Level of management that "knows"?

[thedownhillEXPRESS]

How far down the chain has been told about express saver elimination?
We still have reports of district director level managers denying it to courriers.
A) are they lying?
B) don't they even know?
C) are we really not eliminating express saver?

 

[Myort]

I feel that as long as UPS offers 3 day select, FedEx will offer Express Saver. It might be reduced and not available in some circumstances, but I think it will still remain in some form.

 

[UpstateNYUPSer(Ret)]

You don't think Ground would start offering a similar product instead?

 

[STFXG]

They may as well dump express saver. Nearly the entire country is covered in 3 days by ground anyways. Why pay the higher cost for express?

I'm assuming district management knows by now. They'll keep it quiet until the last minute.

 

[Mr. 7]

My regional sales guy was walking the belt two weeks ago and I casually said "So, when are we losing X saver"?
He totally confirmed it and said "soon".

 

[Goldilocks]

Yep, its been told at a few of our Stations in our District. It's going to Ground. I think all of this is suppose to be final by the end of July....

 

[Ricochet1a]

How far down the chain has been told about express saver elimination?
We still have reports of district director level managers denying it to courriers.
A) are they lying?
B) don't they even know?
C) are we really not eliminating express saver?

Of course this director is lying. It has made its way down to Sr. Manager level.

In all honestly, I'm amazed that you seem to suggest that mid-level management WOULDN'T lie to you if you asked them a question and they weren't "authorized" to give a response to it.

 

[Ricochet1a]

I feel that as long as UPS offers 3 day select, FedEx will offer Express Saver. It might be reduced and not available in some circumstances, but I think it will still remain in some form.

Wrong.

Express Saver is on the way out, customers who ship items that don't need at least 2 day service will be offered Ground service.

Express Saver was an attempt to fill underutilized capacity (back before Ground was part of FedEx) and grab some market share from UPS. With Ground fully up to speed and expanding capacity (and Express shedding capacity), there is no reason to have Express Saver service under Express. It is actually a money loser now, since the margins on Express Saver are in most cases less than zero - and the margins within Ground are in double digits.

 

[thedownhillEXPRESS]

Of course this director is lying. It has made its way down to Sr. Manager level.

In all honestly, I'm amazed that you seem to suggest that mid-level management WOULDN'T lie to you if you asked them a question and they weren't "authorized" to give a response to it.

I'm not "amazed" that they lie, it just seems like its going to be mass chaos when the purple bleeders hear the announcement.
when a district director is asked in a room of 100 people if we are losing express saver, and adamantly denies it, it just seems hard to believe that they wouldn't have a better prepared "spin" response, since they still retain credibility with about 50% of the station( the rest just laugh).
R1A, how will a district director explain this?
I don't think saying I couldnt say anything will cut it, I know they could, but FedEx usually has a very coordinated story to keep the bleeders believing, shouldnt they still be trying to keep the suck ups in their corner?
Again, they left no wiggle room.

 

[TUT]

I'm not "amazed" that they lie, it just seems like its going to be mass chaos when the purple bleeders hear the announcement.
when a district director is asked in a room of 100 people if we are losing express saver, and adamantly denies it, it just seems hard to believe that they wouldn't have a better prepared "spin" response, since they still retain credibility with about 50% of the station( the rest just laugh).
R1A, how will a district director explain this?
I don't think saying I couldnt say anything will cut it, I know they could, but FedEx usually has a very coordinated story to keep the bleeders believing, shouldnt they still be trying to keep the suck ups in their corner?
Again, they left no wiggle room.

The reason they can weather the backlash is because everyone does this in big corps. They will lie to you up to the second it's publicly announced. Probably some laws they are bound to because they are a a public company and if they mentioned it prior to a formal public announcement it can be looked at as inside info for trading purposes. So when it looks like we have finally found satan! It's just more of his minions swaying to the strings into which they are attached. The minions themselves really don't care much for it as well, but 3 square and a warm bed helps justify it all. Corporations: 1000's of souls coming together to make a soulless entity.

 

[Myort]

Is it possible it won't be available to most shippers when shipping over a fairly short distance? I can remember picking up from places and seeing them send lots of standard overnight letters and noticing the ones going across town were shipped XS. It's very possible when shipping short distances you will be given the option of Overnight, 2-day, or ground.

 

[vantexan]

I wonder if FedEx is hoping word will get around about upcoming changes without their having to break the news to us cold turkey. Might get quite a few couriers thinking about leaving that might not if pressed to make a decision quickly. I'd be surprised if senior mgrs aren't aware of what's going on. I showed an ops mgr the Commercial Appeal article and asked another about a buyout. I'm sure some of the couriers I've told have mentioned it to them too. And yet none have told me to stop talking about it, although I've said very little in the last week. Just seems if they don't know, or are trying to keep it quiet, they'd be concerned that I was agitating a lot of people. The silence is deafening.

 

[Myort]

I have a feeling we might get some direction this week when the earnings are released.

 

[55+]

I wonder if FedEx is hoping word will get around about upcoming changes without their having to break the news to us cold turkey. Might get quite a few couriers thinking about leaving that might not if pressed to make a decision quickly. I'd be surprised if senior mgrs aren't aware of what's going on. I showed an ops mgr the Commercial Appeal article and asked another about a buyout. I'm sure some of the couriers I've told have mentioned it to them too. And yet none have told me to stop talking about it, although I've said very little in the last week. Just seems if they don't know, or are trying to keep it quiet, they'd be concerned that I was agitating a lot of people. The silence is deafening.

