Member Info for OliGarch

Normandy, "This is a investment forum".
I totally agree with you. Isn't that what the Royal Mail Chat website is for?

200iq, Dynamofc, we have been delivering charity items for free for years. We also deliver millions of letters every year for free due to software malfunctions and billing failures on the machinery and then there are the underpaid oversized cards at Christmas etc that aren't surcharged plus the reused unfranked stamps and the fake meter mail. Why change now...lol

Wolves, I'm not sure that you can be forced to drive for RM unless those were the Ts&Cs when you joined so I'm guessing that if you joined within the last 10 years then you would probably have needed a full driving license and would therefore be expected to drive?
I can see your point but why are the "non-drivers" given a duty that they can't possibly complete anyway? Surely that is a management issue?
I would agree with a higher pay band for different skill sets. In processing, the machine operators get paid an extra allowance for machine cleaning and I would agree that the machine operator role should attract an extra payment.

200iq, I would prefer that OFCOM dedicated more time to dragging our competitors up to our standards in terms of
quality of service, employees TS&C's and also customer service. I doubt that few mail couriers would survive if they had to jump through all the hoops that we have to.

HHIAN2, looking at it realistically, £1.5m is a drop in the ocean for RM and probably worthwhile economically to take the hit in order to clear the backlog of parcels.

Mike, I'm not so certain that RM could tell OFCOM and the UK government that they want out of the USO as I am pretty sure that RM are contractually obligated.
https://www.royalmailgroup.com/en/about-us/regulation/how-were-regulated/universal-service-obligation/

JB, congratulations on a perfectly worded précis. I was going to reply myself but you beat me to it ;-)

It will be interesting to see how the business manages the management redundancies with regards to any necessary restructuring. As far as I am aware, SB9 and above have it written into their contracts that they can be sent anywhere if necessary. This may be used as s tool to coerce managers to leave of their own free will if there are not enough "volunteers"?

Scamp, regardless of how many trillion dollars Kretinsky is worth and how many shares he holds, changing the USO is not his to call as The Postal Services Act 2011 sets out the minimum requirements the Universal Service Provider must deliver. These are statutory. They can only be altered with the consent of the UK Parliament. Perhaps he has photos of Ghislaine Maxwell with Boris Johnson and some young lady? Who knows? Lol.....

Dynamofc, (my spell checker keeps wanting to change it to Dynamic) I truly believe that unless we go back to the number of cases seen in April in the UK the government will resist another lockdown in preference to local lockdowns. July will be interesting as we are now allowing foreign travel to certain locations!
The good news is that D2D should be picking up. All those "annoying" pizza/kebab/conservatory promotional leaflets are manna from heaven for RM and should increase back to normal levels as business reopens - pure profit :-)

Perhaps it was their reward for working through the pandemic....lol

JB, I just looked on Google and it says
Royal Mail PLC
LON: RMG
165.82 GBX +8.32 (5.28%)

When I joined at 16, I was under the impression that I would be retired by the age of 65. Not only did I have a date to work towards but so did my employer so staff planning was easier.
The Equality Act completely screwed that concept over. Now employers, especially Royal Mail, are left to manage an ageing workforce who are blocking jobs that should have been taken up by the millennials - our children, whilst the over 65 population should be putting their feet up with the thought of 2 weeks golfing in the Algarve to look forward to. Instead my office has an early shift that resembles the cast of Cocoon and has a "glacial movement"....lol

onesharewonder, "No-one should be working more than 70 hours a week". I absolutely agree. No one should be working what is effectively two jobs. If these guys had an accident on duty I would expect the H&S Executive to be all over it.
Every couple of years, my manager shows me the 48 hour opt in form (consent to work over 48 hours a week, averaged over the year) which I put straight into the bin.

Scamp, great post. There are plenty in my mail centre that won't work extra hours either for family reasons or they just don't need the money. Then there are about 25 or so (mainly on the night shift) who appear to be in the office from about 4pm until 6am plus they will often work a 10 hour Saturday night. That's up to 80 hours per week!
Unfortunately, RM have traditionally relied on not having enough staff and either offering overtime or using Angard.

CrystalBall, I believe that it's only really senior managers that are on personal contracts but I would imagine that there's a lot less than 2000 of them. Most managers are JV level (approx £30k to £60k) then there are the Salary Band levels of £60k and rising of which there are obviously less. As far as I am aware these are not on personal contracts and thanks to the Equality Act 2010 no longer have to retire at 60.

Arsenal, I am not a RM manager or a member of CMA/Unite but unless the rules have changed (since 2016) for management then operational managers could receive up to 2 years and non operational managers could receive up to 1 year. As you say, these are indeed generous terms but I suspect that there will be a push to get non operational managers (payroll, IT, customer service ect...) to go as it would be cheaper.
Going forward, I also believe that we will need around 10 to 15% more delivery staff as we become more parcels focused but I would imagine that would be staffed from any displacement of mail centre OPGs.

JB, TP was certainly a lot calmer today and as you say "fair and positive".
When the CWU were balloting for IA last year, our late shift manager said "when they have finished with the CWU they will start on us". Looks like it's happening. Having said that, I could point to several managers in my office who are over 55 with over 30 years service who would be quite happy to take VR even if it was reduced from 2 years down to 1 year's pay.

"Royal Mail were asked to make a comment but as is their tradition they declined" - Sky News 09:41

teslo, I agree wholeheartedly with you on paragraphs 1,2 and 4 but I'm not so sure about paragraph 3?
One thing that is for sure is that RMG is going to be interesting this year and I suspect that there are a couple of plot twists in the offing.