Big changes are been proposed within Royal Mail over the next couple of years. These changes seem to have been agreed between the Union and RM bosses, and it's now due to go to ballot. If a 'Yes' vote is returned all RM employees will recieve a £400 bonus just like that – no questions asked. Surely that is bribery? I'm not even sure it would be legal. Anybody ever come across similar before?

If it goes through what will it mean to you?
They are lifting the cap, currently at three, of unaddressed door to door items you will get meaning more crap through your door.
Two delivery staff sharing a van meaning a massive investment in new fleet vehicles. More vans (two thirds more in our office)= more polution.
Later start times meaning you get your post later than ever.
No regular postie(I know that's the case for a lot of people anyway, but not around these parts).

and we the public are asked for our support when the post office staff go on strike!,give us a royal standard of service and we might give that support until then whistle for it!.

1. Not bribery. Incentive.

2. What will it mean?
More 'straight-to-bin' mail?
Later post? Unlikely to be later through my letterbox than I get home anyway.

Genuinely hope all is well for you personally, but – as a consumer? No big shakes.

If The vote is a yes then in real terms I stand to lose about £25-£30 per week and it will take 3-5 years before I start to acheive my current wages!

essentially the money I would lose is what I currently put into my savings acount each week to help towards family holidays/days out/weekends biking. So it will be a complete change in my life , of course I could always do some overtime to make it up but I'm already knackered when my round is finished (hardly ever any early finishes on my round) and couldn't contemplate working longer.

I have no doubt that the posties who can't see further than the bonuses will vote this in , even though the majority of the bonuses mentioned in the agreement were already due to us via the employee colleague shares but they all of a sudden seem to be tied into this new agreement/fiasco

and we the public are asked for our support when the post office staff go on strike!,give us a royal standard of service and we might give that support until then whistle for it!.

not all areas of Royal Mail are bad , current targets are extremely high but are very nearly being acheived , in order to receive your 'royal standard' would you be prepared to pay a royal price??

is it just me or does it seem that the majority of post office ground floor staff ie, posties themselves actually try to get the job done but can't because the higher level staff ie management and decision makers keep on screwing things up! also i would be prepared to pay a little more for a royal standard of service but the post office has got to try harder to compete in this new age where other companies can undercut if they wish.

and we the public are asked for our support when the post office staff go on strike!

'We the public' can, of course, always make our feelings known to the Royal Mail, via letters, emails, etc. If you don't like something, rather than just sitting around grumbling about it, why not actually let the people/organisation in question know how you feel?

'Royal Standard'? Does that mean 'led by unelected persons for their own benefit'? I think we've already got that. I somehow doubt the bosses of RM are quite the kind of people most of the workers would want in charge…

1. Not bribery. Incentive.

Yeah, I suppose it is. It'll have to be good incentive though.
The worst part of the deal is that they want to make Saturday a regular delivery day. Currently there is supposed to be less mail in the system on Sat' allowing us to work less hours and get home earlier (part of a national agreement a few years ago). Anybody that enjoys going to the footy or anything else considered 'Saturday afternoon enjoyment' is going to be stuffed.

Not looking for sympathy here. I know a lot of people see Royal Mail as a dead duck anyway. Just venting a little.

I somehow doubt the bosses of RM are quite the kind of people most of the workers would want in charge…

Statements issued by government ministers last year also agree with this statement

i personally do not wish to see the end of royal mail it was once a world class service and can be again but there is much work to be done!.

We the public' can, of course, always make our feelings known to the Royal Mail, via letters, emails, etc. If you don't like something, rather than just sitting around grumbling about it,

We can complain to the Royal Mail by writing to them………………………genius 😯

mmb, re your comments referring to the standard of service to the public;
You dont matter…
Not my view, nor the view of any decent postie, but thats the position that the public is held in by Royal Mail, the regulator, and the government.
When the various interests talk about improving standards, modernising, becoming more customer-focused, they're exclusively talking about bulk mail senders, not the candiru*-like individuals that buy stamps.
For what its worth, I'll be voting a big NO to the sleight-of-hand deal, and if it gets through, I'll be coming out of the union in disgust.

* a candiru is a parasitic small fish BTW! 😉

mmb – Member

we the public are asked for our support when the post office staff go on strike!,give us a royal standard of service and we might give that support until then whistle for it!.

Thank you for speaking on my behalf mmb.

But in future, before you take it upon yourself to speak on behalf of the British public, you should perhaps check out the facts.

