GPS test center

[pretzel_man]

The ie guy who implemented pas in our center "added a map" He drew some squiggly lines out to the side and said it was such and such streets; result? I was going back and forth and in circles until I took over 3 hours coded as am meeting to plan it all out on multiple full pages for the dispatcher to change. Now most of it is gone, why?

PAS is a disaster, it causes service failures (bad pals), poor service (business deliveries after 6:00 pm) ( businesses never know what driver or what time to expect), miles thus fuel costs are a joke, overtime costs (sort, meet to exchange misloads, or run misloads)

I honestly believe with the service level we are providing now there may be no UPS in the future if something doesn't happen to get a handle on this mess.

IWork:

I've seen pooly implemented PAS centers and the result is as you described. Poor routes, disrupted service and excess miles.

On the other hand, overall PAS centers have improved service. Delivery scan frequencies are much better and miles are down.

That's the average and as I said certainly doesn't mean that its working everywhere.

As far as Maps go, I'm not sure what he did. He can add areas to the map as you described, but making the trace correct only takes minutes.

As I've said, I've seen this work great in many centers. Some don't work great.

Its the same system. Same training. Same support.

The only difference between the good and poor site is the local management.

P-Man

 

[JustTired]

IWork:

I've seen pooly implemented PAS centers and the result is as you described. Poor routes, disrupted service and excess miles.

On the other hand, overall PAS centers have improved service. Delivery scan frequencies are much better and miles are down.

That's the average and as I said certainly doesn't mean that its working everywhere.

As far as Maps go, I'm not sure what he did. He can add areas to the map as you described, but making the trace correct only takes minutes.

As I've said, I've seen this work great in many centers. Some don't work great.

Its the same system. Same training. Same support.

The only difference between the good and poor site is the local management.

P-Man

I have no doubt that, if implemented properly, the system would work. The problem as I see it is that those that have to work with the system either: 1. Haven't a clue 2. Don't have the ability to "have a clue" 3. Don't want to "have a clue".

You seem to be pretty intelligent. Those put in charge of the system (evidently in most places) are not so blessed.

Step 1 in getting the system to work properly would be to have a time study that more accurately reflects the real world. It seems to me that dispatching drivers with 9 hours of work when in actuality it is 10.5-11 hours, would tend to screw the system up. Having to dispatch with regards to number of drivers allowed, as opposed to actual volume in the building , puts the dispatcher at a disadvantage right off the bat.

Just the way I see it. I could be wrong.

 

[upsdude]

IWork:

I've seen pooly implemented PAS centers and the result is as you described. Poor routes, disrupted service and excess miles.

On the other hand, overall PAS centers have improved service. Delivery scan frequencies are much better and miles are down.

That's the average and as I said certainly doesn't mean that its working everywhere.

As far as Maps go, I'm not sure what he did. He can add areas to the map as you described, but making the trace correct only takes minutes.

As I've said, I've seen this work great in many centers. Some don't work great.

Its the same system. Same training. Same support.

The only difference between the good and poor site is the local management.

P-Man

The PAS IE Team did a really good job of setting up the routes, trace, pickups, etc. At first like anything else there were issues, some of the DOL lists were screwed up. Of course "wrong cars" were a much bigger problem then but that has improved, still needs work though.

Here's the problem, our PDS sup who knows nothing about the routes thinks he has made the system better. Most everyone is driving more miles, working longer hours, and delivering fewer stops than they could be. He took a system that was say 90% effective and has totally screwed it up.

 

[pretzel_man]

UPSDude, JustTired:

The problem I've seen in my region is NOT a computer system problem. I think both of your have described this.

From what I've seen, the management team in the poor centers need to understand how to properly dispatch and analyze the operation.

This computer system was meant to make that easier, but it assumed that the people using it already understood the basic concepts.

I spend a lot of time teaching the concepts. Controlled dispatch, work measurement. Planning. Etc.

One last thing for JustTired....

While the process uses time study to calculate a planned day, the PDS is supposed to enter the amount of "over allowed" for each driver. This way, if the time study is wrong or if operation conditions require more or less work on a car its accounted for.

The system does NOT plan to the time study values. It plans to the paid day which included the time study value PLUS any overallowed that exists.

I spend time explaining this too.

My point is the same. Its easy for the local management blame a system for their own failings. The system is not perfect of course, but it is great when properly used.

P-Man

 

[tourists24]

I spend a lot of time teaching the concepts. Controlled dispatch, work measurement. Planning. Etc.
P-Man

PMan, you seem to be knowledgeable about PAS. A question for you. How come the whole system seems to have problems with mall routes? I have seen a lot of progress over time, but there is still a lot of issues that other routes dont seem to have?

