Notice period

[Andy_07]

Just shy of 20 years in the job and the new finishing times for me is the final straw , How many weeks notice do i need to give ? Thanks .

[Boracay70]

One week, that is what I did
Also make sure you take screenshots of people’s app with your annual leave record.
Had a grievance on my manager and ended up with just over 20 hours annual leave unpaid.
Saying that, other issues I had with Royal Mail
Some of them they admitted that they were in the wrong and some other they just brushed under the carpet.
They thought I would give up and go quietly but they have now received a summon to employment tribunal during the second quarter next year
They thought I would back down but picked up on the wrong bloke

[Andy_07]

Thanks

Don't know how late other offices finish but mine in Edinburgh is over 2 hours later finishing time which i can kinda manage through the summer but when it hits October onwards and its dark at 4pm and the xmas pressure arrives meaning working till 8-9 pm at night in the dark is a big no no for me , Add in our office is an utter shambles with barely any staff so we have to leave part of our duties to cover tracks on other duties which means double mail the next again day , I know people will say work to your time and go home which is right , Just had enough of the place and it's not good for my mental health , Shame , As it was the best job in the world years ago !

[qwerty2]

Thanks

Don't know how late other offices finish but mine in Edinburgh is over 2 hours later finishing time which i can kinda manage through the summer but when it hits October onwards and its dark at 4pm and the xmas pressure arrives meaning working till 8-9 pm at night in the dark is a big no no for me , Add in our office is an utter shambles with barely any staff so we have to leave part of our duties to cover tracks on other duties which means double mail the next again day , I know people will say work to your time and go home which is right , Just had enough of the place and it's not good for my mental health , Shame , As it was the best job in the world years ago !

Why would you want to work till 9pm for these halfwits

[yellowbelly]

Thanks

Don't know how late other offices finish but mine in Edinburgh is over 2 hours later finishing time which i can kinda manage through the summer but when it hits October onwards and its dark at 4pm and the xmas pressure arrives meaning working till 8-9 pm at night in the dark is a big no no for me , Add in our office is an utter shambles with barely any staff so we have to leave part of our duties to cover tracks on other duties which means double mail the next again day , I know people will say work to your time and go home which is right , Just had enough of the place and it's not good for my mental health , Shame , As it was the best job in the world years ago !

Why would you want to work till 9pm for these halfwits

That's the point, they don't want to! IMHO RM are working to an unwritten policy to make it unworkable for peeps on the old style
contracts finishing at 2-4 pm and just employ more people whose contracts require them to be available until 7 - 9 pm.

[Barnacle]

Thanks

Don't know how late other offices finish but mine in Edinburgh is over 2 hours later finishing time which i can kinda manage through the summer but when it hits October onwards and its dark at 4pm and the xmas pressure arrives meaning working till 8-9 pm at night in the dark is a big no no for me , Add in our office is an utter shambles with barely any staff so we have to leave part of our duties to cover tracks on other duties which means double mail the next again day , I know people will say work to your time and go home which is right , Just had enough of the place and it's not good for my mental health , Shame , As it was the best job in the world years ago !

Why would you want to work till 9pm for these halfwits

That's the point, they don't want to! IMHO RM are working to an unwritten policy to make it unworkable for peeps on the old style
contracts finishing at 2-4 pm and just employ more people whose contracts require them to be available until 7 - 9 pm.

That’s what it looks like to me. Instead of messing about with VR they are playing the longer game of making people on older contracts leave and flooding offices with new contract staff. There’ll be a tipping point soon where more people are on newer contracts and then the pressure on the golden oldies will really start.

That’s my theory anyway.

[Barnacle]

Thanks

Don't know how late other offices finish but mine in Edinburgh is over 2 hours later finishing time which i can kinda manage through the summer but when it hits October onwards and its dark at 4pm and the xmas pressure arrives meaning working till 8-9 pm at night in the dark is a big no no for me , Add in our office is an utter shambles with barely any staff so we have to leave part of our duties to cover tracks on other duties which means double mail the next again day , I know people will say work to your time and go home which is right , Just had enough of the place and it's not good for my mental health , Shame , As it was the best job in the world years ago !

Your office sounds an absolute joy. Not

[Acca Dacca]

Thanks

Don't know how late other offices finish but mine in Edinburgh is over 2 hours later finishing time which i can kinda manage through the summer but when it hits October onwards and its dark at 4pm and the xmas pressure arrives meaning working till 8-9 pm at night in the dark is a big no no for me , Add in our office is an utter shambles with barely any staff so we have to leave part of our duties to cover tracks on other duties which means double mail the next again day , I know people will say work to your time and go home which is right , Just had enough of the place and it's not good for my mental health , Shame , As it was the best job in the world years ago !

Why would you need to work till 8-9pm during the pressure? What is your current oficial finishing time?

[R5001]

Thanks

Don't know how late other offices finish but mine in Edinburgh is over 2 hours later finishing time which i can kinda manage through the summer but when it hits October onwards and its dark at 4pm and the xmas pressure arrives meaning working till 8-9 pm at night in the dark is a big no no for me , Add in our office is an utter shambles with barely any staff so we have to leave part of our duties to cover tracks on other duties which means double mail the next again day , I know people will say work to your time and go home which is right , Just had enough of the place and it's not good for my mental health , Shame , As it was the best job in the world years ago !

