3 strikes.

Hate 150lb Packages

Well-Known Member
I have to show up to the sort... Then I have until 5pm to do all my businesses. I have only 3 or 4 pickups. They can all be done up until 5pm as well. If I start at 9, I finish by 1. Then I get one late afternoon pickup. I can do straightline delivery, alphabetical delivery, start at 4pm, pick my nose, drive in reverse... as long as I finish by 5 I can do whatever I want. No one bugs me, no one calls me, and the only time I hear from a manager/contractor is during quarterly inspection or if I get a dispute, which is rare. Stress free. I get paid decently for what I do.
 

MrFedEx

Engorged Member
I have to show up to the sort... Then I have until 5pm to do all my businesses. I have only 3 or 4 pickups. They can all be done up until 5pm as well. If I start at 9, I finish by 1. Then I get one late afternoon pickup. I can do straightline delivery, alphabetical delivery, start at 4pm, pick my nose, drive in reverse... as long as I finish by 5 I can do whatever I want. No one bugs me, no one calls me, and the only time I hear from a manager/contractor is during quarterly inspection or if I get a dispute, which is rare. Stress free. I get paid decently for what I do.

This is exactly what WE do...not.
 

bbsam

Moderator
Staff member
Here's what you don't have "figured out". At Express, if you "work safe" and "obey the law", you don't make SPH and then you get fired. Understand how that works?
Yes. I understand completely. I said it before. You are the one who insists.WAD is working. It isn't. You have been placed in a "Catch 22". The pressure is on to get couriers to quit. Not enough will, but as I said before, enough couriers will have many, many OLCCs accumulated and the company will have their choice of who to cut.. Now that you and I understand maybe you can explain it to your henchmen. They just want to argue with me.
 

bbsam

Moderator
Staff member
"3 Strikes" has it's origins in 2 items..the end of Performance Reviews and the unwillingness of FedEx to pay Unemployment. Think about it. When you WAD, and it sounds like a lot of people are, there is no mechanism to hold you accountable. With the Performance Review, there was, and if you scored low enough, they could create "cause for termination". That meant they didn't have to pay Unemployment because you were fired for cause, and not laid-off.

Fred hates to pay Unemployment. Just ask anyone who has tried to collect some from Mr. Burns. This incredibly stupid "3 Strikes" move tells me a couple of things. One, that WAD is working or that people simply no longer care anyway and are performing defacto WAD. Two, they are throwing safety under the bus and opening themselves up to some big lawsuits. When Courier X hits that school bus going 80 trying to make SPH, think the lawyers are going to introduce "3 Strikes" as evidence? Three, that they are doing everything in their power to eliminate employees.

Could Express possibly be more of a craphole? Yes, it can. Watch for more of this type of idiocy in the near future.

...but then again, you don't always believe us either.
 

Ricochet1a

Well-Known Member
Getting back to the assertion of the OP - 3 months of not meeting a monthly SPH goal in a 12 month period of time and 'you're out'...

If this is true, then for each monthly period of time in which SPH goal isn't met - 'performance improvement' will have to be issued (functionally equivalent to Warning Letters). That would be a new one, even for Express.

I tend to be a bit skeptical on this one (I think a senior manager is expelling a lot of hot air to put fear into his employees - what a great leader...). If this assertion of the OP was the case, Express would be exposing itself to a potential of a class action suit - something even Express is wary of.

Ever since doing away with the performance review (all due to losing wrongful termination fights), Express has flailed about for a method to place some control on its wage employees. With the old performance review, Express essentially had an implicit 'contract' with its hourlies; that if they wanted some form of a pay raise, they'd have to met a certain set of criteria (degree of control) in order to get that raise. Things like punctuality, attendance (no sick calls), scan compliance, safety evaluation, and even sales lead submissions at one time were all part of the performance review. That is all gone now.

Employees are using sick days as de facto personal days (increasing OT costs and causing service failures), employees don't 'sweat' being late once every couple of months or so, and they ditched getting sales leads (what ever happened to those cheap sunglasses they were going to offer you guys anyway...). The personal incentive for getting an increase in pay was taken away, so was the ability of Express to 'control' its employees.

