I'm very interested to see how things are in non-peak times. You may be right. Then again, I'm part time so if they push me a little, I'm more than happy to get a few more hours in per week. As it is now, I chose to have 10 percent of my pre-tax wages go to my 401(k). I have a ton of catching up to do.
Having recently completed the 10, no 5, make that 3 day courier school, let me say that the company is living a fantasy if it thinks this is anywhere near enough time to adequately train new drivers. Not only isn't there enough time to learn, retain and practice various procedures, there are entire areas that aren't even mentioned, let alone covered in the shallow depth three days allows. I've learned more from actually being on the road and from veteran drivers.
The sense I got from our instructor at Boston(ian) division h.q., was that he has a vested interest in doing all the courier, driver and other training because his job depends on it. He has no assistant and isn't interested in getting any, so he's totally overwhelmed and overworked. New couriers pay the price. I also despised that he made all of us stand during the entire class. And that he encouraged us to ask questions, but when anyone did ask he wasn't interested in answering.
I did learn, though, that FedEx international shipments have a 700 percent profit margin.