[News] Royal Mail what next?

[The Clamp]

You aren’t trained. You aren’t DBS checked. You can’t even engage in a grown up discussion without giving out insults. If you are representative of your company then you and your management deserve each other and us customers will continue to go elsewhere.

You do not need training or a DBS check to unofficially welfare check a person.

In fact, every single person in the U.K. with capacity has a legal duty of care to help people who have come to harm or are in imminent danger of harm.

Not a duty to seek them out obviously. Which is why a postie out on the street at a time when perhaps other potential sources of assistance aren’t generally around and about is such a help.

 

[Neville's Breakfast]

I'd like to think that as a member of the management, I've engaged in a grown up discussion with you and been civil, even when we've disagreed.

The reason that the unofficial social service argument is relevant is that one of the accusations that the CWU have made is that RM want to turn the employment model into a similar one to some of the other parcel companies, i.e. zero hours, paid by the number of parcels delivered etc (which is not something I believe they want to do - but that's probably an argumennt for another day). IF that happened, then it is highly likely that posties wouldn't be able to realistically continue checking on their customers in the same way they do now.

As I've said on this thread a few times, the market is very different - letters volumes have diminished rapidly over the past decade (except for a slight jump during Covid), whilst parcel volumes have steadily risen. The result of this is that the future of the postie probably won't involve going to the majority of houses every day, as they do currently. What I've been an advocate for, and will continue to be so, is that even if the role does change then we need to maintain the community-spirited attitude that posties have in wanting to be an important part of their community.

Re your first paragraph the answer is yes, you have been civil at all times which is the reason I take your posts seriously. My post was in response to your colleague who called me a tool. I have little regard for him.
I still don’t see the relevance of the (let’s call them ancillary) services provided by the posties in this dispute. If they want them included then we have to be able to measure their benefit in a changing market. Everyone else is measured in this way and yet tin pot lefties (another poster) come on here using this dispute to further their political agendas. Meanwhile us customers get just a little disenchanted.

 

[attila]

Great speech but no need to shout. I wouldn’t have privatized the post (or anything else) but it has happened and the world has moved on. Communication has changed completely from when we were kids. If the Royal Mail is a social service as you claim then what are the qualifications required ? Social workers have degrees and go on umpteen training courses to deal with the needs of their clients. As do teachers, TAs, therapists etc etc. Basically you are talking rubbish. You can’t just turn up and provide a ‘social service’ like in the 1970s.

I am not talking rubbish. You most certainly can provide social services and they will return. I am simply on the opposite side to you, and I am on the right side of history. The Britannia Unchained budget was the last spasm of laisser-faire. The pendulum is swinging back: predatory capitalism will soon be consigned to the dustbin of history along with its polar twin, Stalinism. No formal qualifications needed: just being a decent person. Most people are caring and decent: four unelected press billionaires and a gerrymandered electoral system stand in our way, and our benighted generation, the most privileged in history, is fooled in a way subsequent ones will not be. Wait and see.

 

[Neville's Breakfast]

You do not need training or a DBS check to unofficially welfare check a person.

In fact, every single person in the U.K. with capacity has a legal duty of care to help people who have come to harm or are in imminent danger of harm.

Not a duty to seek them out obviously. Which is why a postie out on the street at a time when perhaps other potential sources of assistance aren’t generally around and about is such a help.

It’s a help,yes. Not relevant to a pay dispute though.

 

[Brian Fantana]

Re your first paragraph the answer is yes, you have been civil at all times which is the reason I take your posts seriously. My post was in response to your colleague who called me a tool. I have little regard for him.
I still don’t see the relevance of the (let’s call them ancillary) services provided by the posties in this dispute. If they want them included then we have to be able to measure their benefit in a changing market. Everyone else is measured in this way and yet tin pot lefties (another poster) come on here thinking this is still the 1970s.

If we break down the essence of the dispute, we have the following aspects:

1. Pay (as with a lot of other industries)
2. Terms & Conditions (trying to keep things as brief as possible, the thorny issues are around later start/finish times, Sunday working and new starters on different contracts, as well as the removal of some historic allowances in certain roles)

So you're correct in that the ancillary services we've been debating don't strictly fall into the specifics of the current dispute, but, as in my previous post, the CWU believe that RM want to dramatically change the employment model, which a lot of posties are against specifically because they enjoy having the ability to be those eyes on the street.

In short, the CWU believe that RM wants to change the role of the postie so that they're essentially the same as working for any other delivery company, which is neatly what you said in your comment to spark this all off.

We might disagree on this, but I hope I've been informative in providing some of the wider context.

 

[Neville's Breakfast]

I am not talking rubbish. You most certainly can provide social services and they will return. I am simply on the opposite side to you, and I am on the right side of history. The Britannia Unchained budget was the last spasm of laisser-faire. The pendulum is swinging back: predatory capitalism will soon be consigned to the dustbin of history along with its polar twin, Stalinism. No formal qualifications needed: just being a decent person. Most people are caring and decent: four unelected press billionaires and a gerrymandered electoral system stand in our way, and our benighted generation, the most privileged in history, is fooled in a way subsequent ones will not be. Wait and see.

