Waiting for the post?
Ballot papers will be sent out to more than 120,000 postal workers today, so they can vote on strike action. Postal services across the UK have already been affected by walkouts at local offices.
How would a national postal strike affect you? Has it impacted on your life already? Do you run a small business, maybe you're waiting for something special in the post or maybe your life would be entirely unaffected? Is it fair to strike when the public are the victims?
That's the Phone-in from 9am. Text us on 85058, email breakfast@bbc.co.uk or post a message here.
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I am astounded that nobody has mentioned the immense salary and bonus package Adam Crozier was reported to receive as the boss of the Royal Mail, £3 million last year!! What is the bonus for, brining the service to its knees by imposing these working conditions?
As far as asking postmen to do larger rounds because of staffing cuts, along with time constraints on them to complete the rounds without any overtime, I would like to remind the Royal Mail hierarchy that you can't put a quart in to a pint pot, the rounds our local postmen are being asked to do are physically impossible to complete in the working day. And who wants to get theior post at 3.30 in the afternoon, which is what is happeneing in our locality (urban!).
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Royal Mail workers at sorting offices but mainly those on walks, vehicle drivers and managers have had it too easy for too long. Example 1. Com run drivers on nightshifts drive for, say, about half of their attendance, the rest of the time back at the mail centre with their feet up. Example 2: Union representatives given full release on full pay claiming allowances such as night shift allowance, never working a night, phantom overtime claims and never having their attendance checked. Example 3. Office managers working their shift patterns with each other, so one starts at say 06:00 then leaves at 10:00 to go and play golf, whilst his/her colleague starts at 09:00 working through to 14:00, despite the fact they should both be in attendance for the whole shift. Example 4. Walking postpersons finishing 2-3 hours before their shift finishes, not in all cases of course, but the younger fitter ones do. Each walk is assessed using a measurement procedure agreed with the union, so saying that walks are unmanageable is bogus, it is just that people have had it too easy for too long. Example 5. Senior management straight out of business studies who think they know best meddling with some of the working tried and tested procedures cocking things up and finally, example 6, an intransigent union who are in it for their own kudos, who if honest will admit, in most cases, they just want to be in the pub by 11:00 every day.
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I concur with carrie. Our post often doesn't arrive until the afternoon and was delivered in the evening once. (urban area too)
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Excuse the typos in my above post!
NewsTruth gives certain examples that may of course be true, but to suggest all postmen behave like that is ridiculous and the examples remind me of the undercover piece shown on TV a while ago. It does not ring true to the behaviour, attitudes and working practices of the postmen I have known for years in my home area. There has been a reluctance to even join the union and take part in the recent strikes, and the couple of postmen I have spoken to about this have been very distressed about the repercussions of the industrial action because they are the face of the Royal Mail, have taken the flak over the strikes, and are the ones that have taken the time to explain to customers just how hard it is to do these new rounds within the time constraints now set.
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Well, yes but it came in two Emails - today at least.
But it occurred looking at the senders - they were not what I WANTED - how self centred one becomes.
I sit here with music blaring into my ears - no offence Nicky - my love of the ukelele is right up there with the nose flute - and the missus is relaxing with her exercise and meditation techniques.
The first post is expected midday but I no longer notice. If the post is received or not.
What was the Post Office briefly employed me too but it didn't work out. We both failed to deliver what the other side wanted. No offence. My fault I am sure.
What the other side wanted? Given todays's situation - odd that - isn't it?
I must endeavour to be more a first class male to someone.
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How have the ballot papers been 'sent out'???
While I think it may have been common once upon a time for posties to knock off early, I think it's probably the case that a lot of them also worked above and beyond their normal hours. The workloads at christmas used to be (and probably still are) much higher, but there was a 'we'll all pull together and get it done' mentality. If you try and make them work to rule you will lose all that good will. Then where will the postal service be??? Do we really want everthing done electronically? It's my birthday on saturday - and an e-card wont do! (she says at the grand old age of nearly 48!!!)
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These post guys are not living in the real world, private companies are doing a better and much faster job, our daily post arrives at 13.30 most days.
Why should they not work the hours they are paid for and carry out meaningful work for all of the paid hours like most people working in the private sector.
