11/12/24 Mount Pleasant bulletin

[jimallen]

Hi, here's the Mount Pleasant bulletin of 11 December (I missed posting the previous one, sorry!). Comments welcome!

THE MORE, THE MERRIER (XMAS)...
You'd think managers would know by now that the Black
Friday and Cyber Monday workloads are heavy, and that
the closer we are to Xmas, the heavier the load gets. But
another year and yet again, they haven't ensured there are
enough of us in Processing to tackle the mail mountain.
Well, it's too bad for them. Because no way are we even
going to try.

PENCE, MAYBE, BUT NO SENSE
And by the way, management's Xmas overtime in
Processing is a mess. They said we'd need to add our
names to apply for it, but now we also need to call earlier
the same day to confirm that we're still needed! And then
the extra shifts on offer are mostly at night or weekends.
So if you're on Lates, if you agree to the OT, you might end
up working a super-long shift or have to give up the very
little time you have at weekends to see family or friends...
Not bloody likely.

WHAT'S 'APP-ENING?
Us casuals use Angard's app to "indicate" our availability,
so you'd think the agency could plan who they need in
advance... But no. Instead, some of us are contacted just
a few hours before managers want us to work a shift, like
the same afternoon ahead of nights! They're lucky that
anybody actually turns up!

STINGY 1
And yes, management's bloody-mindedness not to offer
part-timers a full-time job during the Xmas period means
that we need that already stingy £100 "Xmas supplement"
even more this year. But guess what? They're only paying
it pro-rata, so we don't even get the full amount!

STINGY 2
Last week, each section on Processing was asked to leave
their work in turn, to join managers in the Work Time
Sleeping room for a "Xmas surprise"... They then told us
that all our names were in an envelope and that a random
person would draw the name of a winner - the prize being
a £25 voucher... while the rest of us were given a
chocolate Crunchie! A "Xmas surprise"? More like a
Grinchie...

PS: These vouchers can only be used to shop online...
Well, if there is a nice big Xmas pudding on offer on this
website, we can bring it in, to share with our workmates.
Or throw at the manager's head... (Only joking).

STINGY 3... OR ROYAL MISERLY?
What has happened to the vouchers we ALL used to get to
spend in the canteen, as we'd like? It may not have been
much, but at least it was something. Management's
Scrooge-stinginess seems to get worse every year...

DRY TURKEY
At least the Xmas meal isn't cancelled this year... but it
better not be more expensive than the £7.50 basic (without
trimmings...) we paid last year. The one thing we want to
see on Nights though, is a fresh Xmas meal and not the
dry leftovers we had last Xmas!

PS: And we all know why Night canteen food is usually so
bad... despite all our complaints, management still hasn't
recruited the extra staff needed to cook fresh food!

NEW MANAGER, OLD DUTIES?
The last re-sign for us cleaners wasn't good: too many of
us ended up with heavy duties that aren't fit for just one
cleaner. There are only two options here: either
management recruits extra-cleaners to share the work, or
the Mount won't smell so Pleasant.

NOT WORTH THE PAPER!
The media reports that Kretinsky is "close" to finalising his
purchase of RM, but as yet, it's still not confirmed by the
government. Apparently the Labour business secretary,
Jonathan Reynolds, has got "guarantees" from Kretinsky to
keep the "universal service" and "not to raid the pension
surplus"! And if (when) he breaks those "guarantees"?
Then what? Because we know that no boss would be
interested in RM if he didn't think he could get away with
wringing out tons of cash by any means possible...

THE SPHINX VS THE LAMB
And so when the union leaders say they see Kretinsky's
takeover as "a real opportunity", we know they are not on
the same planet as the rest of us. They claim that they'd
be able to renegotiate the Ts&Cs (which they willingly gave
up), if the Sphinx takes over... We suggest they take a
look at Wikipedia, which tells us that: "In Greek tradition,
the sphinx is a treacherous and merciless being with the
head of a woman, the haunches of a lion, and the wings of
a bird."

HOW TO MAKE HIM JUMP
...but that's not the end of it. In Greek Mythology, Oedipus
solved the riddle of the Sphinx, which caused it to jump off
a cliff. So, what's the riddle of Kretinsky? Buy cheap, sell
dear? Increase our rate of exploitation? The answer's
easy. All out!

LET'S KEEP ON FIGHTING!
We've heard that one of our reps has resigned from the
CWU because he's fed-up with the top leadership... Aren't
we all in fact? But whether we're in or out of the union, one
thing we have learnt - and that is that we need to take all
our fights (big or small) into our own hands, collectively,
out of the hands of the CWU leadership - because that's
the only way we are going to defend our jobs and our
conditions.

[SpacePhoenix]

DRY TURKEY
At least the Xmas meal isn't cancelled this year... but it
better not be more expensive than the £7.50 basic (without
trimmings...) we paid last year. The one thing we want to
see on Nights though, is a fresh Xmas meal and not the
dry leftovers we had last Xmas!

PS: And we all know why Night canteen food is usually so
bad... despite all our complaints, management still hasn't
recruited the extra staff needed to cook fresh food!

Be glad that your canteen actually has cooked food on every shift. Just about three hours a day here, RM will probably axe the cooked food all together and partition off and convert the kitchen area to either sorting ot storage space

[yellowbelly]

DRY TURKEY
At least the Xmas meal isn't cancelled this year... but it
better not be more expensive than the £7.50 basic (without
trimmings...) we paid last year. The one thing we want to
see on Nights though, is a fresh Xmas meal and not the
dry leftovers we had last Xmas!

PS: And we all know why Night canteen food is usually so
bad... despite all our complaints, management still hasn't
recruited the extra staff needed to cook fresh food!

Be glad that your canteen actually has cooked food on every shift. Just about three hours a day here, RM will probably axe the cooked food all together and partition off and convert the kitchen area to either sorting ot storage space

What's a canteen?

[oypostie]

What's a canteen?

Somewhere to hide mail in