 

[wornoutupser]

P Man,
please come to my center ASAP!
We are a disaster. Old building, band aid fixes everywhere, PAS team comes with no area knowledge and "fixes" everything with Google maps. Get the picture?
Rumor has it the PAS team is on 30-60-90 yet UPS allows them to stay and "fix" things here that are getting worse by the day.
My run? I had it aced in trace. It is now changed nearly daily, yet everyone denies touching it. The result is more miles and less customer service and higher paid days than when I had my 3 day ride to learn the system. Pocket dispatching is rampant.
UPS is retaliating by intimidating drivers here. My sup is about to pull his hair out being caught in the middle. He is new but trying and is dead coming out of the gate. It amazes me have UPS just blames drivers for every fault once PAS goes in, I (and many other drivers) have personally given up and just run whatever crap goes into the car. Missed pkgs? sheet them up. One letter off on the address spelling? It is now a "bad add". Areas across town loaded every day and nothing is done to stop it? Get back soon enough to deliver those business stops....add 12 miles round trip. No one cares

We could use you here if you are good!

 

[pretzel_man]

PMan, you seem to be knowledgeable about PAS. A question for you. How come the whole system seems to have problems with mall routes? I have seen a lot of progress over time, but there is still a lot of issues that other routes dont seem to have?

Here is how to handle a mall route.

They need to put in every store that is delivered to. Every last consignee.

Then, they need to put in "aliases" for the appropriate stores. For instance if you have JC Penney as a consignee, they should have Penney's, JCP, etc. as aliases if packages come addressed that way.

They then give each consignee a sequence number so it shows up in the right order in EDD.

Next step is to go into shelf assignments and ensure that the consignees are in the proper place on the shelfs.

Last step is to turn on a setting that will ensure each consignee is displayed in EDD. (This setting will cause additional work for the data capture people, but will save you and the preloaders time).

That's what I teach for mall routes that are having issues. Its not needed for each one, but works when there are issues.

It gives you more information on what you have, and reduces ambiguity in the preload. It may cause a little more data capture.

One thing though. It will not help stop counts. It will credit in PAS a fixed number of stops. As long as the number of stops is consistent, that's not a problem.

P-Man

 

[pretzel_man]

P Man,
please come to my center ASAP!
We are a disaster. Old building, band aid fixes everywhere, PAS team comes with no area knowledge and "fixes" everything with Google maps. Get the picture?
Rumor has it the PAS team is on 30-60-90 yet UPS allows them to stay and "fix" things here that are getting worse by the day.
My run? I had it aced in trace. It is now changed nearly daily, yet everyone denies touching it. The result is more miles and less customer service and higher paid days than when I had my 3 day ride to learn the system. Pocket dispatching is rampant.
UPS is retaliating by intimidating drivers here. My sup is about to pull his hair out being caught in the middle. He is new but trying and is dead coming out of the gate. It amazes me have UPS just blames drivers for every fault once PAS goes in, I (and many other drivers) have personally given up and just run whatever crap goes into the car. Missed pkgs? sheet them up. One letter off on the address spelling? It is now a "bad add". Areas across town loaded every day and nothing is done to stop it? Get back soon enough to deliver those business stops....add 12 miles round trip. No one cares

We could use you here if you are good!

Wornout:

I'm sorry for your problems and frustrations. Sounds like your center is certainly one of the poor ones.

First, the system does not automatically make any changes. If changes occur from day to day, they are either making changes, or they have multiple plans that have different information.

Someone earlier said that its too much work to fix. I don't buy that. A route can be copied from plan to plan.

Finally, the intent with PAS was to get improvements by reducing miles. Not through intimidation or making drivers work harder.

If they are pocket dispatching, they are by definition causing extra miles and therefore violating the intent.

I realize you are caught in the middle. When I work with a site, I track miles. I'm looking to see the same amount of work get done with less miles.

Of course, I'm up front with the drivers on the consequence. If I reduce miles, I will expect to either have them clock in earlier, or I'll put more stops on the car. (I'm trading miles for stops)

P-Man

 

[upsdude]

P-man,

There doesn’t seem to be any accountability for the PDS sup. Sure, they have to be “in range” but that report can be acceptable but at what cost?

I really think we need a system ,using GPS, that shows drivers overlapping. Someone needs to be able to look at a screen showing the center’s territory and bring up each route. The program would show say “blue” for each street a driver delivered on that day. Bring up the next route and so on to see what a mess some PDS sups have created.