I don’t remember saying you can’t provide social services. I did say you can’t provide untrained ones in the modern world. Being a decent person is not enough. I’m afraid that’s just ignorant. I know that because I provide a social service, I’m a decent person and I am trained and I know what I’m doing. The rest of your post is just a speech.

Ps I don’t have a side. I am one of the many people you need to persuade. The fact you don’t bother is the reason you never get what you want.

 

[The Clamp]

It’s a help,yes. Not relevant to a pay dispute though.

I think it’s relevant. Limited relevance for sure but all things to be considered when we weigh up the value of a job role. IMO.

Of course, it’s all irrelevant if the organisation is losing £1M a day and nobody is using it.

It’s all a massive shame.

 

[nordicgod]

All I get from Royal Mail is junk Mail and a choice of 2hours to pick up a parcel once a day even though Polegate delivery office must be staffed at least 16 hours a day , that’s why it’s so antiquated , it has a bell surely they can keep it open and press the bell to call someone to give you your parcel . What a joke

 

[The Clamp]

All I get from Royal Mail is junk Mail and a choice of 2hours to pick up a parcel once a day

I get my contact lenses delivered by them. A task I require once every three months but Jiminy Cricket! They don’t hand make a best-seller out of it

I’m getting texts and prompts and emails several days before it arrives, then the inevitable apology that it’s running late, then the new round of updates

Pretty mad really!

 

[Springal]

Not related - but if I had a tracked 24 delivery despatched today, and it’s let me ‘change delivery day’ but how reliable is this ? It’s still only at the sorting office it was posted at. It’s a present for someone in my household and they are nosey, so want to make sure it won’t still turn up tomorrow rather than the date I just requested !

Thanks

 

[mile oak]

Over the years thanks to other available communication options, delivery companies and people simply no longer letter writing Royal Mail
has had alter it's business model. When you look at other European countries and their door to door service delivery policy and with the proposal to drop Saturday delivery just how long will it be before it will simply be a Monday, Wednesday and Friday home delivery service ?

That frequent! Postman Pat struggles to put the correct post in the correct letter box up here.

 

[Reagulls]

we live about 50 yds from the sorting office in Boundary Road, Portslade,
Mrs Reagulls had to go and collect our post Saturday morning (in a 2 hour time slot) so I could have my fathers day card on Sunday.
The woman in front of her had missed two hospital appointments because they only deliver the post every couple of weeks now, even if you only live 50 yds away!

 

[Garyoldfan]

Posties are leaving in their droves and Royal Mail are not rehiring. The office hours are being reduced to virtually zero. It’s the “higher ups” making the decisions to bring in profits for shareholders.

 

[The Clamp]

Royal Mail should be binned and Its assets liquidated and handed out to the hundreds of people they had put in jail after falsely accusing them of theft.

It’s an outdated, inefficient, archaic business model that doesn’t work.

In the sea with it.

 

[CHAPPERS]

'Sorry'

 

[jcdenton08]

Royal Mail should be binned and Its assets liquidated and handed out to the hundreds of people they had put in jail after falsely accusing them of theft.

It’s an outdated, inefficient, archaic business model that doesn’t work.

In the sea with it.

Plough them into a ditch, Shirley?

 

[Brian Fantana]

Royal Mail should be binned and Its assets liquidated and handed out to the hundreds of people they had put in jail after falsely accusing them of theft.

It’s an outdated, inefficient, archaic business model that doesn’t work.

In the sea with it.

Difficult now, as Royal Mail and Post Office are totally separate entities.

 

[Guy Fawkes]

Posties are leaving in their droves and Royal Mail are not rehiring. The office hours are being reduced to virtually zero. It’s the “higher ups” making the decisions to bring in profits for shareholders.

Or to keep it's head above water / keep losses to a minimum in a business which is becoming increasingly redundant, in the same way that telegrams (and so on) have been assigned to history as society, and technology progressed

 

[Brian Fantana]

Or to keep it's head above water / keep losses to a minimum in a business which is becoming increasingly redundant, in the same way that telegrams (and so on) have been assigned to history as society, and technology progressed

It’s a very complicated picture. The demand for the services are actually increasing, but the infrastructure and processes are still largely configured to a) letters and b) an outdated version of how people live their lives.

If the business can redesign the operating processes, there is a highly profitable entity in there still.

 

[Official Old Man]

I send a few parcels out each week using Evri (Hermes). Yeh, I lose one a they are cheap.
Had a 120 gram envelope to post so went to my Post Office. As it was bulky it didn't fit through their post box tester, and it was going to be £4.44 to send! Evri charged £2.99.