Re: Royal Mail pull their usual annual stunt!

I joined Royal Mail in 2007 as a part time postman Bruce. I was supposed to work from 9:00 am until 2:00 pm, just five hours, but it never quite worked like that and I ended up doing a couple of hours overtime each day.

The frame you can see represented every delivery on my walk, and my first job was to bundle up the post in order of delivery. Four bundles to a bag, and four bags. I used a trolley and could carry two bags at a time plus parcels. Because I had been a self employed courier prior to being a postman I was allowed to use my own van for deliveries. It was insured as a commercial vehicle and had no signage on the side.

My first walk was 650 deliveries, the biggest walk in the delivery office. I think they put you on that when you first started as a test. I loved it and got to know a lot of the customers. After six months I was taken off my walk and made reserve postman and had to do the walks that nobody had turned up for, sickness, holiday or just hungover from the night before (quite a few drinkers in the office) and a different walk each day, not bad once you got used to it.

Eventually I got a walk of my own, well I say a 'Walk of my own' I opted for the job of 'Cover Man'...A postman (including me) would have one day a week off, apart from Sunday. It was my job to do their round when it was their day off, unlike reserve postman, you got the same five walks each week alternating. It was so much easier once you got to know the routes and hard to find addresses.

As a reserve postman I got familiar with a round called 'Farms and Firms' it was driving to remote farms and a large industrial estate full of factories. I ended up doing it quite a lot, and even as a coverman I would be asked to do Farms and Firms as not many postmen knew how to do it. All day out in the van with lunch at a garden centre, it was hard work because there were lots of parcels and special deliveries, but it was one of my favourites.

I retired in 2010 but wished I had started earlier in my working life, it was my second favourite job.....

Re: Royal Mail pull their usual annual stunt!

Their career choice.

Re: Royal Mail pull their usual annual stunt!

You are a hard Man Todger.....

Re: Royal Mail pull their usual annual stunt!

Not really but if a person doesn't like the job that they're doing then the solution is to change the job.

It might take a little time to do, it may need to learn a new skill or qualification but no need to do what you don't want to do.

Re: Royal Mail pull their usual annual stunt!

I didn't say a postman didn't like his job, but there is nothing wrong with showing a little gratitude when times are hard. I can't count the number of times when a customer took pity on me while delivering their post in the snow and rain and produced a piping hot cup of tea, and sometimes even a piece of toast on the doorstep. It was much appreciated. And after being an apprentice trained mechanical engineer for the best part of my life, I had retrained to be a postman and it was the best thing I ever did....With or without the toast and tea...

Any person who works for me will be lavished with unlimited cups of tea and biscuits, even the postman, in appreciation.... A bit of good will goes a long way in this dehumanised world we live in now.