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The government is destroying the quality of service in the Mail industry following EU directives to liberalise the Mail industry across Europe.
With a decline in volumes of letters comes an increase in overall revenues because packet-volumes are up (indeed Richard Hooper stated this in his report), and they are of higher value, so it is wrong for the company to say there is no money - it could be more if RM was able to charge realistic prices for its services e.g. Royal Mail cannot compete on a level playing field under the directive, and taxpayers money, and customers money is being transferred into private hands via false, cheap prices of bulk postings made by large business users. This incudes the "competition" which largely comprises mail-handlers who sort mail, the cheapest part of the process, and take it to delivery offices for RM to deliver (this is called Downstream Access) which is the most costly element of the process. For this, prices can be as low as 11p per item, as opposed to regular first-class prices, a saving of around 65-70% .
So revenues are not coming into the business. Meanwhile no-one but RM is obliged, much less interested in, delivering to every property in the country (The Universal Service Obligation), which is fairly obviously not a profitable enterprise. This, and public opposition to privatisation of RM, stops competitors such as TNT and Deutsche-Post from buying into Royal Mail - they just don't want to uphold the USO- it isn't where profit lies.
Meanwhile, RM has little choice but to cut costs to keep its head abvove water; as such, the management can't negotiate with the CWU because they know what they are doing IS unreasonable- they have no options, though. Consequently, changes are implemented arbitrarily without consultation, and the workforce is bullied, manipulated, cajoled, and browbeaten, into doing whats been decided.
This has meant a lessening of earnings potential, harder work, longer deliveries, and later working- some properties now don't receive their mail until 5pm.
They also have lost their pension-values from a change to career-average instead of final-salary values.
Conditions have also worsened- we now have little time for any flexibility- every second of work-time is accounted for - on the face of it, efficient- but in the real world it means that if something goes wrong, everything goes wrong, because there is no slack in the system to correct any upset. The result is that management chooses to fail on targets rather than spend money upfront- trading-off the risk of having to pay comepensation to customers against labour and equipment costs to provide a smooth service.
Pressures on deliver officers are now immense- there is no training for new entrants, nor for people transferring to other work. Nobody knows how the job should properly be done, and when things go wrong, as surely they will under such circumstances, it is blamed on the employee for not doing a good job.
The whole thing is a shambles, and the root cause is the EU directive.
What needs to happen, to restore Britain's world-leading mail SERVICE is to abandon this directive, and restore RM to a monopoly able to charge realistic prices for its services. No-one ever used to complain that mail was expensive- because it wasn't.
The status quo is untenable for most in the industry. It may suit a handful of companies which cream off public money whilst abdicating any responsibility to their customers- for example, a bank contracts a privateer, the privateer charges less than RM on the basis of cheap Downstream Access, but will not guarantee any service standard comaparable to Royal Mail, thus exonerating it whilst enabling it to make a healthy profit.
Moves toward privatisation have led to this sitaution. The public must decide whether to have this type of service, or whether, ultimately, they will be satisfied with perhaps a two deliveries per week scenario, or a mail-collection-based operation where they come to a mail-holding office and collect their mail in person rather than have it delivered, or pay a premium for a delivery.
Lord Mandelson has shelved plans to introduce private capital to Royal Mail, but by doing so has precipitated this current unrest.
Whether that's by accident or design itself remains open to question. A man of such experience would surely realise what he's doing- and that means suspicion falls on him that he is out to reduce labour and delivery costs in RM precisely to facilitate a private buyer.
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If posties don't like what they have or are being offered, they like everyone else have the ultimate sanction -RESIGN. Then they can join the real world; lower salaries, unprotected or non existent pensions, unsocial hours, no union to negotiate the most beneficial terms, compulsory redundancy etc, etc.
Posties get real before you loose the best protected enviroment you could ever have. So you have to work for your money; as we all do! If you don't want to work for the Post Office, there are many, many who would want your jobs.
Just spoken to my postman, who definitely does not want industrial action.
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Regarding a postal strike
Postal workers come into 2 different catagories genuine decent people who work a hard weeks work and the slackers and Royal Mail has failed over 20 plus years to weedle out the slackers the company has gone from feeding the Govt 500 plus million a year in profits to being in the state it is in.
