6 day USO

[Barnacle]

I looked this up.... the only media reporting this is The Telegraph and I can't read the article because you need a subscription....

Found an article on La Poste's website.... doesn't say anything about a 3 day USO, it actually mentions about maintaining the current USO in France of 6 days. The only thing relating to 3 days was a type of delivery you can choose which takes 3 days, but they still offer a next day service so no idea how that means they can go to a 3 day service. I wouldn't be surprised if it's nonsense and seeing as it's the telegraph again - I would not be surprised if this is a paid for article by Royal Mail to encourage the government to reduce the service.


Anyhow - these days the world is heading for 4 day working week, but you get paid the equivalent to 5 days. So feel free to drop the service to 4 days, but pay us for 5.

Totally agree with the 4 day working week,i've seen lots of companies adopting this lately and are getting more productivity,never understood why RM didn't go for the 3 on 4 off model 3 12hr shifts,do your mail 1st return to office for an hour break then deliver your parcels no need for any agency,going back 10 years ago i shared a duty with someone and we done 3 10 hr days 30 hrs a week and it worked really well after the revision they stopped it.

We serve business and business doesn’t work a 4 day week. So while shift patterns could change, the USO should not be reduced to suit the desire of the owners of RM to become a parcel service.

[stevejm]

France today have said they'll only be delivering letters three days a week. Germany are the only other six day letter service in Europe I believe, and they had plans to drop to that until the change of government there meant plans hit a snag. Might be time for the CWU to make this concession and agree to lobby to government with Royal Mail to make this happen, in the hope of concessions elsewhere.

Fake news, it's not true, France still delivers letters 6 days a week.

from DT >>

"France is to move to three-days-a-week letter deliveries from the start of next year as ministers in Britain resist pleas from Royal Mail to axe Saturday postal rounds.

Letters will also be delivered within three days in a major shake-up that French bosses say will reduce La Poste's carbon footprint.

Next-day deliveries will only be available if customers email the text to La Poste, which will then print out the letter at a local branch before passing it to a postal worker."

[Barnacle]

[/quote]

Next-day deliveries will only be available if customers email the text to La Poste, which will then print out the letter at a local branch before passing it to a postal worker."
[/quote]


That could never happen here. I know it happened when we used telegrams but we have privacy and data protection laws now.

I don’t think we should be looking to France as a way forward.

[peterwyles]

Telegraph article is incorrect ,go to la poste website for correct details, France will still have a 6 day USO because that's what the public wants

[Barnacle]

Telegraph article is incorrect ,go to la poste website for correct details, France will still have a 6 day USO because that's what the public wants

Good.

[Binsey]

A bit like Belgium then……

[TopperGas]

Telegraph article is incorrect ,go to la poste website for correct details, France will still have a 6 day USO because that's what the public wants

It seems they are moving to a hybrid next day service where letters are emailed by the customer to a local office and then printed off locally before being delivered. I assume that's an attempt to encourage most customers to use the 3 day service.

La Poste has been running up massive annual losses:

"In 2020, the fall in mail volumes accelerated rapidly. Due to this, the universal postal service in France, which is one of La Poste's four public service missions, lost a lot of money (to the tune of 1.1 billion euros).

On 22 July 2021, the French Government announced it would allocate an annual budget of €500 to €520 million (depending on the quality of service results) to partially compensate for the universal postal service deficit."

[Jen1]

This sounds great not having to work weekends but if everyone is working Monday to Friday then cover duties will no longer be required

Who would cover annual leave, sickness etc? I know it’s easy to say lapsing, not so easy if it’s a rural 20 miles away with the duty holder on long term sick.

Reserves like they do now
don’t know about your office but in ours we have full timers with their own duty

Then we have cover duties where they have 3 regular duties they cover when it’s the duty holders day off and they work 4 days a week

Then we have reserves (like me) that get put on anything and everything depending on who’s off sick or we might do mop up on busy days or whatever

[SpacePhoenix]

This sounds great not having to work weekends but if everyone is working Monday to Friday then cover duties will no longer be required

Who would cover annual leave, sickness etc? I know it’s easy to say lapsing, not so easy if it’s a rural 20 miles away with the duty holder on long term sick.