Twice as many people sympathise with the Postal Workers rather than the Royal Mail management in the postal dispute

"Half of those surveyed (50%) sympathised with the postal workers and the Unions as opposed to the Royal Mail management (25%) according to an opinion poll carried out by ComRes for BBC Two's Newsnight."

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1. Not bribery. Incentive.

And of course everyone knows that a bribe is not designed to be an incentive.

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As far as whether the deal now being offered is good enough or not, I don't know…..I would probably rely on the CWU's recommendation.

But what I am absolutely sure about …….. is what excellent deal the self-serving greedy multimillionaire Adam Crozier, has managed to secure for himself.

Next month, when he leaves Royal Mail after screwing the postal workers and joins ITV as its' Chief Executive, Adam Crozier will, before he's even got his feet under the table, receive a "golden hello" of £200,000.
And that's on top of his £775,000 annual salary.

So then, that's a touch under a million pounds for the first 12 months in a job which he has zero experience in.

Let's hope for the sake of ITV that Adam Crozier doesn't get run over and killed whilst crossing the road.
Because he is clearly irreplaceable.

As with the current BA dispute I find it very hard to reconcile/see any justification in the enormous salaries of the senior management. How can they possibly have any empathy with the workforce when they earn more in a week than many of the 'workers' earn in a year!

My postie is brilliant, even this week when he delivered my Bell-laps perched on his head like a pair of antlers "! I have every sympathy for hard working guys like Carlosg who reckons he will be worse off with a yes vote.

Funny how the bonuses/golden parachutes always seem to go to the top guys even when they screw up.

One of the things that is so unacceptable about the deal is the even later start/finish times.
this means that around 60 posties in my office wont be able to be home for their kids getting home from school.
this in turn means their partner won't be able to go to their job- its hard going raising a family on just a posties wage.
Royal Mail, claims it will accomodate 'some' of these workers under 'family-friendly'rules, but we've been told that it'll struggle to apply this to more than about 20%. Even our managers are fuming about it too.

Of course, we could all just do the decent thing and find ourselves another job…. which may be one of the ideas behind the change in the first place.

dude that's not good at all, i know how difficult it can be raising a family on one wage, i do it now, and how can they expect the best from the workforce if they don't look after them properly?.

They dont care one way or another.
There is part of RMs management that wants it fully privatised, ASAP, and a failing business is probably the quickest way to achieve this (especially under a likely tory goverment)
There's another part that wants the company to survive, but believes blindly in extending to infinity, the progressive frontline cuts that have been so successful over the past few years.

Of course, we could all just do the decent thing and find ourselves another job…. which may be one of the ideas behind the change in the first place.

You probably hit the nail on the head there, as is probably the case in alot of mid/low skill industries, the top end management consider the frontline staff expendable.

B.A.Nana, I wasn't really merely suggesting it…
After seeing just how cynical and scheming and how low RM will stoop, I'm fairly sure thats the reason.
(BTW, that'll be mid-skill!, when people get a low skill postie, they definitely know about it) 🙂

when people get a low skill postie, they definitely know about it

You must be talking about the knuckle dragging, filter feeder who misdelivers my mail every day.
I think he's performing some kind of community service by getting the neighbours to talk to each other on a daily basis as we try to recover our mail.
He's really special.

Yes, thats exactly what I'm talking about Trailmonkey.
Hmmmm! if you pay trailpeanuts, do you get trailmonkeys? 🙂

edit, though I'll repeat, as a member of the public, and simply the mail recipient, you are are an inconvenient net cost to Royal Mail, and thus 'dont matter'

Maybe I should leave a trail of peanuts to my front door every day. There might be an outside chance of the postie finding my letterbox.

To be honest, speaking personally, you'd be better off leaving strong drink.
Not an excuse, but there's a lot of very p**sed off, demoralised people working for the company, right up to middle management levels.

I somehow doubt the bosses of RM are quite the kind of people most of the workers would want in charge…

During the last series of strikes, management were driving the vans to where I work to pick up the day's mail,
a considerable amount, 50-100000 letters, (we're a charity lottery company), and one upper management oik, beer belly, shaved head, stuck his head into my machine room, and just yelled “Oi” at me. Ignorant ****.

Shocking, but not surprising.

Which way do you posties think the vote is going to go?

I find it confusing that unions and posties always blame the management, yet during my brief spell of employ with RM I was always told that most of the management are former posties anyway, who've just forgotten where they came from. I would find it difficult to beleive that any postie promoted up the line wouldn't also follow the party line.
I recall 12hr night shifts at a sorting centre at xmas when its busy, 2x 45 min breaks and another 20 min break, and an early finish.
Wish I could get that kind of deal now.