Your comment about less miles and adding stops. No problem. The PAS team had me running 165-170 a day roughly 40 miles. I was knocking that out in about 830 hours with ease. Now I’m expected to run 155-160 stops covering roughly 50 miles. Why the added miles? The PDS sup has me driving to another route to run 10 stops. That driver is heading over to my area to run 10 stops. ?

The center manager and division manager are fully aware of this situation, they do NOTHING. That’s why some sort of accountability (reports) needs to be in place. One thing I’ve learned in my 21 years at UPS, if it’s a conference call item it will get fixed. LOL.

 

[JustTired]

P-man

Ok...if I got this right, the problems lie with the implementation and those that "man" the system afterwards. That was my thoughts basically.

I'm guessing that to make the system "work", you need someone dedicated and knowledgable enough to keep up with it. In other words making valid changes supplied by the driver and possibly even keeping track of trends.

Therein lies the problem. Chosing someone to oversee and work with the system should require more than just a warm body. The people in these positions should have some background and/or training (rather extensive, I believe) before asked to tackle what I will admit seems like a rather daunting task.

Above all.... I don't believe you can have someone such as a Div. or Dist. manager overriding the system by demanding only a set number of drivers on the road when the plan or system clearly show differently.

You can have all the systems in the world. But if you don't use them as they were designed, what's the point?

 

[pretzel_man]

JustTired, UPSDude,

You are both right.

The PDS need to be empowered and also to have the proper skills. I've seen this work.

If things are not going right in your center, I blame the managment people.

Its interesting, that I've spoken with hundreds (if not thousands) of drivers and when I explain about swapping miles for stops (or time), I rarely get any grief. Some may not like it, but they understand.

I have more problems with poor managment who don't know how to do that.

UPSDude:
That GPS system you're discussing partly exists in the PAS system today. The center can turn on GPS for 5 to 10 drivers each day and see your actual trace. The GPS will take a reading every second and display it on a map.

In addition, this thread started by talking about a new GPS system being tested. The new one makes the current system look like a toy. It will do exactly as you state.

Of course as you've stated, these great tools without the proper management knowledge will not work.

I think UPS is doing the right thing. I think it may take a while to get every center properly using it but its essential to our long term.

P-Man

 

[JustTired]

Its interesting, that I've spoken with hundreds (if not thousands) of drivers and when I explain about swapping miles for stops (or time), I rarely get any grief. Some may not like it, but they understand.

I have more problems with poor managment who don't know how to do that.

P-Man

I would have no problem swapping miles for stops. The problem in my case is that if I run things by EDD, I'm assured more miles. Yet my stop count is not adjusted accordingly. I have a feeling that the swap thing is a oneway street.
ie...."If you run less miles, we will give you more stops.....if you run more miles, you won't get less stops."

Our center is a mess. I would like to see someone like yourself come in and set things up here. Without the time constraint that seems to have been put upon the original person. I don't think that he was even here for half of the center setup before being sent somewhere else. This left it up to the sup who was to become the PDS to finish. The first guy didn't do that great a job, but it really went downhill after he left. Just about everything I've read in the above posts and elsewhere on this forum has happened or is happening here.

You seem to have at least part of the answer, but how do we get those in power to listen? I see nothing but bigtime money savings in the future if someone is willing to take the bull by the horns and admit that it really needs to be revamped or just reimplemented properly.

 

[IWorkAsDirected]

P Man,
please come to my center ASAP!
We are a disaster. Old building, band aid fixes everywhere, PAS team comes with no area knowledge and "fixes" everything with Google maps. Get the picture?
Rumor has it the PAS team is on 30-60-90 yet UPS allows them to stay and "fix" things here that are getting worse by the day.
My run? I had it aced in trace. It is now changed nearly daily, yet everyone denies touching it. The result is more miles and less customer service and higher paid days than when I had my 3 day ride to learn the system. Pocket dispatching is rampant.
UPS is retaliating by intimidating drivers here. My sup is about to pull his hair out being caught in the middle. He is new but trying and is dead coming out of the gate. It amazes me have UPS just blames drivers for every fault once PAS goes in, I (and many other drivers) have personally given up and just run whatever crap goes into the car. Missed pkgs? sheet them up. One letter off on the address spelling? It is now a "bad add". Areas across town loaded every day and nothing is done to stop it? Get back soon enough to deliver those business stops....add 12 miles round trip. No one cares

We could use you here if you are good!

From what I gather on here and other sites, it's pretty much like that almost everywhere, you described our center perfectly. Most have just given up and dealing with it the best they can. I honestly think if something drastic doesn't change UPS will not survive with this mess.