Just joined have thoughts/questions

IWorkAsDirected

Outa browns on 04/30/09
Hi, all
I just joined, have been reading these forums for a few months. Our center is gearing up to start on the dreaded pas in a few weeks. We have 30 regular routes in southern Utah (no snow, mostly good weather thank goodness). I am a 20 year female driver looking forward to retirement the end of April 2009. Until pas goes in the drivers have done the preload, until a few years ago we also unloaded and loaded the trailers, did the clerk work etc. Now with a preload and pas going in all drivers including myself will no longer have a 3-4 hour preload, so we are going to have to jam 3-4 hours more work on our cars. A huge joke I know, it doesn't always fit now, but what do you do?

BTW our volume was way up on Thurs and especially Friday, mostly residential, as my route right now pre-pas is 80% resis and I had Christmas stop count. We had nearly 700% to cram into 30 cars, we are only running 4 p12 and about 10p10s around 6or7p8s about 5 p7s and a few p5s. Don't know how they will get it all in the cars as they don't plan to cut routes. Our center as a whole has a high percentage of businesses as compared to residentials as it is a commericial center for a wide outlying area of so Ut and so Nv. For example we have 2 super walmarts 2 home depots 3 albetsons a large indoor mall, a large factory store strip mall as well as the other strip malls, office and professional complexes etc. Anyway because of the high commercial stops they cannot cut routes and get all of them done before closing as we don't leave the building to deliver until after 10:30 AM. I load two p8s which hold the factory outlet stores strip mall as well as another strip mall and various other businesses. One driver delivers these two cars and the stops on the second car are not delivered until after 5 or 6 pm, these are business stops. Pretty sad state of affairs, and I'm sure it will be worse with pas.

Glad I only have 1 year 3 months and 24 days to go.

Any thoughts or suggestions are welcome.
 

IWorkAsDirected

Outa browns on 04/30/09
Sure wish I could, know any rich about to die with no wife or kids guys I could hook up with?

Oh well, I can do anything for that much longer!!

Not looking forward to it though. I think it will be a long nightmare, does anyone agree? Anymore thoughts?
 

Upslady20

Well-Known Member
The business's will be easier to get done since you will have a couple more hours to get them done.. What is your new start time going to be??? That is a strange retirement time.. will you reach an age needed or what.. Being also female just wondering I have 22 in with 8 to go.
 

IWorkAsDirected

Outa browns on 04/30/09
First off, no we won't have more time, we will still be leaving the building at 10:30 or later, so now that will be our start time. At present, pre-pas pre- preload our start time is 7:00.

We actually have the best pension plan in UPS or the Teamsters it's an 80 and out which means years worked plus age must add up to 80. Since I started a little later in life, I am retiring at 58 with 22 years after my seniority date in April 2009. We also opted to contribute to a Western States retirement health plan which keeps all but the prescription benefit intact for retiring members until death and will even work as a medicare supplemental benefit including vision. The only downside is there is a million dollar lifetime cap which could be used up with a severe illness or injury. NO COST after retirement. My pension will not be all that huge since I will only have 22 years paying in, but I have already downsized and I will be out of debt in a few months and I have a little over $110,00 in my 401k. Would have more but had a late bad marriage which wiped me out and alot of problems helping kids. My boys have been very troubled with drugs bad marriages etc. Not a good idea to be working 12 hour days as a single mother with teen-agers.
 

old brown shoe

30 year driver
Hold on you are probably in for a rocky ride. Since you will be starting later you will be dispatched out with more work. Then you will be told that you can work much faster because you will be getting a better load than you can put up yourself. They will re loop your center and your route could completely change. Just be glad you are a short timer. Good luck.
 

UpstateNYUPSer(Ret)

Well-Known Member
You should be happy that they at least waited until after peak to put PAS in. This will give you the bulk of the year to fine tune your route going in to your last peak.

I am sure the 1 year, 3 months, and 23 days will fly right by, you will find your "sugar daddy", and you will have fun in your retirement.
 

IWorkAsDirected

Outa browns on 04/30/09
Thanks everybody, and yes they did plan to implement pas before peak, but our district manager pulled the plug on it, we would have been leaving at noon, I'm sure.

Yes I know we'll have alot more work out on car.

The IE guys met with each of us back in Oct to show us how we would be running our routes. I was a dumbell and actually thought they were looking for some driver, area knowlege input, but silly me, I was just supposed to watch this little cursor on his laptop go through my route. I told him it wouldn't work as I have businesses in all the areas of my route and businesses he said would be in my pm delivery area would end up missed. He didn't want to hear it said there was no way to arrange it so I could do those businesses in that area when I go up there to do air. He also said he couldn't seperate out those businesses from the area and just have me deliver them, it was either the whole area or none. No other drivers are close earlier in the day to deliver them. I told him I definately was not going to do 200 stops everyday because I had to do the whole area, he said you get overtime don't you? I said I don't care if they pay me triple time I don't want to work 12 hours every day been there done that. He told me to talk to my center manager about that problem.

