Time to Renegotiate

[kevbo]

As Royal Mails trading update revealed a massive difference in the financial position of the company represented to CWU in the recent talks. And that position was also used by CWU to persuade us this was a good deal in the circumstances is it not fair to expect a renegotiation on our 1% pay rise for this year? Before anyone mentions the 1 hour shorter week that should have come in October 2019 as part of that pay deal.

[yubin282]

That sounds fair and sensible....so it will never happen.

[Martin Walsh]

The whole reason we did not get the SWW 2 years ago was that we were not going to accept the delivery method change and the larger parcels into circa 300 delivery offices and the changes they wanted.

This agreement guarantees a shorter working week based on a revision and adds 82 million pounds to the way bill and is worth 2.6% to a part timer which is why the pay deal is only 1%.

Believe me Of com are not happy that Royal Mail are going to pay out 2.7% and 1% in April before an hour has been saved. Do you really think that after the 2.7 gets paid anyone is going to take us seriously if we than say we want to renegotiate the deal !

Fair play we all love a dreamer but most of us who have negotiate the impact from the agreement have to deal in the realities and Royal Mail have been lucky to have seen a revenue windfall but it is on parcels and tracked which is not as automated as they wanted and of course parcels occur extra costs from hiring outhouses etc.

[Woody Guthrie]

This agreement guarantees a shorter working week based on a revision and adds 82 million pounds to the way bill

The SWW is based on revisions which are based on improving productivity and efficiency.

We dont know how many hours those revisions based on improving productivity and efficiency may take out of the business.

Therefore we have no real idea what the SWW will in practice add or in fact subtract from the pay bill.

You may be impressed by paper exercises but most of us can see through the smoke and mirrors.

[yubin282]

So do we still get SWW when RM have to put extra hours/jobs into a DO.

[hans solo]

rm will renage on the sww when they realise its unachievable as the job at present is untenable
the only way goods are going out is because of all the peeps on early starts and pt overtime
what then mr walsh

[Martin Walsh]

Woody there are three calculations to the cost of the shorter working week. 1. Is the increase that part timers get as a result of the hourly rate going up so that will include new pension costs and National insurance.

2. It how much of that hour can be absorbed and clearly the offices above 196 WIPWH which is the equivalent of 100 BSi will need a level of investment to introduce the SWW.

3. The other factor is that due to increase in the hourly rate the next pay rise will cost more based on a percentage.

In terms of how you achieve this hour will depend on whether your unit is doing a structural or table top revision.

The table top will be based on a productivity improvement. The good news is since the reference period of 27-30 most not all offices have seen a growth in the heavier weighted traffic. Providing your offices work hours have not increased by the same percentage as your traffic increase you would have seen a productivity increase.

An office can make further productivity increase From absolving delivery point growth , reducing work hours including overtime or by introducing a summer staffing plan. You can also look who is retiring or due to leave and decide if you fill that job with a part timer.

In essence if your traffic has increased by 10 percent and your work hours have only increased by 5% your office is going to be more productive.

In terms of the structural, this will be based on the outputs of the IWT , a geo route for outdoors and a 3 year flight path based on WIPWH to ensure that an office can make the step change.

There are 30 pilot offices who will have the full structural revision planned and we will learn any lessons from those.

The key to the structural revision is that the call rate has gone down , but your attendance calls have increased , not enough to compensate for the indoor loss. We will also need to factor in that 15% potentially of the larger parcels will come off the core.

[Woody Guthrie]

Yes Martin that's all well and good but at the end of the day improving productivity only means one thing.. doing more for less.

To you that's a set of numbers on a spreadsheet, to us that's a little bit closer to exhaustion. It makes it slightly more personal for us.

At the end of the day if you don't believe that Royal Mail will attempt to claw back the entire cost of the SWW plus some more through the revision process you're definitely living in another world.

It's counterintuitive to think otherwise as they've always been clear they believe it should be self funding.

Now your offices may be protected from the worst of that, they usually are but the rest of the country will pay because they usually do.

[blacov]

What about delivery offices where growth is so fast that there are hundreds of delivery points not even on the frames with several hundreds more due to go live by the end of the year. I wonder how this is reflected in productivity. Is it even properly measured in offices like that?

[PJ101]

Martin

The 4 pillars agreement made clear that all free work should be removed from a delivery office. This has not happened. Surely none of these figures mean anything until this is achieved. The truth is RM and the CWU have no idea how many hours are worked in a delivery office as the reported figures are not accurate. Just one example would be managers prepping and delivering. How is this accounted for?

[POSTMAN]

The whole reason we did not get the SWW 2 years ago was that we were not going to accept the delivery method change and the larger parcels into circa 300 delivery offices and the changes they wanted.

Yeah, we know, but the union pushed out a lie that RM had welched on the deal.

[DGH]

An office can make further productivity increase From absolving delivery point growth ,

I'm sorry, I'm probably just dense, but I haven't a clue what 'absolving delivery point growth' means.

The key to the structural revision is that the call rate has gone down , but your attendance calls have increased , not enough to compensate for the indoor loss. We will also need to factor in that 15% potentially of the larger parcels will come off the core.

Basically this means you're walking further to more doors already but you're going to have to walk even further for longer to more doors because there's not enough inside work.

How long do you think a sustainable delivery span is in terms of miles walked (even out of a van, there will be lots of walking on most deliveries)? Last week, for instance, I spent an average of between 4.5 and 5 hours per day walking (discounting breaks but including pauses to batter on doors where I had a packet)? My office is not one of the blessed with a WHIPWH above 196, so presumably you think it's fine to increase the walking time by up to 10% to compensate? So is it welcome to 5.5-6 hour delivery spans?

[clashcityrocker]

He means absorbing delivery point growth.
It is always important to spend time getting a form of words both sides can agree on.

[DGH]

He means absorbing delivery point growth.
It is always important to spend time getting a form of words both sides can agree on.

Ah, of course. A simple typo. Shame. I really hoped 'absolving delivery point growth' was a new kind of RM doublespeak.

Absolving them does sound much nicer than having to absorb them, almost like a papal dispensation from having to consider them at all.

[citypostie]

The key to the structural revision is that the call rate has gone down , but your attendance calls have increased , not enough to compensate for the indoor loss. We will also need to factor in that 15% potentially of the larger parcels will come off the core.

What indoor loss is that? We are due a structural revision and in the 10 years since the the last revision we now have more indoor work than ever. That's because when full timers have left they've been replaced with part timers or the jobs have been removed altogether. Now with the massive increase in tracked there is all the extra scanning and sorting they bring.
Yes we get our first wave of mech sequenced and 2nd if we are lucky, but the double preppers are now completing the full prep for both duties because the other person is up sorting so long or it's a late starting part timer. We now get out at least an hour later than we was just a year or so ago.
Our office pays out overtime every morning for tracked scanning and sorting and often prep. There is no reduction of indoor work in my office, I'm hoping the full timers will be able to get 4 day weeks in the revision so we can start earlier, do longer days to cover this extra indoor work. It would suit me and I guess a few others even if it means I miss out on the early overtime