If anyone in Express HR had an ounce of sense, they would've predicted this and came up with an alternative method of coming up with some form of compensation that is INDIVIDUALLY targeted and not across the board to all employees. But along with the ending of the performance review, came a decision to hand out jokes for pay increases and essentially freeze compensation levels to being slightly less than annual inflation. This is all the price a corporation must pay as a consequence of screwing over its employees.

Whether or not Express is actually going to hand out Performance Reminders for failure to meet monthly SPH goal remains to be seen. Until and unless a poster here states they PERSONALLY know someone who has received a Performance Reminder for failure to meet SPH, I'd be very cautious about assuming Express would actually follow through on this senior manager's threat (that is what I'm viewing it as, at this point).

Firing employees over an arbitrary productivity goal of stops per hour just begs of class action litigation. Express would be left trying to prove that its Swing Couriers could meet the SPH goal for a route while the assigned Courier is chronically unable to (damn difficult to do). This is the key reason why Express (to date) has used SPH as an implicit 'threat' to its Couriers, but never actually followed through on issuing any form of discipline for meeting that goal. The SPH statistic is more of a way for district level management to hold operations managers' feet to the fire (thus why ops managers let the fecal material flow down to the Couriers). If a station's managers cannot get their Couriers to meet the SPH goal, it is THEY who are looking at disciplinary action. The only real way they can take the heat off themselves is to run check rides on routes that are not meeting the report 'goal', then if they find the Courier is working with correct methods and not making any screw ups, have the goal adjusted accordingly.

With all the crap that is flowing down to the hourlies at this point, worrying about SPH (unless someone reports actual performance improvement being issued), is a waste of time. You've other things to worry about (like trying to find another career at this point).
 

bbsam

Moderator
Staff member
So Fedex wouldn't use the file full of OLCCs as a defacto performance review for termination with cause? Wouldn't that insulate them from the ensuing class action lawsuit?
 

Ricochet1a

Well-Known Member
So Fedex wouldn't use the file full of OLCCs as a defacto performance review for termination with cause? Wouldn't that insulate them from the ensuing class action lawsuit?

Doesn't work like that. Express just can't take a 'file full of OLCCs' and convert them into performance reminder (take ten $1 bills and convert them into a single $10 bill). They have their own personnel policies to follow (PEOPLE), and performance reminders have to be issued either for a specific event which warrants it, or after a series of related events for which OLCCs were issued (OLCCs issued for similar events then performance reminder issued if issues addressed in previous OLCCs not corrected).

OLCCs serve to give 'background' to issue either performance reminders or warning letters, but management just cannot issue one of these higher forms of discipline for an employee having a series of OLCCs for unrelated issues. Simply put, if an employee has a file full of OLCCs but no active Warning Letters or performance reminders, Express under its own personnel policies CANNOT terminate an employee's employment. There are certain things which may warrant termination without previous warning letters - use of cell phone while driving, runaway truck, 2 back-to-back 'no call, no shows', etc..

However (again), this doesn't stop management from trying to get rid of a troublesome employee if they really want (I have first hand experience in this matter).

Management can and will take any little issue and issue an OLCC for it. If they are really gunning for an employee, they will fabricate any little issue they can think of, in order to issue a performance reminder or Warning Letter. The management of the station I was at along with the district manager fabricated events in order to build documentation against me to get rid of me due to my organizing activities in 2010 (I was openly organizing at this point, openly distributing union literature). I left before they were able to generate their 'Three Strikes', but the message was clear to me (stop my activities), and clear to my coworkers (union talk within the station would be punished).

Given there is no 'check' on management allegations (other than GFT process, which only serves to protect Express from REALLY out of bounds allegations), management can and will issue discipline to employees at their discretion. As long as the district manger 'signs off' on any performance reminder or Warning Letter (and it isn't so flimsy as to be shot down by HR on 'appeal' - GFT process), hourly employees work at the discretion of their station and district management.

