Collapsing for the sake of it

[Nigel1505]

"You need a rep with a backbone and your rep needs an area rep with a backbone"

Our rep has, he shares it with our DOM. You scratch my back and you can do f..all all day.

[5plusbonusball]

Thought the op was me when i read this , must be in my office and have same lazyboy manager! Only I don't have kids to pick up , I just want to "live" normally when I get home not ache and sleep.
Anyway I just don't get it, we need more staff to post yet up to 20 each day stay in the office doing the jobs of 2 maximum! IF THEY CAN'T POST LETTERS - THEN GET RID.

[postslippete]

Its nothing new at the Royal Mail these days....


It must have been like the busiest day ever mail wise with 3 waves of mech! (12 packed trays for both duties!!); 3 lots of D2Ds as well as reams of thin mech bumpf plus heavy catalogues. The end result: a very untidy paper avalanche sat on my desk whilst I was walk sorting.

And yet.........the gaffer still seems to think we can collapse 3 duties. Is he out of his tiny mind?? Did he not observe the mail traffic forecast for today? Is he aware that we now have fewer walk sorters than before thus we are leaving the office later? Has he observed how staff were reacting in the office?

I informed the lino in good time that we would pushing it just to get our own deliveries done today, never mind the 2 loops of collapse for the two of us. The response I got was not entirely unexpected. "Yes, just put the time that you have gone over by in the book when you sign off."
What's the big deal "manager I'm only working my time today,I will leave what I can't finish in frame ok" end of conversation,if they want to make snide remarks or ignore you,oh well that's there problem.walk off and ignore them
However, I have an issue with this and its not the fact that I enjoy walking a marathon everyday and getting home just before Look North starts on the TV. I don't know if other delivery offices are doing this. Bot our DOM has had the brainwave that if you finish before your time on one day, when you go over on another day, means you probably don't get paid for going over your time. It sounds fair, but it just doesn't work in practice. Its like Swings and Roundabouts but they are his Swings and Roundabouts. And there are numerous reports of staff not getting paid what they have worked even when they have done everything by the book signing in and out on time.

And so I think to myself: Why should I bother working past my time today if I am not getting paid for it?? So I informed the gaffer that I do not wish to work past my finish time. And so the standoff begins.

Manager: Why?

Well, I need to pick my son up from school at 3.30pm.


Manager: Can't you get someone else to pick him up?

No.


Manager: Well, you need to give me 30 minutes flex.

What's that?


Manager: Well can you work half an hour past your time and come in 30 minutes later on Saturday?

I can't because I've told you I need to pick the kid up from school.


Manager: (sighs) well I guess its not going to be delivered today then, it will have failed.



This was quite a brief exchange by his standards but it won't probably be the last. Little did I know that he had an ace up his sleeve in the fact that he rang up one of the lads to come in and do the full round on overtime (just in case). I admired the fact that he did try to pull out all the stops beforehand though.

And so the bullying and harassment will never stop in delivery offices when managers are trying to do everything they can to get all the work delivered because it otherwise means that they will have to deliver it themselves. And we as posties know, that is why a lot of them became managers in the first place....

If it isn't going to get delivered what is that to do with you?

A:
Nothing. Its the managers job

And most staff don't like confrontation with managers

It leads to snide comments and petty bullying in all its forms - and believe me there are many ways managers do this

And Royal Mail needs to stamp bullying out like it keeps promising to do, yet this cock-eyed way of working actually breeds it



You know I posted this on the forum to get all your views. I appreciate its a difficult job for reps sometimes as some posties rush round and finish hours earlier than finish time. Regardless, I would like to see Reps taking a proactive approach: For example when the Mail traffic figures are busy then reps insist to management that no lapsing should be done in that section for that day.

It might happen in some CDOs?? But at the moment in ours, it is like it is every man for himself. Collapsing is set regardless of how busy it is and only when one or two individuals have the balls to tell management they don't wish to go over, do they relent, but alas they don't always make it easy for you.

[5plusbonusball]

These imaginary traffic figures should be displayed for all to see , too much secrecy and private phone calls to bosses narks going on , nuff said for now.

[Hitcher]

As a rep you look at traffic figures and exit time if either are over simple we don't absorb.

6 yorks of manual left unsorted today so they could get people to lapse.

Grass...
justsayit@royalmail.com ; securityhelpdesk@royalmail.com

Doesn't work, tried it before.

[enskied]

. Roll on have you're say !

You don't think RM actually take any notice of the Have your say do you, after 17 years I have never known one thing to change as a result of have your say.

I do0n't think HYS is for our benefit at all.

I think it is a tool senior management USE to gauge how much further they can push the workforce. Most Posties in our office simply tick straight down the middle thinking that they are saying or doing nothing. What they are actually telling those above is "Go on, squeeze us some more, we are not that unhappy or overworked yet."
They would not push HYS so much if it was not of value to them.

[stan_lers]

These imaginary traffic figures should be displayed for all to see , too much secrecy and private phone calls to bosses narks going on , nuff said for now.

Our office used to put them up. Every day traffic was above the forecast, every day we got more and more lapsing. For some reason they eventually stopped putting the figures up.