Earlier start times

[DiRt BAG]

Has anyone else heard the rumors that all operations are going to be moved up at least 30 minutes? We’ve been hearing, starting sometime in May, that our start times are being moved from 09:00 to 08:30. The air trailer is supposedly pulling at 19:30 instead of 20:15 and most feeder runs are getting moved up. This really makes sense and that is why I’m having a very hard time believing it!!

 

[UpstateNYUPSer(Ret)]

One of the proposals from the Company was getting us out of the building earlier.

 

[Johney]

I have, only here their talking an hour earlier.

 

[trickpony1]

I have, only here their talking an hour earlier.

That's really gonna screw the feedah drivers that can't get out on time now. I guess management thinks something magic is gonna happen.

 

[UpstateNYUPSer(Ret)]

That's really gonna screw the feedah drivers that can't get out on time now. I guess management thinks something magic is gonna happen.

Earlier pull times from the centers should led to earlier pull times from the hubs.

 

[MrBates]

I had a center manager before that hated the idea of an earlier start time. According to him package drivers take advantage of the extra daylight especially during the summer to milk the hours and stay out later. His professional opinion was that drivers work faster when they know they are running out of daylight.

 

[Big Babooba]

Earlier pull times from the centers should led to earlier pull times from the hubs.

In theory.

 

[Dhydratd]

...His professional opinion was that drivers work faster when they know they are running out of daylight.

I can prove he's wrong. I have only two speeds. "Slow" for every day and "Slower" for when it gets dark.

 

[PT Car Washer]

Has anyone else heard the rumors that all operations are going to be moved up at least 30 minutes? We’ve been hearing, starting sometime in May, that our start times are being moved from 09:00 to 08:30. The air trailer is supposedly pulling at 19:30 instead of 20:15 and most feeder runs are getting moved up. This really makes sense and that is why I’m having a very hard time believing it!!

Feeder driver told me last night that our air trailer was going to pull at 19:25 instead 19:45 starting May 21st. We have a last minute air shuttle that runs at 20:15 so should be interesting to see how this all shakes out. An earlier start time could eliminate a lot of AM air driving jobs. Also could mean drivers back to the building at a decent time.

 

[Dhydratd]

Has anyone else heard the rumors that all operations are going to be moved up at least 30 minutes?

I heard that also. I wonder how the UPS Stores are gonna like having to get their closed-out on time?

 

[PT Car Washer]

I heard that also. I wonder how the UPS Stores are gonna like having to get their closed-out on time?

Could mean more PM air driver routes.

 

[Wally]

Has anyone else heard the rumors that all operations are going to be moved up at least 30 minutes? We’ve been hearing, starting sometime in May, that our start times are being moved from 09:00 to 08:30. The air trailer is supposedly pulling at 19:30 instead of 20:15 and most feeder runs are getting moved up. This really makes sense and that is why I’m having a very hard time believing it!!

Lol. We keep moving in the other direction. Everytime we move, the preload moves up too to cut costs.

 

[barnyard]

When I started on the preload, driver start time was 7:50. Now we are at an 8:50 start and the preload is wrapped about half the time. I would LOVE to start at 8:20. That would get me to the coffee shop before school lets out and I would take a break there. I would also be able to do a little more than the 3-4 businesses I do before running straight air.

 

[Brisket]

I heard that also. I wonder how the UPS Stores are gonna like having to get their closed-out on time?

Oh wow, you’re right especially the ones that get picked up on Saturdays...gonna be interesting that’s for sure!

 

[35years]

1/2 an hour would not even get me back to my previous start time.
But it would help.

Any chance it is a coincidence this is a contract year?
Once it is signed they will move it back again 10 minutes at a time.

I remember a cryptic statement on Brown Cafe by a IE manager that the strategy for this year leading up to the contract vote was not what IE recommended.

Seems to me this is likely one of those strategic manipulations to make us feel like this job is not that bad going into the vote.

"Yeah, we don't need binding contact language limiting OT, or establishing a curfew...We are starting earlier now"...
Then the vote happens...
And 10 minutes at a time they move the start time back: Or move it back "for peak" and never push it earlier again in January.

 

[Fenris]

My understanding is that earlier start times are being driven by moving flight times up so volume gets to Worldport earlier so it can be turned around and outbounded sooner to improve on Air service.

 

[35years]

The Hawthorne effect
"The Hawthorne effect is named after what was one of the most famous experiments (or, more accurately, series of experiments) in industrial history. It marked a sea change in thinking about work and productivity. Previous studies, in particular Frederick Taylor's influential ideas, had focused on the individual and on ways in which an individual's performance could be improved. Hawthorne set the individual in a social context, establishing that the performance of employees is influenced by their surroundings and by the people that they are working with as much as by their own innate abilities.

The experiments took place at Western Electric's factory at Hawthorne, a suburb of Chicago, in the late 1920s and early 1930s. They were conducted for the most part under the supervision of Elton Mayo, an Australian-born sociologist who eventually became a professor of industrial research at Harvard.

The original purpose of the experiments was to study the effects of physical conditions on productivity. Two groups of workers in the Hawthorne factory were used as guinea pigs. One day the lighting in the work area for one group was improved dramatically while the other group's lighting remained unchanged. The researchers were surprised to find that the productivity of the more highly illuminated workers increased much more than that of the control group.

The employees' working conditions were changed in other ways too (their working hours, rest breaks and so on), and in all cases their productivity improved when a change was made. Indeed, their productivity even improved when the lights were dimmed again. By the time everything had been returned to the way it was before the changes had begun, productivity at the factory was at its highest level. Absenteeism had plummeted."

Workers want a brighter workplace...Turn up the lights.
Productivity improves.

Turn them back down incrementally, even dimmer than at the start...
Productivity remains higher.

Push the start times earlier...Happy contract voters.
Push the start times incrementally later, after the vote... No one complains.

 

[35years]

I have seen the pushing up of start times before in previous contact years.
What else?
-Management becoming buddy-buddy.
-PCMs subtly and not so subtly supporting management's posistions on sticky contract issues.
-Overemphasis on competition, how they are stealing all our vollume, how they pay less....FIND A COMMON ENEMY to promote solidarity with management: One UPS!
-cutting back excessive OT the summer before the vote.

New statagies...
-Raise the starting wage prior to the contract, since this must be done anyway and increases job satisfaction prior to the vote.
-Social media and apps that present propaganda.
-Supposed empathetic supervisors and fake drivers/loaders posting on Brown Cafe.

I don't blame UPS for using these strategies. But employees need to know the manipulation is intentional.

 

[eats packages]

Historically our start times are the same, if not slightly more forward, than last year.

But I doubt volume or staffing stayed the same.

 

[Coldworld]

That's really gonna screw the feedah drivers that can't get out on time now. I guess management thinks something magic is gonna happen.

Throw a few dozen donuts in front of the ivis that the feeder drivers punch into and watch them get a pep in their step... throw some coffee into the mix and watch feeder drivers turn it up a notch....