Management and Union working together and the changes will happen with benefit to all and a business to be proud of.

Its not just the workforce that has to change its style and approach its Management from the top down.