Personal Safety

[estelle]

Is it really the case that if a postie voices concerns about their increasing concern over their own personal safety on a particular walk, RM will do nothing unless said postie is the victim of an attack?

[stokes11eg]

No, in theory at least. They should investigate your concerns. If you perhaps feel threatened by a customer for example, you could refuse to deliver mail. Much as I hate to compliment Management, in our office they normally take our complaints seriously.We use to have two outsize chaps, who, if female staff were having problems ,turned yp at the troublemakers door, and had a 'quiet word'.

[brothermagrew]

Is it really the case that if a postie voices concerns about their increasing concern over their own personal safety on a particular walk, RM will do nothing unless said postie is the victim of an attack?

Estelle Royal Mail consider an 'assault' to be any incident in which any of their employees are abused, threatened or physically attacked in circumstances relating to their work, where that assault is perpetrated by a member of the public.

This includes incidents which result in physical injury, attempts at robbery with threats of physical violence and instances of threats of violence without apparent gain. Royal Mail do not include internal instances of bullying or harassment, as these are covered by other Royal Mail policies.

Assessing the risk
Where unit managers become aware of a significant risk of assault on a particular walk, they should complete a specific walk threat assessment and deploy the control measures identified from this assessment. If Corporate Security or Corporate Social Responsibility become aware of a heightened risk in a particular area they will alert the local office manager.

People should report any incident to their manager at the earliest opportunity.

All Royal Mail employees have the right to expect to be able to go about their work without the fear of assault, threat of intimidation.

[estelle]

hmm, so by mentioning said concerns to my boss, one would expect a threat assessment to be carried out?

What happens though if the concerns are more generalised rather than in relation to a particular customer? the area being worked in is not what you'd class as affluent - but it's taken over a year on the same walk to actually start to feel significant vulnerabilities due to various 'incidents'

[Ahebban]

Your Line Manager/DOM and H&S Rep should take any concerns you have seriously, and then carry out relevant threat/risk assessments as a matter of course.

[andy2007]

Is it really the case that if a postie voices concerns about their increasing concern over their own personal safety on a particular walk, RM will do nothing unless said postie is the victim of an attack?

Estelle Royal Mail consider an 'assault' to be any incident in which any of their employees are abused, threatened or physically attacked in circumstances relating to their work, where that assault is perpetrated by a member of the public.

This includes incidents which result in physical injury, attempts at robbery with threats of physical violence and instances of threats of violence without apparent gain. Royal Mail do not include internal instances of bullying or harassment, as these are covered by other Royal Mail policies.

Assessing the risk
Where unit managers become aware of a significant risk of assault on a particular walk, they should complete a specific walk threat assessment and deploy the control measures identified from this assessment. If Corporate Security or Corporate Social Responsibility become aware of a heightened risk in a particular area they will alert the local office manager.

People should report any incident to their manager at the earliest opportunity.

All Royal Mail employees have the right to expect to be able to go about their work without the fear of assault, threat of intimidation.

Unless you're assaulted by a collegue or manager, in which case RM will deny that the assault ever took place! That's happened twice where I am, over recent years. One ended up with the victim being accused of making a false and malicious accusation, and went to Tribunal, before the deception was proved. The other, is still in it's early stages. So it would be wrong of me to speculate about whether it actually took place or not.