I feel that they are being let down by self serving unions, we have one at our place who just agreed to scrap cost of living payrises for most staff, payrises will now only come about if youv'e performed exceptionally and the company says there is any profit left over from shareholder divi's to afford a payrise!, nothing for appraisals either donesn't matter how well you've performed against your KPI's.

I would find it difficult to beleive that any postie promoted up the line wouldn't also follow the party line.

You've obviously never heard the line : "The working-class can kiss my arse, I've got a foreman's job at last"

It's sung to the tune of the Red Flag btw.

Some of the most vicious anti-working-class individuals I have ever known, have come from very humble origins……….the 'Thatchers' and 'Tebbits' of this world.

In contrast, often those who show a great deal of compassion towards their fellow human beings, come from highly privileged backgrounds.

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I feel that they are being let down by self serving unions, we have one at our place who just agreed to scrap cost of living payrises for most staff, payrises will now only come about if youv'e performed exceptionally and the company says there is any profit left over from shareholder divi's to afford a payrise!

So what are you saying ? That the union where you work isn't militant enough ?

white101,
Its one of the problems we have getting any sympathy from the public; there's quite a lot of people out there that think their time doing some chrismas casual work in a mail centre bears some similarity, workload or condition-wise to conditions in a delivery offices or elsewhere.
It doesn't.
Try a nine or ten hour very physical day, with no breaks, compulsory unpaid overtime. And that was before the current changes.
I dont think the union is smart enough to be self-serving TBH, I honestly think that Senior management was going to ask for LESS cuts and concessions before the strike.
Mark Higson and chums are probably praying for ANOTHER strike , so that they can ram through even more changes. 🙄
And it still wont address the real reasons Royal Mail is losing money.

Just to answer your question Chapaking,
There's a lot of short-sighted postal staff out there, and many in mail centres that wont be affected so much, They'll think 'mmm, cash in hand' rather than realise that twice that will be coming out their next years wages.
So, It'll be a yes vote 👿

Ernie – thats the point I was making (probably badly) I agree with you.

That the union where you work isn't militant enough ?

..no I reckon that some unions only try to look like there working for you, but in reality are keeping the employer happier than the workers (nowt new in that)

Kipper, worked there 9months as a temp and after that at a BT mailing centre for 2 years, 48hrs a week, permanent nightshift and represented by the same union. OT on a Friday night was time & a quarter. I think your right about Higson & co, everytime somebody shouts strike it gives them an even bigger opportunity to push through unegotiated changes

And it still wont address the real reasons Royal Mail is losing money.

Is it true that companies like TNT have taken over collection of bulk mailings from big companies, but delivery is down to RM who don't get a cut of it?

That the union where you work isn't militant enough ?

..no I reckon that some unions only try to look like there working for you, but in reality are keeping the employer happier than the workers

😕

You can't have it both ways……..you can't say you don't want the unions to be more militant, and then, complain about them just wanting to keep the employer sweet !

2X 😕

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And it still wont address the real reasons Royal Mail is losing money.

Whatever they're losing, it's not enough to stop them making a profit :

Royal Mail profits almost double

I'd say that a good 80% of mail that we receive for delivery is downstream access from rival companies.
The really downright misleading thing about it is that a large part of that ….isn't counted by royal mail in their figures!, allowing them to trot out the same old crap about falling volumes.

Sorry Kipper is 'downstream access' where someone else collects and dumps it with you – job done?

yes, Lifer, sorry for not clarifying that.

ernie, I don't recall asking any union to be militant, I merely said that they agreed with my company that payrises should be scrapped and its been done, and currently they have not put in place or discussed an alternative way of ensuring staff are motivated other than being told 'well, at least you've got a job'. I don't see that as representing a workforce.

It's still not clarified really! Doesn't make sense at all.

ernie, I don't recall asking any union to be militant

No, I don't recall you saying that either. In fact, you appear to be suggesting you don't want them to be militant.

And yet, I clearly recall you complaining that the union is only interested in, quote : "keeping the employer happier than the workers"

There, I fear, lies the basis of my confusion.

Or maybe it's you who's confused ?

white, are you saying that the CWU, are ineffectual and a bit useless?
I might not disagree with you. 😉
Lifer, as part of keeping the universal service contract (wow, thanks!) Royal Mail is obliged to deliver any items of its rivals mail under downstream access, for a (below actual cost) fee.
Its such a good deal for private companies that the majority of the mail we deliver is now DSA, leaving no money to cross-subsidise the public service aspects (and keep stamp prices low, for instance) as we used to.