Seems like they know somethings up..They aren't denying it. In fact one mgr told me they think it will happen..Hope they hurry up..Also seems like they would want us oldies out soon since fulltimers accumulate 1000 hours around December and they would have to contribute a chunk of money into the portable pension account on their behalf..I think they just want to be able to control whatever it is they will offer and are working out the details..They don't want too many people to leave all at once..Not that that would happen since most people can't/won't leave..they need the money. It's not like everyone can run out and find another job right now..Back in 03 and 04 it was easier for people to find other work. Anyway I'm not holding my breath..

 

[Myort]

Not here to get into a pissing match and argue, but I am going to maintain the XS is not going to go away. To get an idea as to where we could be headed, pull up the FedEx and UPS websites and click the link for "get rates and transit times" and start comparing. I didn't do much, but I noticed when shipping a package across town, UPS only gave Overnight and ground options, where Fedex gave everything. If you try the same shipment across the country, UPS gives more options. I didn't try shipping the next state over or other medium distances. I think that is the direction FedEx is heading.

 

[Ricochet1a]

Is it possible it won't be available to most shippers when shipping over a fairly short distance?

Express doesn't have the ability to deny service on the basis of "short distance". If a shipper wants (currently) 3 day service on a package going 50 miles, they can select that. On the billing side, there usually isn't any savings between 3 and 2nd day over short distances - so Express covers themselves there. Express does hold packages on Mondays that are not due on Mondays, solely to prevent shippers from using 3rd day on a Friday and getting the package delivered on Monday (Memphis clears out everything Sunday afternoon to the ramps - who sort everything they have that evening).

Many stations also have routes not take out volume during the week if they get it "early" (Express Saver arriving at the station a day before is commit date). This is done solely to "pressure" customers to pay for the level of service they really want to receive.

 

[Ricochet1a]

I wonder if FedEx is hoping word will get around about upcoming changes without their having to break the news to us cold turkey.

The plan has been made and a decision to implement it has been made. It appears that it will be announced in steps, to avoid creating problems among too many people at once.

I'd be surprised if senior mgrs aren't aware of what's going on.

They know. All have had either face-to-face meetings with their district directors, or conference calls. Exact details haven't filtered down yet, but they all know what is coming.

I showed an ops mgr the Commercial Appeal article and asked another about a buyout. I'm sure some of the couriers I've told have mentioned it to them too. And yet none have told me to stop talking about it, although I've said very little in the last week. Just seems if they don't know, or are trying to keep it quiet, they'd be concerned that I was agitating a lot of people. The silence is deafening.

From what I understand, it hasn't made its way down to the ops mgrs yet. They know something is up, but they are still "stumbling in the dark" when it comes to grasping the scale of what is going to happen in the next 2 years.

 

[Ricochet1a]

Not here to get into a pissing match and argue, but I am going to maintain the XS is not going to go away. To get an idea as to where we could be headed, pull up the FedEx and UPS websites and click the link for "get rates and transit times" and start comparing. I didn't do much, but I noticed when shipping a package across town, UPS only gave Overnight and ground options, where Fedex gave everything. If you try the same shipment across the country, UPS gives more options. I didn't try shipping the next state over or other medium distances. I think that is the direction FedEx is heading.

You are missing the fact that UPS is completely integrated - FedEx is working towards that (integration from the customer point of view while maintaining separate opcos to take advantage of labor laws).

When someone pulls up a quote for "cross-town" for UPS, they know offering 2 day "air" service is ridiculous. Their shipping options take into account distance and begins to offer 2nd day air service when that can "beat" their ground game getting a package to a location.

FedEx doesn't currently have that option ("intelligent" service level selection). If you are getting a quote for shipping to your next door neighbor or someone across the country, it will offer ALL of the service levels as part of the quote.

The whole aim of what is about to happen is to get an integrated option which will be much more like UPS's - offering customers the option which fulfills their needs as to arrival time while offering the most economical solution for the customer (and consequently the greatest margin for FedEx).

 

[SmithBarney]

Express does hold packages on Mondays that are not due on Mondays, solely to prevent shippers from using 3rd day on a Friday and getting the package delivered on Monday.

Actually I was told, TUE freight on Monday is held in order to keep production numbers up for Tuesday, imagine with the extra time on Monday(due to sorts being early) it would kill Tuesday numbers

 

[Ricochet1a]

Actually I was told, TUE freight on Monday is held in order to keep production numbers up for Tuesday, imagine with the extra time on Monday(due to sorts being early) it would kill Tuesday numbers

That is the "practical" reason given at the operational level.

A lot of shippers were deliberately choosing either 2nd or 3rd day for their Friday shipments, knowing that they would in all likelihood be delivered on Monday (there were exceptions of course). Express knew it was going on, but didn't worry too much about it.

When they did an analysis of the "lost revenue" (the difference between what was being collected and would've been collected had the customers paid for the service which they actually received), there was a significant gap. So all freight not due on Monday was to be held for Tuesday delivery (clogging up the stations with a lot of volume they usually got out) all in an effort to get customers to pay for the service Express was providing.

The funny thing I heard, is that they are enforcing a strict gatekeeping for send-agains (to be placed in a cage as soon as Courier returns and locked up), but all this freight that is sorted on Mondays and being held for Tuesdays is just placed under the belts or collected and placed into a can that isn't "locked" (latches secured with "zip ties" to prevent potential pilferage, or some such method), not "secure" in the least.

The ramps do a decent job of splitting out the Monday freight from the Tuesday freight during the Sunday PM sorts, but there is still a lot of Tuesday commit freight that makes it through to the stations' Monday AM sorts.

Tuesday "production" is the reason given to the Couriers for not taking out Tuesday volume - the real reason (as is the real reason behind everything Express does) has solely to do with REVENUE and the attempt to get more for doing what they already are doing.

With the elimination of Express Saver, this will eliminate a lot of this issue (customers won't have a cheap alternative available for shipments going through Express).