Why would you want to work till 9pm for these halfwits

That's the point, they don't want to! IMHO RM are working to an unwritten policy to make it unworkable for peeps on the old style
contracts finishing at 2-4 pm and just employ more people whose contracts require them to be available until 7 - 9 pm.

That’s what it looks like to me. Instead of messing about with VR they are playing the longer game of making people on older contracts leave and flooding offices with new contract staff. There’ll be a tipping point soon where more people are on newer contracts and then the pressure on the golden oldies will really start.

That’s my theory anyway.

It's already pretty clear they would prefer to offer overtime to those on lesser contracts already in my office. Sunday OT is a no go now, unless they're real desperate if you're on an old contract.

This is the biggest f**k up the union made imo, the 2 level contracts mean we (Older weekly contracts) get treated better by the letter of the contract, but newbies are cheaper and better to "use" for excess work. I don't know where the breakpoint is, but I suspect some of those who do silly overtime might actually be better off on the newer contracts, if they don't do work with any kind of premium they don't get (Sundays, lates, earliers, nights etc).

[Andy_07]

Thanks

Don't know how late other offices finish but mine in Edinburgh is over 2 hours later finishing time which i can kinda manage through the summer but when it hits October onwards and its dark at 4pm and the xmas pressure arrives meaning working till 8-9 pm at night in the dark is a big no no for me , Add in our office is an utter shambles with barely any staff so we have to leave part of our duties to cover tracks on other duties which means double mail the next again day , I know people will say work to your time and go home which is right , Just had enough of the place and it's not good for my mental health , Shame , As it was the best job in the world years ago !

Why would you need to work till 8-9pm during the pressure? What is your current oficial finishing time?

On a rural new finishing time is 5pm . Throw in xmas pressure and your leaving the office at 1pm instead of 11am . I'm on IP with only 1 other person , We have over 1 thousand new houses with no additional help we are expected to sort letters and parcels between the 2 of us which takes so much time

Anyway like i said guys i'm out the place very soon so thanks for the input

[Perseus]

Does the funding for new contract overtime come from a different budget? Or is it just preferred to use new entrants as you can pay them for it 4-6 weeks later. I know it's 'cheaper' per hour, but it's often paid at time x 1.25 after a point, plus it often takes new entrants 3 hours to do something an experienced staff member can do in 2 hours. Or like people say, maybe it's a long game with the older staff. Possibly a bit of everything above?

[Smoothbackground]

As someone on the new contract, I would observe that it is the longstanding staff who are really feeling the pressure at the minute.

Our deep rurals are now failing daily as the guys are leaving so much later and just can’t complete (because their start times have been “cushioned”, meaning they really should be starting 70 minutes than they actually are and as a consequence are stood around for at least an hour in the morning). This is manageable at the minute as “late staff”, as we are colloquially referred to, can go back out in the afternoon with the cut-offs. Come October, due to darkness etc, this won’t be possible. Managers are already alive to this, and a cover manager insensitively told one such dutyholder they are at risk of losing their duty and it being given to someone who can complete it (ie a new-style employee). They are almost being set up to fail. The business is hoping on some “natural attrition” imho.

[R5001]

Does the funding for new contract overtime come from a different budget? Or is it just preferred to use new entrants as you can pay them for it 4-6 weeks later. I know it's 'cheaper' per hour, but it's often paid at time x 1.25 after a point, plus it often takes new entrants 3 hours to do something an experienced staff member can do in 2 hours. Or like people say, maybe it's a long game with the older staff. Possibly a bit of everything above?

There will be some variance, and I don't know the specific numbers, but new starts on 30 hours cost something like 15% less to employ per hour. It'd take them doing over 40 hours to start breaking even per hour (that 1.25x), at the 40th hour, so they get 10 hours ot per newbie cheaper than an oldie, meaning as soon as the balance hits about 30% newbies, newbies are better. Plus you need to bear in mind that Part Time OT up to Full Time Hours is paid the same as if they were FT for those hours on old contracts, newbies, afaik, get no such incentive. ("Ot1 1st 10 hours" or whatever it is.)

Honestly, if I get bored I might try and work this out, it'd be interesting to find the breakpoint. I suspect newbies will be cheaper in many cases, otherwise, why would they push that s**t contract?

[norris9]

New starts potentially leave the company quicker, so has the attrition rate gone up? = extra costs in recruiting and training.

It is quite common for posties not to get paid properly for the overtime they do which makes them permanently stop doing any overtime. It's outrageous. Have even been told of managers refusing to pay posties overtime because they think the postie is booking too much time, the postie stops doing overtime, then the managers are screwed as mail is always coming back.

A new start told me recently that him and his new van-share partner both weren't being paid properly so they can't be bothered with the overtime.

The company treats their staff like cr@p.

[LouBarlow]

It is all very well saying they just want to flood offices with new starters on inferior contracts, but I have to say, the standard coming forward to sign up nowadays is not good. I realise it is a generalisation, but the turnover for new starters is ridiculous in our office. I see new faces most weeks now, who leave so quickly I don’t even have time to learn their names. And as much as it pains me to say, a lot of the newbies are terrible at the job and really don’t care to improve. I can’t say I blame them either, given how they are treated by both the company and most of the established workers (not gonna use the ‘old guard’ phrase).

There will come a point where RM will realise that people don’t want to do this job for the peanuts they pay and the inferior terms they offer, if you make their working life more difficult, especially if they have kids or other commitments. Especially when the weather turns to s**t again later this week.