Current Flavor of the Month?

[Overpaid Union Thug]

I'm just interested in what some of the flavor of the months (for drivers) are in other centers around the country. Stops per car seems to be common but I think it might be a permanent thing and not just a flavor of the month. With management's ability to measure EVERYTHING there is no limit to what the flavor of the month could be. The current flavor here (other than stops per car) seems to be customer concerns. I can understand legitimate concerns but we've noticed that even the BS concerns are being put in our files.

 

[UpstateNYUPSer(Ret)]

Stops per car and overallowed.

 

[tieguy]

I'm thinking grape might be it this month

The new focus is profitability. That means we will need to generate more volume to increase profitability and wiegh our decisions more carefully with profit in mind. Everything else will basically stay the same.

 

[scratch]

In my Center, we are being charged with any little safety thing and drivers are being taken out of service for a couple of day as punishment. We have had ten official accidents this year, as opposed to the same number this time last year. I think we are actually driving safer, because last year the minor things like busting a mirror with a tree limb or scrapping a bumper trying to pull out of the building were often not reported. So right now, morale is at an all time low and overtime is up. SPORH has suffered because everybody is being extra careful. We used to have 50% of the drivers run scratch everyday, the other day this was 12%. I have never seen things so bad. We are dispatched with too many stops with routes being cut and the weather is getting miserable with it hitting the 90s and very humid. Doesn't anybody up the management ladder understand what fatigue is?

 

[hurricanegunner]

In my Center, we are being charged with any little safety thing and drivers are being taken out of service for a couple of day as punishment. We have had ten official accidents this year, as opposed to the same number this time last year. I think we are actually driving safer, because last year the minor things like busting a mirror with a tree limb or scrapping a bumper trying to pull out of the building were often not reported. So right now, morale is at an all time low and overtime is up. SPORH has suffered because everybody is being extra careful. We used to have 50% of the drivers run scratch everyday, the other day this was 12%. I have never seen things so bad. We are dispatched with too many stops with routes being cut and the weather is getting miserable with it hitting the 90s and very humid. Doesn't anybody up the management ladder understand what fatigue is?

They understand what fatigue is; they just don't care. And if we get heatstroke, they'll say it's our fault for not drinking enough water. Just keep doing what you're doing. If crunching numbers means more to them than a human being's safety, it's up to us to take care of our own safety. If they harrass the 88% of drivers who don't run scratch, file. 88% of drivers in one center each filing a greivance will make quite a statement.

 

[over9five]

It should be........


GROWTH!!!!

 

[tranham]

I was thinking what the possibility of pushing back would be, in a way that could not get anyone fired.

#1 Don't bring your cell phone to work day (or month). How much harder would it be on management if they could only use the diad to contact you? How much more time wasted sending text messages. How much more time on the clock if you can't call you pickups to see if they have anything?

#2 Calling in (or texting in) everytime you hit something. Meaning any branch or bug you hit is supposed to be called in right? Where I work it's impossible not to hit a tree branch on the side streets in some spots. Make them come out and write an accident report, then refuse to deliver down the same street ever day after or walk the 2 miles to deliver.

Any other ideas?

Robert

 

[SWORDFISH]

Stops per car and overallowed.

+1........... They want us all at running scratch by august, LOL. What a pipe dream. My supes say their jobs are threatened by comporate to get us at scratch.

It should be........


GROWTH!!!!

Amen.... But how do we grow when we constantly screw the costumers we have? I see routes constantly changed to supposedly help things but actually end up upsetting good customers. They dont ask drivers for input they just do what they think looks good on paper. Kinda sad to see them say lets grow the business all the time and then screw the current customers all the time.

 

[browned_out]

Running an 85% or better trace, overallowed.

 

[SWORDFISH]

I was thinking what the possibility of pushing back would be, in a way that could not get anyone fired.

#1 Don't bring your cell phone to work day (or month). How much harder would it be on management if they could only use the diad to contact you? How much more time wasted sending text messages. How much more time on the clock if you can't call you pickups to see if they have anything?

#2 Calling in (or texting in) everytime you hit something. Meaning any branch or bug you hit is supposed to be called in right? Where I work it's impossible not to hit a tree branch on the side streets in some spots. Make them come out and write an accident report, then refuse to deliver down the same street ever day after or walk the 2 miles to deliver.

Any other ideas?

Robert

Never use your cell for business. They know if they want me to call them bad Im driving to where I can find a phone. The board has a texting system they can get you on that. As far as hitting anything, you dont need to call in for like a tree branch if no damage is done. If its unsafe dont do it. We have some driveways we dont go deliver because of the driveway is to long and no turnarounds. If they direct you to walk it then take all day walking down all the long driveways(I dont mean take your time I just mean it will take alot longer).

