Being provided handcarts.

undies

Well-Known Member
Sooo, we've been having a lot of base routes put in to deal with the recent volume and I've had to go out without a handcart because my center and every other center seems to not have any spare handcarts. It makes my job so much harder as most drivers know. What can I do here? File a grievance for not being supplied proper tools and equipment? Kindly ask my division manager to order more handcarts? Just suck it up and kill my back carrying one box at a time to all the damn apartment buildings? Thanks.
 

rod

Retired 22 years
Sooo, we've been having a lot of base routes put in to deal with the recent volume and I've had to go out without a handcart because my center and every other center seems to not have any spare handcarts. It makes my job so much harder as most drivers know. What can I do here? File a grievance for not being supplied proper tools and equipment? Kindly ask my division manager to order more handcarts? Just suck it up and kill my back carrying one box at a time to all the damn apartment buildings? Thanks.

Back in "the good old days" I would have stopped at a hardware store bought one and taken it out of my COD cash turn-in. I suppose you can't do that now? :wink2: Life sucks without a handcart. If you were around here I would give you the one I rescued from the dumpster when UPS went to all aluminum carts. It only weighs about 10 times what they do now but I hauled tons of cardboard on it. On second though I couldn't part with it. I still use it for hauling stuff like refrigerators, washers and dryers-----or at least I loan it out to friends who do.
 

UpstateNYUPSer(Ret)

Well-Known Member
The company is required to provide you with the materials that you need to do your job safely---this includes handcarts. Ask your center team to order a handcart for you.
 

JonFrum

Member
Ask and ye shall receive . . .

ARTICLE 18. SAFETY AND HEALTH EQUIPMENT, ACCIDENTS AND REPORTS
Section 14. Package Cars
[...]
"A package car will be equipped with a hand cart at the driver’s request."
 

Covemastah

Hoopah drives the boat Chief !!
When you get your hands on one,,, LEAVE IT at a trusted pick up and you will know where it is every day !!
I had two of them out on the road and the customers where great,never touched them !!
 

Dracula

Package Car is cake compared to this...
I don't want to get you in trouble, but what we used to do if we didn't have our two-wheelers, we told them we were leaving until we had one. If you want to turn a driver sup into a scurrying rat, what him find you a dolly before your start time. Our sups would always go steal them from other centers.

But maybe your best bet is to just calmly tell your center manager that you feel it is a safety issue, not having a dolly. Tell him since you, and you alone are responsible for your safety, that you feel it is risky and dangerous to do your job unsafe. Them ask him, "What do you want me to do?" See what he says. Also, have a grievance written up referring to Article 18, like JonFrum says above.
 
Get yourself a good bike lock and take it out and lock it to an out of the way pole each night.

The one at the strip club does not count.
 

BrownArmy

Well-Known Member
I got a Masterlock U-shaped bike lock...much harder to cut.

I lock my hand-truck to a railing, next to the 20+ other locked up hand-trucks.

Tell the center manager you can't leave until you have a hand-truck. When he says, "aw, come on, you're on a house-call route, you don't need one", refer to the PCM you've just recently had about the proper way to load an over-70 onto a hand-truck.

Refer to the Eight keys: Get an object in your POWER-ZONE! (Hard to do with a 4'x6' 120lb PBTeen bed getup)... Use existing equipment...(hard to do if you don't have said equipment), etc.

Refer to the 5 keys to avoiding slips and falls...kind of hard to scan your walk area when you're carrying a stack of amazon/zappos packages up the rich ladies' awesome curving stone staircase...

If you want to 'take it to the streets', message the center (every time) that you need help with an over-70 and the consignee isn't home...someone's going to have to break off and help you...rinse, repeat.

Bring it all back to safety, and throw in some efficiency arguments if you want to get fancy, but your center manager needs to get you a hand-truck.

(and when you get one, lock it up with a good lock...)
 

soberups

Pees in the brown Koolaid
File a grievance.

The company is required to provide handcarts.

You would think that the handcart would simply be considered part of the package car, like a tire, and that every car in the fleet would have one aling with a few spares back in the building. Its not rocket science.
 

Indecisi0n

Well-Known Member
Sooo, we've been having a lot of base routes put in to deal with the recent volume and I've had to go out without a handcart because my center and every other center seems to not have any spare handcarts. It makes my job so much harder as most drivers know. What can I do here? File a grievance for not being supplied proper tools and equipment? Kindly ask my division manager to order more handcarts? Just suck it up and kill my back carrying one box at a time to all the damn apartment buildings? Thanks.

You work A LOT more carefully and any bulk or overweight you call for a second driver. Make their problem just that, their problem.
 
Top