The simplest answer to making the company a profitable company is to re unite Parcelforce with Royal Mail along with counters and as they used to do share the same buildings, the massive loss of financial clout has been eroded over many years by purchasing or leasing other buildings for Parcels seperation etc.
Modernisation is essential however as a company it needs modern management and not off the floor workers who are notoriously people handed a job because they were unable to fulfil the postal workers job.
I have first hand experience of a company that was once a respected part of the community in all aspects of its business to a backdoor privatised company.
All aspects of Royal Mail should be re united, all post office counters included and should under Govt rulings be supported and given back to the people of this country.
Obviously the company does employ the wrong people but that came about when Labour introduced the minimum wage which Royal Mail accepted as a target to aim for and this brought people in from the bottom of the workforce of the country.
Do I agree with a strike?
No not really I believe in the fact the postal workers should be allowed to state there case this way however striking for them loses them the very wage increase they are fighting for immediately. A much better way forward I believe is overtime bans and working to rule, if every postal worker just did the job they were employed to do in the correct manner health and safety matters included then no wages would be lost and a point would be proven.
Phil
Liverpool
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What about companies, like credit card company Capital One, who are making profit out of this? A payment sent to them on the 1st reached them on the 10th, they acknoledge the post date but still charge a late fee! Seems some people welcome the post strike and the profit they can make out of it! Wonder how many others have been unfairly charged 12.00 this week?
Sean
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This discussion has highlighted the growing division between public sector workers and those in the private, a division that the great and the good must revel in as it assists them in getting off the hook for the state of the economy!
Many workers in the private sector (hard working as some may be) are deluded in thinking that public service workers and indeed public spending must be cut back as they are both an intolerable burden on the economy! Yet in reality it has been the public sector and billions of public money that has bailed out the financial sector and therefore the private sector due to years of low profitability and economic growth caused by free market neoliberalism that's been politically unchallenged for years!
No type of industrial action is really about a single issue but rather an amalgum of many that have come to a height now, particularly in the Royal Mail. The Corporate media make out the dispute has sprung up out of the blue but in fact its been brewing up for months. Having played it down all along now of course its a leading issue because suddenly the precious business community (not people) are affected.
Whatever one's grievances are with the Royal Mail, Mail workers are in reality voting to strike against the very same business practices that have brought our economy and others in the developed world to a state of bankruptcy. For that reason they must be supported.
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This is delicious - postal workers balloted on strike action by post. Do they not see the irony? The public sector needs to wind its neck in. Does it not realise the country is bankrupt and there's nothing in the kitty for pay rises or anything else? I've not had a pay rise at all this year, whether in line with inflation or otherwise. Maybe I should go on strike and cause the whole outfit to go bust so we're all out of work? See, I have to think about minutiae like that because I work in the private sector and actually earn my wages, ta very much,
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So according to you Tempus nobody in the 'private sector' is urged to take industrial action.
Yes I'm sure most in the 'public sector' do realise that the country is bankrupt but realise as well that the reason why it is bankrupt is due to 30 plus years of unchallenged neoliberal policies by both Tory and New Labour governments solely tailored to allow the private sector to flourish!
You knock the public sector but isn't it the 'public sector' in the form of billions of taxpayers money that has just bailed out the entire system.
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Not at all - but the private sector seems more restrained in that regard. It may just be a perception but the public sector unions seem to be lead by out-of-date entrenched dinosaurs like Bob Crow more than those covering workers in the private sector.
According to the front page of the The Times today, by the time you've read this post the country will be another six grand in debt. Surely we should be tightening the belt and being somewhat more austere before we well and truly screwed as opposed to just having a hand down our panties, comparatively speaking.
I can hear a trailer on air this moment where Brown is talking about cutting where they can. All fine and dandy but dropping ID cards to save forty mi9llion (apparently) when they've wasted much more on it already is not exactly blowing my skirt up - and he'll still be telling the house at PMQs that his party is not a party of cuts but investment when all his ministers - and himself, it seems from VDs trailer just now - are busy telling the media where they're going to cut and cut hard.
Still, it's a mad, mad, mad, mad, mad, mad world...
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