to be getting a leeeetle bit hacked off with the postal strike...

[AtheneNoctua]

Today I have to take a 2 hour lunch to sort out a Halloween costume because I can't rely on the mail to deliver one if I order it online. That is 2 hours of my work which I will have to make up if I want to be paid for it.

news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/8327158.stm

I selfishly hope they hire the contract workers.

What about the public who relies on this service? Where is our compensation?

I will add I don't know the details of the reasons for the strike (because they aren't reported and not because I haven't looked). So I don't have an opinion on whether the strike is justified.

But I am starting to feel they have made their bloody point and I want my mail service back.

Surely, he got up in the morning, was of sound mind, and made a concious decision to not go to work. Of course it is a choice.

But, I have not said I don't support their choice to strike. I still don't know the reasons for the strike. For me, the crux of it is whether the proposed changes are in line with the trends in private industry. If we are asked to suffer and then bail out the roayl mail (through our tax contributions) because the posties were asking for priviledges the rest of us don't have either then I'll be on the side of RM. If RM is bullying beyond reason, then I will sypoathise with the Posties. BUT... whatever the cause (I excpect it is somewhere in the middle) I would like them to resolve it like grown ups!

But I do get fed up with everyone saying "We don't want to do this. We don't have a choice" Of course the strike was a choice. Each of us is responsible for our own actions. Stand up and say "I chose to strike because..." Pretending you had nothing to do with it is silly.

We still haven't found out the detail of what they're actually striking about though. I can't find it on the BBC or the union site. Just general "conditions". When the tube people go out they always tell you in minute detail exactly who wants what and what the argument is.

and the information on the strike is out there: google Royal Mail Strike and you'll find it.
just make sure you read all of it, though, because Adam Crozier has a habit of repeating himself. unfortunately his repetition seems to vear rather far away from truth....

I can't read every single link on google surely? I have read the BBC and the union site - what would you recommend devileatsbabies and please can you link or point me in the right direction? Googling brings up multiple articles in independent, telegraph, daily mail etc etc

okay, this has a really big reply from a royal mail worker.
it's not judgy, it's not whiney, it's clear and to the point.

it is really long, though, so please read it through.

daily telegraph

(the post from geordiepostman)

yanbu to be hacked off, I think everyone in S London where it seems to be worst is. I am furious.

However, yabvvu to say the reasons for the strike "aren't reported." You may have looked but it can't have been very hard, there's plenty of info available. Look it all up and then come back and make a more reasoned contribution.

My nephew works for Royal Mail and when I asked him why he was striking he said he had no idea but had been told by the union that he isn't allowed to go into work.

They seem to strike at the drop of a hat, I have no sympathy for them.

yet more ill informed posts, i really feel like leaving this thread. please just try to see the bigger picture.

also how do you know my dp actually voted to strike? i suppose if it were you, athene, you would have walked in to the office alone and run the gauntlet, yeah right .

It was reported on last nights news that if a worker has finished a shift he is expected to deliver/sort any other mail that needs dealing with providing he is still within his contracted paid hours.

Sounds reasonable enough to me. If you are being paid you should really be working.

your nephew really should have had the mountain of information passed to him about the strike, sounds like he just hasn't bothered reading it.

Most probably true, SEA. He is glad of the day off work even if it is unpaid. He is young and still living at home, not interested in the bigger picture which I think can be said for a lot of the youngsters. God I sound like my Gran.

Would have been easier if you had said which post you meant - having read the article and no clues I assume you mean the post from geordiepostman?

He says they don't like:

1. Stopping overtime
2. Starting their working day later than they used to
3. Introduction of part time duties - but doesn't explain who will be affected or how ie is it everyone/what does it really mean
4. Then there is a chunk which says "later start times,full-time positions going to part-time,Pegasus 2 revisions (flawed computer program),night staff being moved to days,full-time staff to prep part-time staff walks,more hours to go from delivery office"
5. It mentions pensions but not what the govt want to do - I understood that they wanted to move them to money purchase schemes and this was the main bone of contention

Then he moves onto bullying and harrassment which is what I think he is really upset about and lists a load of stuff. However that's not something to go on strike about - as it involves individuals rather than T&C. Normally union takes up individual case or individual can sue.

He also mentions that the taxpayers owe the royal mail billions of pounds.

TBH having read that I don't see anything out of the ordinary in what is happening in the organisation. And I think that the real bone of contention is the pensions.

southeastastra - to a lot of people the bigger picture is that this constant strike action is harming rm workers & the rm service not benefiting them/it. I have not seen or read anything which changes my mind on that point.

thedevil - yes that reply is interesting and gives a lot more detail than I have seen anywhere else. However it is an individual and naturally biased response, just like any of the posts on MN .

I agree with other posters, it is very hard to find a clear, factual explanation of exactly what the dispute is about. I suspect that the reason for this is that both RM management and the union leaders are pretty entrenched in their viewpoints and therefore these standoffs have little to do with clear points of dispute and more to do with general dissatisfaction/unwillingness to back down or to be seen as doing so. Us consumers & perhaps the rm workers themselves are pretty much caught in the middle.

I really don't think the information is out there in any straightforward format - "google it" and "read this post on a forum" isn;t quite the same as "the BBC/other reliable source sum it up here" which makes me think that no-one can find it. People are asserting that it's there but not producing it.