Express has a process (which exists to protect itself from litigation), so Express doesn't deviate from that process. Since the employee has no advocate other than HR (lot of help they are for the wage employee), the employee is left making sure they don't cross any implicit 'lines in the sand'. I haven't heard of OLCCs being issued for failure to meet monthly SPH on occasion (at least for only missing it by a few percentage points). Express has a personnel policy called 'process improvement' where employees who are demonstrating difficulty in meeting expectation are to be instructed and monitored for improvement. As long as the employee demonstrates improvement, discipline isn't handed out (all part of PEOPLE). Express has been changing PEOPLE considerably in the past few years to get around many of the small 'employee protections' that are within it, so I wouldn't be shocked to find out that process improvement has been changed too.
 

bbsam

Moderator
Staff member
However it is documented, cases will be built for and against couriers with SPH being a component. Overall goal remains the same: downsize the courier ranks.
 

MAKAVELI

Well-Known Member
However it is documented, cases will be built for and against couriers with SPH being a component. Overall goal remains the same: downsize the courier ranks.
SPH goal just doesn't carry the weight in case to terminate an employee you think it does. Like I said before unemployment benefits can not be denied for this reason and a good lawyer would have a field day with this.
 

bbsam

Moderator
Staff member
SPH goal just doesn't carry the weight in case to terminate an employee you think it does. Like I said before unemployment benefits can not be denied for this reason and a good lawyer would have a field day with this.

I agree. It doesn't carry that weight on its own. But I believe it will be a metric used in determining who stays and who goes. What some might describe as "hot air" will be very much considered in the cut downs. Unless of course you disagree with the premise that Fedex is looking to downsize the courier ranks. In that case, by all means, nothing I am saying makes any sense whatsoever if that is your belief.
 

bbsam

Moderator
Staff member
And if SPH means nothing at all, why do we have MFE himself satin you either hit them or you're gone? Why the numerous assertions that the SPH goal will "make" couriers drive unsafely and break laws? Because I suggested just yesterday that people should absolutely ignore the goal if it meant being unsafe or breaking laws.
 

MAKAVELI

Well-Known Member
And if SPH means nothing at all, why do we have MFE himself satin you either hit them or you're gone? Why the numerous assertions that the SPH goal will "make" couriers drive unsafely and break laws? Because I suggested just yesterday that people should absolutely ignore the goal if it meant being unsafe or breaking laws.
Because it is being used as a tool to put pressure on the courier to both increase productivity and quit. I also believe it is in retaliation for a large percentage of us who are not giving in to the pressure and WAD. They view this as organizing and want to snuff out any form of it.
 

Nolimitz

Well-Known Member
It's kinda wierd here. Since "gap" reports went away and DRA is in place, I have not heard word one regarding the term SPH? maybe its just our vol is up and trrucks are stopped to the max??
 

bbsam

Moderator
Staff member
Because it is being used as a tool to put pressure on the courier to both increase productivity and quit. I also believe it is in retaliation for a large percentage of us who are not giving in to the pressure and WAD. They view this as organizing and want to snuff out any form of it.
If they have to fire to get to the number they want, that is what they will do.
 

MAKAVELI

Well-Known Member
Because it is being used as a tool to put pressure on the courier to both increase productivity and quit. I also believe it is in retaliation for a large percentage of us who are not giving in to the pressure and WAD. They view this as organizing and want to snuff out any form of it.
If they have to fire to get to the number they want, that is what they will do.
Then they will face higher unemployment rates and lawsuits.
 

bbsam

Moderator
Staff member
Doesn't matter if they save more in compensation. You really should give them credit for being smarter than that. Any firing they do will have a plausible causation. They will lose some and win some and the variety of courier let go will cover any age discrimination going on.
 

Cactus

Just telling it like it is
Because it is being used as a tool to put pressure on the courier to both increase productivity and quit. I also believe it is in retaliation for a large percentage of us who are not giving in to the pressure and WAD. They view this as organizing and want to snuff out any form of it.
If they have to fire to get to the number they want, that is what they will do.
Then they will face higher unemployment rates and lawsuits.
And get new hires that can't make those numbers either.
 

MAKAVELI

Well-Known Member
Doesn't matter if they save more in compensation. You really should give them credit for being smarter than that. Any firing they do will have a plausible causation. They will lose some and win some and the variety of courier let go will cover any age discrimination going on.
if it were that easy they would have done it already plain and simple:.
 
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