 

[tranham]

Never use your cell for business. They know if they want me to call them bad Im driving to where I can find a phone. The board has a texting system they can get you on that. As far as hitting anything, you dont need to call in for like a tree branch if no damage is done. If its unsafe dont do it. We have some driveways we dont go deliver because of the driveway is to long and no turnarounds. If they direct you to walk it then take all day walking down all the long driveways(I dont mean take your time I just mean it will take alot longer).

There is not 1 person I know of in our hub that doesn't use their personal phone for UPS business.

I have seen many people diciplined for hitting things and not doing any damage. Garbage cans, for example. They direct us to call it in even if there is no damage.

Robert

 

[jimstud]

sales leads.... 10 hour days but take time and get sales leads. what do the sales people do again?

 

[SWORDFISH]

Running an 85% or better trace, overallowed.

We have that one to. Actually had the dispatch supe threaten to make us run 85% so we better hurry up and fix our trace on our own time of course(LOL ya right). Its funny that he thinks thats a threat and even funnier that other people feel threatened by it. It will only hurt them if they want the route run like that if they dont want to take the time to fix them.

 

[just interested]

In my Center, we are being charged with any little safety thing and drivers are being taken out of service for a couple of day as punishment. We have had ten official accidents this year, as opposed to the same number this time last year. I think we are actually driving safer, because last year the minor things like busting a mirror with a tree limb or scrapping a bumper trying to pull out of the building were often not reported. So right now, morale is at an all time low and overtime is up. SPORH has suffered because everybody is being extra careful. We used to have 50% of the drivers run scratch everyday, the other day this was 12%. I have never seen things so bad. We are dispatched with too many stops with routes being cut and the weather is getting miserable with it hitting the 90s and very humid. Doesn't anybody up the management ladder understand what fatigue is?

SPORH???

SCRATCH????

What do these mean? How are they measured?

 

[UPSGUY72]

Running an 85% or better trace, overallowed.

Running trace , if I ran trace I would be out till 9:00 each day. I some routes there stops right next to each other that are 4 sections apart in the DIAD and management could care less. Anywys they are always doing adds/cuts which doesn't help either.

 

[whiskey]

SPORH???

SCRATCH????

What do these mean? How are they measured?

SPORH is an acronym for Stops Per On Road Hour. You divide the total stops by hours worked in a day to arrive at a driver's SPORH.
The number of boxes a driver delivers and picks up factors in heavily whether or not a driver runs "scratch". A driver may have one stop where he picks up 1000 envelopes. This will allow his "route" to "work up" rather easily. So when a driver is running "scratch", he or she is looking good on paper. "Scratch", to my knowledge, is not an acronym. It simply means the driver was sent out with 9 hours of work and it took him exactly 9 hours to complete his work day.

 

[Jones]

All I know is that I'm on pace to make some serious money this year. I guess my flavor is green

 

[stevetheupsguy]

Scratch is also a fellow BC'er, as well as a small cut one may get when say, passing by a thorny bush or this.

 

[Overpaid Union Thug]

Never use your cell for business. They know if they want me to call them bad Im driving to where I can find a phone. The board has a texting system they can get you on that. As far as hitting anything, you dont need to call in for like a tree branch if no damage is done. If its unsafe dont do it. We have some driveways we dont go deliver because of the driveway is to long and no turnarounds. If they direct you to walk it then take all day walking down all the long driveways(I dont mean take your time I just mean it will take alot longer).

I recently quit calling customers and I don't allow them to call me anymore. So many of our drivers do this and it's become a problem. When I run a bid driver's route while he is on vacation I end up with plenty of pissed off customers because "So and So always calls us first if we have a C.O.D." or "So and So always calls us so we can meet him" and crap like that. Another problem is when a supervisor calls to whine about how many stops I've gotten off so far. NO MORE! My phone is for personal use only.

As far as flavor of the months go.....I'm just glad we don't have telemetrics (or whatever its called) up and rolling in my center. I can only imagine how dizzy our management team would be if that additional burden of measurements were added to our center.

 

[stevetheupsguy]

I recently quit calling customers and I don't allow them to call me anymore. So many of our drivers do this and it's become a problem. When I run a bid driver's route while he is on vacation I end up with plenty of pissed off customers because "So and So always calls us first if we have a C.O.D." or "So and So always calls us so we can meet him" and crap like that. Another problem is when a supervisor calls to whine about how many stops I've gotten off so far. NO MORE! My phone is for personal use only.

As far as flavor of the months go.....I'm just glad we don't have telemetrics (or whatever its called) up and rolling in my center. I can only imagine how dizzy our management team would be if that additional burden of measurements were added to our center.

One of my add/cut customers is a cash/money order COD customer, who thinks I'll be swinging back with his pkg after he runs to the store for the money order. I told him that my mgmt team wants me to work urgently, and me coming back to his shop would be counter productive. Since then, he's had check/M.O. in hand.

My on-road can't call me, so I usually get the message via ODS, which is fine with me. Sometimes I show it to customers and we get a big laugh out of the message, because it's usually sent when I'm getting ready to scan their pkgs, so I have know choice but to reply.