Sleeve_meet_Heart,
This is just not true.
Where do you get your inaccurate information?
It is true. Just from this past week:
* My job was threatened for refusing to lift a transmission that weighed more than 300 lbs. [These are regular deliveries ... the Company has done NOTHING to stop their pick-up or progression.]
* I unloaded a 53' trailer in which I estimate 75% of the packages were heavy (50 lbs. or more) or bulky (e.g. boxes of 30 lb. of textbooks / paper reams that feel much heavier). These packages were stacked to the top of the ceiling -- including a 93 lb. package with no overweight markings that was wedged in so tightly, it knocked me & my load stand down. Again, this is a REGULAR occurrence (the hub filters all the heavy packages onto a single trailer). We've taken pictures and questioned this in the past & have been told EXPLICITLY that the loading style helped their production numbers.
* Speaking of loads ... nowadays, the emphasis is on filling all available space. Even if that means placing a hazmat (you know... blocked & braced, no higher than waist) in the hole. Or a 120 lb. metal pipe in the hidden hole at the very top, that the unloader isn't going to see until he moves a package and the pipe comes at him. It use to be that you loaded heavier packages on the bottom, lighter in the middle & bags at the top of the ceiling. Now... production, production, production - what's your function?
* I refused to work in a trailer with an employee that had the flu -- I get sick real easily, and certainly don't need to flu. I was told I'd be "voluntarily quitting."
This is just my observations, as a petty preloader. There were other incidents, but I digress.