Here Comes the War
Well it's no surprise, but here comes the war. With the falling volume, cars are being split out, areas are being expanded, and of course up go the hours. I heard the statement for the first time, "you should consider yourself lucky to be working in this economy!" The center manager blew a gasket when the driver complained about hours. He threatened the driver with having to sit with the division manager and explain himself if he filed a nine five grievance. Of course there were five more drivers complaining after this one, and of course the grievances will be filed because everyone is being dispatched with 10 to 11 hour days. The sh-t will really hit the fan when they in turn lay off the low senior drivers, and stop giving any days off. The interesting part will be to see how the Union reacts. Where they've been able to make the company pay double time in the past, the current economic times will allow the company to whine much louder, and I suspicion the over dispatching will go on without relief. Time will tell.
I forgot to include that 8 hour requests are also going to be under attack. They want to go back to the old days where you worked all day and half the night and liked it. Now your seeing the push by Bush to create dog like slave labor in this country. UPS is definetly on that page. We'll find out if the Union is.
I forgot to include that 8 hour requests are also going to be under attack. They want to go back to the old days where you worked all day and half the night and liked it. Now your seeing the push by Bush to create dog like slave labor in this country. UPS is definetly on that page. We'll find out if the Union is.
Bob,
Glad to see you back with George. One retired and one still on the front in a foxhole, works for me. Though I hope you don't have too many years left?
I have a DEAR friend who watched my back for 20 years and he was a target for termination (3 times unsuccessful) as was I (4 times unsuccessful). In fact having that in common, made us fast friends. I worried whether Teddy would be outnumbered as we both started at the same time, made sure neither one of us left the building before the other, and were witnesses for each in all management office conversations, whether we suspected discipline or not. For most of those 20 years, the Union was in collusion with the company, and our appointed Steward and BA, were useless.
Good Luck Bob and be careful at all times in every way?
Doug Chapman
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Have the Division and Center manager go explain to their wives why they are still working these hours and Christmas was over last month. My wife asked me last year this exact question, when I kept coming home after 8. We had this BS last year and the grievances piled up and then the Division manager fought them and ended up paying us what amounted to triple time from January to June on anything over 9.5. This year has been great for me and the other's that I have spoken to in the center. Apparently we have a new CEO that is changing the way profit loss is measured, so I have heard. Not sure if any of you have heard this yet. Oh and another thing tell the Center Manager to have IE come down and explain their numbers, and show how you can run scratch, what a bunch of BS that is. Any of us that have been around for some time have seen the numbers dwindle, but hey they don't mess with them. Nothing like lying to your face. So those 11 hour day's today back in the day when it was fair would have been like a 13 hour plan.
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None of this is a surprise. Now they will try to send the least amount of people out the door every day, with the most diversified work loads. Never mind family, school functions, kids sports and other things unrelated to profit and making money. Then the mantra will be, "be grateful for your job, others are broke and unemployed". Of course, this is also true, but the entire system of priorities in our country is all wrong. Many years of bad leadership in Washington has created a "Money Centric" philosophy of life.
I am also wondering if the Union will still support these guys who take the legal remedy to solve excessive hours? Will they stand behind them, or will they simply say "be grateful for your job, so many are unemployed".
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I think we are all grateful to have a job during this economic downturn. But I also believe that there is room and a majority of us are willing to share the wealth when it comes to paid days. If anything the company should be taking advantage of this slow period and listen to the drivers and get this Park And Sort (PAS) mess cleaned up and working right. I remember in the day when I started there was always extra bodies to work and there was always somebody willing or wanting to have the day off. Now it is run so lean that you get one sick call and it screws everything up, and it is our fault for getting sick. "It's Jone's fault for calling in sick." I say it's the company's fault for running things so lean, eventually it catches up to you.
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