What a bunch of stupid dorks. Looks like my last year will make me alot of money although I will have no life and no energy. I WILL file ove 9.5 grievances and probably get harassed. The guy who works next to me on the sort filed a grievance over a sup working on the preload and has been made miserable by the *(&%$ for weeks now.

Any suggestions? How do the adjustments work for dispatch with pas? It has taken me years to get them to realize there is more to a planned day than stop counts, such as bulk, miles etc. So what do you do? For example, Friday I worked 11 1/2 hours after pulling 30+ stops because of bulk and miles and we left late because of late air. The same above mentioned sup said "If you're still over 9.5 after pulling this area I'm going to assume you want it that way" I had no comment but was thinking "Well there's a signed paper in the center manager office that says differently" What do you do when they ask you are you going to be under 9.5 especially with pas how do you know if you have runners etc. When I load my own car I can tell easily by an hour from wrap-up how long my day is going to be and what I need to do to make adjustments, not that it usually makes much difference when that sup is in charge. The other sup just says "You know what you need to do to be under, just pull it to that car"
 

IWorkAsDirected

Outa browns on 04/30/09
First time I really met one, seen them around not really doing anything once in awhile for years, we're 300+ miles from the nearest hub so we don't see too many suits. They are not very smart imo pathetic.
 
oh yeah, they are smart...very smart, however they don't have a clue what it's like to actually run an area. All they can do is look at maps and read numbers.
Taking your full meal time on area, o/9.5 Gs and working by the methods will be your bestest friends.

Here they started putting pals on the packages before actually emplimenting the whole system, that gave us a little over a week to get some things straightened out. Hopefully.

Brownshoe:
Did they really say to you, "Then you will be told that you can work much faster because you will be getting a better load than you can put up yourself."? I would have to split a stitch to keep from laughing right in their face. What a stupid stupid remark that simply is not true.
 

2Slow

Well-Known Member
As a driver, EDD is actually nice to have. It's the extra work and the unbelievable misloads that suck.
PAS could be a nice system, but managment has been unwilling to do the work from their end to make it happen.

Follow the rules. (even the stupid ones) Don't lie cheat or steal. You'll be alright.

As far as that business in the later sections;
Either the Center manager orders you to follow EDD or he doesn't. If they start talking about percentages, tell them you don't understand and you need clear instructions in writing so that you can remember.
If he orders you to follow EDD, inform him (with union witness) that you expect to have service failures.

They stopped even posting the percent on trace report in my center some while back.

"do you want it done right or do you want me to follow EDD?"
 

IWorkAsDirected

Outa browns on 04/30/09
Thanks for the suggestions 2slow, however the businesses will be a problem unless they can separate them and I can get to them in the morning when I run air. With 3 more hours (or more) of work in my car there will be no way to find them or pull them out (in fact I'm really wondering how they will cram it all in. Of course I guess I can make 3 trips up to that area. Isn't that efficient though?
 

2Slow

Well-Known Member
One of the good things with EDD... *IF* your preloader is worth a :censored2::censored2::censored2::censored2::censored2::censored2:, it becomes much easier to find stuff in the truck, even if it's pretty ugly.
You can look at the EDD list before you leave the buliding and find those particular addresses.

All the addresses in EDD have a Number associated with them. (HIN number) (sometimes 2 numbers if there is air and ground) This number tells you where the package is supposed to be.
 

bad company

semi-pro
One of the good things with EDD... *IF* your preloader is worth a :censored2::censored2::censored2::censored2::censored2::censored2:, it becomes much easier to find stuff in the truck, even if it's pretty ugly.
You can look at the EDD list before you leave the buliding and find those particular addresses.

All the addresses in EDD have a Number associated with them. (HIN number) (sometimes 2 numbers if there is air and ground) This number tells you where the package is supposed to be.

This can help a lot when used properly, yes. But can some one please explain to my why my dispatch sup insists on giving me blocks of 10-15 stops with the exact same number? Doesn't this defeat the purpose? Or how about when I have 30 stops in the 1000 section, and 1-5 stops in
the 2000 section?

Your preloader can make or break your day. I've seen both sides of the preloader spectrum, and my performance numbers reflect the quality of my loads. As far as your trace is concerned, it seems that management is not so paranoid and obsessed with running your route in trace order any more. I believe they've accepted the fact that most loops have been poorly implemented, and are happy with trace effectiveness between 60-80%.

I have a route with schools, churches, funeral homes, day cares, and other misc. business stops mixed in with my residential areas and break trace daily in order to make service. I've tried having management fix it, but they can't or refuse to, so I use this to justify my numbers being poorer than they could or should be.
 
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