A 5 day USO and what it might mean.

[Navalron]

As most of you will now have heard by now in union briefings or seen on CWU socials, there is intent from RM to push through a temporary 5 day USO.

Putting aside the wrongs or rights of this, and any bickering as to whether it is likely or just words with asterix' in, let us focus on what it would mean for your shift patterns, job roles and job security. I know from other threads that a few people are concerned and we have a lot of questions.

I politely ask that if all you are interested in point scoring or shooting down people's opinions, please bugger off!


Let's begin.

If we look at how things currently are; generally speaking we are short-staffed. RM is trying to attract new staff but with the newer contracts, this seems to be failing. Royal Mail is spending too much on agency staff, especially on Sundays. Mail volumes are currently very low. New contracts have been taken for Sunday parcels. And of course, RM loses a million pounds every time the wind changes.

A 5 day USO will reduce the amount of staff needed for a Saturday. Redeploying most of the staff to Sunday could completely remove all Sunday overtime and agency work.

There is no way duty holders will get away with a Monday to Friday week, unless it directly benefits Royal Mail, and it doesn't. They would have to do an enormous recruitment drive for weekend only workers, and they would be stupid to think that would go well.

No instead, initially i'd expect shift patterns to remain mostly the same. I think their first move will be to move the easiest people to move to Sundays from Saturdays. That's the people with contracts from the past few years. They can keep them flexible and move them between the weekend days as needed.

If they need any more to move to Sundays then they will look at asking older contracted staff. A fair amount would be happy to work Sundays over Saturdays.

I'd imagine that would be enough staff to cover weekend demand and also fill gaps during the week with spares.

Wage bill will be massively reduced without the need for redundancies due to reduced overtime and agency. Sunday demand will be met. Holes created by staff leaving will be filled and there will be less pressure on recruitment. Win, win, win for RM.

I don't think there needs to be any panic about job losses, for one there are still many more looking to leave after September.

All the new staff from last year have it in their contracts that they need to work Sunday's if required and most are working them with no Sunday premium. They don't get paid breaks, they get paid monthly, they don't get delivery supplement or rrp and only get 12.29 per hour. And RM wonder why their not staying we are having a big recruitment drive in DWP, so if your a bit computer savy look on the website. Starting at 27k for 35 hours mon_fri. Also new security staff on 25k again mon_fri. You will go up to about 31k after 3 years.

What IT jobs are available with DWP? 27k ones specifically, if you don’t mind me asking

Yes mate, it's basic. You will start off as a clerical grade, basically you will be working with universal credit mostly and some other benefits. If you can work WINDOWS then your sorted. DWP will give you all the training onto our systems. I will get some information and PM you.

[richietns]

So why do the government think we still need 6 days there was 8 billion letters delivered in 2022 thats not a minuscule number we are also in the summer lul wait a month we will get more running up to winter.

Why on earth would I care what this government thinks? They can’t even keep kids safe in schools, never mind understanding the minutiae of the mail delivery system in this country.

Because they control it they've just last month said no thats probably why ofcom are waiting to ask later this year with there grand plan