Cassell said that "...it is very hard to find a clear, factual explanation of exactly what the dispute is about" and this seems to be a reccurring theme in posts here and in discussions I've seen elsewhere.

Thedeveileatsbabies or southesatastra, could you please lay out succintly exactly why the strike has been called? I think it would be really useful in helping people understand your point of view on this.

I don't think any of the links provided so far have been particularly useful (for me, anyway).

I'd also appreciate full detail - for example, not just saying that it is "working conditions" but exactly what the problem with the working condtions is and the solution that the union are suggesting will improve them.

Thank you.

"By thedollshouse Tue 27-Oct-09 15:03:11 Add message | Report | Contact poster

It was reported on last nights news that if a worker has finished a shift he is expected to deliver/sort any other mail that needs dealing with providing he is still within his contracted paid hours."

that's one of the problems: they're expected to do it regardless of whether they're still within their hours and then they're not being paid the overtiem if it takes them longer.
and they don't take into account how long it takes them to do their own work.

"ImSoNotTelling Tue 27-Oct-09 15:12:28 Add message | Report | Contact poster

Would have been easier if you had said which post you meant - having read the article and no clues I assume you mean the post from geordiepostman?"

i realised after i'd posted, so i put it in the post afterwards. yes, the one by geordiepostman.

and the BBC is havinga field day telling the whole story from one side: i have yet to see a single article on the (supposed to be unbiased) BBC to support the posties: it all supports the bosses. that's not impartial and unbiased reporting, that's gossip-mongering.

notanumber: the best one i've seen that sums up the facts without bias is the one i last quoted.

at the moment the CWU is keeping mum on updates because of the talks with the TUC.

i think it's clear that the "working conditions" is the list of conditions that have been stated. I'm not saying that you should agree with it at all, I'm just saying that the information states the facts and it is very hard to talk about all of the conditions without sounding like a runaway train: i think maybe that's the problem; there are so many reasons and so many things that the bosses have rescinded since the last agreement.

I couldn't find anything on the BBC to say why they were striking either.

Lots of jobs you have to finish up even if it means putting in extra unpaid hours. That's why part-timers and those who have to finish on time to collect children are often penalised - they can't do the unpaid overtime that everyone else does. It's not right, but it is common practice in the UK (both the unpaid overtime and the penalising).

I think why people are upset is that the postal workers seem to be striking because their terms are going from preferential to the same as everyone elses. And until someone can link to a good explanation of what the strikes are actually about, and show that's not what they're about, then people's sympathies won't lie with the RM employees.

Hmm. I'm rather pissed off that I've been charged £280 for an item I returned nearly 2 weeks ago which didn't arrive in the return period, I do have proof of postage so I'm more pissed off with the company messing me around rather than the Royal Mail, in fact a letter I sent to my DH in Iraq has arrived before the item I returned to Glasgow.

TBH I don't have a clue why they are striking, the BBC don't seem to be reporting it properly at all. It all seems very one sided.

don't have time to read whole thread just now - but this link tells the story of the strike from the pov of a royal mail worker, and has made me go from 'why are they striking?!' to fully supporting the workers.

sorry if it's been posted already!

DH works in public sector. Some of his collegaues have been in the same role for donkeys years. he comes home and tells me what they're having a strop about - there's always sometihng. We think that when you have been in a organisation/role like that for a long time, especially when it's heavily unionised, you start to genuinely feel hard done by about loads of things. Every change is a huge wrench designed to make everyone's lives difficult, and will ruin the service etc etc and they don't get paid enough and it's not fair.

Whereas in reality they are getting paid about half as much again as they would for doing the same (fairly unskilled) job in the private sector, they have lovely final salary pensions, they have a lot of job security, they knock off on the dot and so on and so on.

i think a lot of people know people in the public sector like this, so when it is reported that the postal workers are striking for - unspecified reasons - then sympaty is not automatically there. If someone could tell us in simple terms what the strike is for then maybe people will change their minds. I suspect it is mainly the pensions though.

The "whereas in reality" bit was about DH and his colleagues BTW

"By arolf Tue 27-Oct-09 15:52:08 Add message | Report | Contact poster

don't have time to read whole thread just now - but this link tells the story of the strike from the pov of a royal mail worker, and has made me go from 'why are they striking?!' to fully supporting the workers."

i think that's the best one i've seen.
well done for finding it arolf.

I am rather vague as to why the postal workers are striking. But I support their right to do so.

I would question the assumption that they are just after a cushy number. There seems to be a widespread misconception in this country- that is that public sector workers make more money than private sector workers in similar jobs!

I used to be a civil servant and people often assumed that made me a rich 3 hour lunch taking man in a bowler hat,not a £7,000 per anum teenager.

I'm not sure if this was ever true of public sector workers, but it certainly is not the case anymore; most public sector workers are forced by the government to make cost savings every year, year after year no matter if they were delivering an excemplary service already. Their pay rises may sound okay to some people, but recruitment is so highly regulated that promotion is extremely slow and difficult.

People who suggest the postal workers just get different jobs are naive in the extreme-working as a postman hardly qualifies you for many other lines of work. Many postal workers may be doing this because the hours fit around the rest of their lives (early starts and finishes can work particularily well around young families for instance)Therefore just getting another job will be complicated by these considerations aswell.

Anyway it's good to get that off my chest