Parliamentary Committee report

[TopperGas]

https://publications.parliament.uk/pa/c ... eport.html

An interesting read, OFCOM seemingly being told to do their job properly or they'll be replaced! Whilst RM are trying to put a positive spin on the report on Workplace I'm not sure it makes good reading for RM, particularly when it suggests OFCOM should invest whether they are prioritising parcels over letters.

[yellowbelly]

This made me laugh:

Nevertheless, Alistair Cochrane acknowledged the risk that the contingency procedures could be applied “miscellaneously”, and as a result Royal Mail carries out around 100 “unannounced self-audits” every week to “make sure that we do not have an endemic problem”.Royal Mail appears to be more rigorous in policing itself than its statutory regulator.

How many DO's are there? About 1400?

So each office gets an audit every 4 months or so?

Or do they class an 'unannounced audit' as a manager popping out of their office, having a look around and going:

'Looks good to me'?

[TopperGas]

This made me laugh:

Nevertheless, Alistair Cochrane acknowledged the risk that the contingency procedures could be applied “miscellaneously”, and as a result Royal Mail carries out around 100 “unannounced self-audits” every week to “make sure that we do not have an endemic problem”.Royal Mail appears to be more rigorous in policing itself than its statutory regulator.

How many DO's are there? About 1400?

So each office gets an audit every 4 months or so?

Or do they class an 'unannounced audit' as a manager popping out of their office, having a look around and going:

'Looks good to me'?

I've worked at my present DO for over 5 years and can't recall us ever having any audits, apart from the annual one where they check managers record keeping etc is up to date.

Do RM even have an audit team solely set up to call to audit what's been behind in the DO's?

[JustALowlyManager]

How many DO's are there? About 1400?

So each office gets an audit every 4 months or so?

Or do they class an 'unannounced audit' as a manager popping out of their office, having a look around and going:

'Looks good to me'?

As a lowly manager, I can confirm that you are almost correct. Most offices should be audited every 3 months and no, a manager cannot audit his/her own office. An audit consists of (but is not limited to) checking for items within a DO which shouldn't be there. This includes the obvious (1C, Tracked, SDs, etc.), the not-so obvious (suspicious amounts of D2Ds) and now the newly-acceptable (2C, deferred mail). Obviously, as this has its roots in the old "Clear Office" policy, audits are done whilst the staff are out on delivery, so you will rarely if ever see them being performed in situ.
Other things checked are correct signing in/out of vehicles, PMT procedures, etc. as well as some other day-to-day stuff which most people don't even realise are going on.

Hope this helps.

[TopperGas]

If audits are carried out 4 times a year then how come posties never seem to be called into the office after an audit has taken place to explain why 1c etc has been left in the frame?

[yellowbelly]

How many DO's are there? About 1400?

So each office gets an audit every 4 months or so?

Or do they class an 'unannounced audit' as a manager popping out of their office, having a look around and going:

'Looks good to me'?

As a lowly manager, I can confirm that you are almost correct. Most offices should be audited every 3 months and no, a manager cannot audit his/her own office. An audit consists of (but is not limited to) checking for items within a DO which shouldn't be there. This includes the obvious (1C, Tracked, SDs, etc.), the not-so obvious (suspicious amounts of D2Ds) and now the newly-acceptable (2C, deferred mail). Obviously, as this has its roots in the old "Clear Office" policy, audits are done whilst the staff are out on delivery, so you will rarely if ever see them being performed in situ.
Other things checked are correct signing in/out of vehicles, PMT procedures, etc. as well as some other day-to-day stuff which most people don't even realise are going on.

Hope this helps.

Interesting. Thanks for that insight!