Reserves like they do now
don’t know about your office but in ours we have full timers with their own duty

Then we have cover duties where they have 3 regular duties they cover when it’s the duty holders day off and they work 4 days a week

Then we have reserves (like me) that get put on anything and everything depending on who’s off sick or we might do mop up on busy days or whatever

Will anyone at any MC or DO actually have their own duty soon? It's been mentioned in another thread that one thing RM are thinking about is that managers will allocate duties (walks in DOs) each day

[Barnacle]

[/quote]

Will anyone at any MC or DO actually have their own duty soon? It's been mentioned in another thread that one thing RM are thinking about is that managers will allocate duties (walks in DOs) each day
[/quote]


I would be in favour of a monthly rotation system where duty holders are moved to a different walk for a week each month.

Reason being that some have done the same walk for YEARS and YEARS and are very set in their ways and have no understanding of other walks.

Plus, learning something different is good for the brain so it’s in their best interests

[priority102]

I was told that the future will most definitely be a day's work for a day's pay, allocated by managers. It's not a proposal, it's a definite, just a case of when.

"Signed for" duties will be going out of the window, as the duties belong to Royal Mail they will decide who delivers where. Whether 87 year old Fred who refuses to retire and has been on his cushy rural delivery since 1960 will be affected who knows.....

[Splappy_McSplap]

I would be in favour of a monthly rotation system where duty holders are moved to a different walk for a week each month.

Reason being that some have done the same walk for YEARS and YEARS and are very set in their ways and have no understanding of other walks.

Plus, learning something different is good for the brain so it’s in their best interests

Putting someone who has never done a business job, or even a particular business job out to some industrial estate to deliver that business job is idiotic, nothing else.

There is a reason that posties do the same walks for years. It is more efficient and it is better for the customers. I got a Christmas card for number 18 last week that I knew from the name was actually for number 14. That is just one example.

I am guessing you don't have much seniority.

[Splappy_McSplap]

I was told that the future will most definitely be a day's work for a day's pay, allocated by managers. It's not a proposal, it's a definite, just a case of when.

If it's allocated by the managers then it will be a day and a half's work for a day's pay.

[guardianangel]

Totally agree with the 4 day working week,i've seen lots of companies adopting this lately and are getting more productivity,never understood why RM didn't go for the 3 on 4 off model 3 12hr shifts,do your mail 1st return to office for an hour break then deliver your parcels no need for any agency,

Might be down to the average travel times between DOs and the start of walks. There must be loads of walks these days that are a long way from the location of the DO where DOs have been moved onto industrial estates

yep if they move our start times back we will be bang in rush hour and a normal 20 to 30 min drive to delivery will take an hour,this will cost an extra £1250 per year for man hours per delivery in my postcode only, it will cost royal mail an extra £37440 a year for our post code area not including doubling the fuel,that's roughly 7500 extra large parcels to deliver before you even start to make it viable in one postcode area,personally i can't see my customers sitting up until midnight to order for next day delivery to make it viable,maybe thats the reason to start new entrants on worse pay and conditions,i'm no economist but the figures don't add up . Surely its better to concentrate on being the best delivery company rather than the same as all the others,in my opinion we have the perfect model but what would i know im just a postman.I have an idea supply all households with a dedicated parcels bin for royal mail parcels only.

[guardianangel]

I looked this up.... the only media reporting this is The Telegraph and I can't read the article because you need a subscription....

Found an article on La Poste's website.... doesn't say anything about a 3 day USO, it actually mentions about maintaining the current USO in France of 6 days. The only thing relating to 3 days was a type of delivery you can choose which takes 3 days, but they still offer a next day service so no idea how that means they can go to a 3 day service. I wouldn't be surprised if it's nonsense and seeing as it's the telegraph again - I would not be surprised if this is a paid for article by Royal Mail to encourage the government to reduce the service.


Anyhow - these days the world is heading for 4 day working week, but you get paid the equivalent to 5 days. So feel free to drop the service to 4 days, but pay us for 5.

Totally agree with the 4 day working week,i've seen lots of companies adopting this lately and are getting more productivity,never understood why RM didn't go for the 3 on 4 off model 3 12hr shifts,do your mail 1st return to office for an hour break then deliver your parcels no need for any agency,going back 10 years ago i shared a duty with someone and we done 3 10 hr days 30 hrs a week and it worked really well after the revision they stopped it.

We serve business and business doesn’t work a 4 day week. So while shift patterns could change, the USO should not be reduced to suit the desire of the owners of RM to become a parcel service.

Why couldn't we have a 7 day service with full timers doing 4 days and part timers doing 3 days rotating no need for floats,the daily working pattern is not keeping up with the world of work today,nhs,supermarkets and nearly all 24 hour working jobs have these type of patterns,maybe its time for change that doesnt mean i agree with putting the times back because i think that will be bad for royal mail but more days off in our job is what we need to aim for.