maga:
Carryfast:
Have you ever worked 8 hours let alone + 1 hour overtime in a factory.Trust me the average driver will be running for the exit after just 4 hours to save their sanity.
The only way i’d leave my 36 hour p/w factory job is if the place closed down.
Chester is right, the hours are way too long in Transport for a decent wage. The overtime rate only starting after 50 or so hours and that overtime rate being absolute pish forces many to have to get the hours in.
The reason the hours are too long is too few miles being run and too many multiple local running loads requiring too long spent waiting/loading/tipping during a shift.Bearing in mind a general 9 hour driving time limit.
If you can handle the factory work mindset maybe.But in general for those who can’t ( definitely me ) every hour seems like two.Either through the concentration levels required for highly skilled precision type jobs or sheer boredom in the case of others or a combination of both.In addition to the repressive nature of being shut inside all day with no change of scenery except for lunch.While 10 hours of mostly driving over distances seems like only 6 by comparison.Although all bets are possibly off in that regard given too much warehouse work and too few miles out on the road.IE more than half of a 10-12 hour shift for example.While I’ve forgotten most of the skills that I was learning regarding most of the work that I did in a factory now anyway having ditched my training around half way through to luckily go out on the road driving instead.I definitely wouldn’t/couldn’t change that if I did it all again.It was a case of looking forward to going to work every day as to where I was going next around the country collecting components or road testing which truck at Chobham at that time.As opposed to the crushing depression of starting on a Monday morning of another week inside which I then miraculously escaped from with a lot of thanks to the guvnors who made it possible for me.
I think it’s fair to say that the hourly rate is deliberately kept miserable so that drivers will work 15’s to make a living - if you could have decent wedge only doing 10’s drivers would say no to anything over.
And that would be a problem.
For the pointy shoe brigade.
Carryfast:
chester:
Just look at the mentality of many of TNet posters, I’ve read it many times on here.
“Yeah the wage isn’t the best, but if you put the hours in its alright”
Give me any other Industry where a 15hr shift is regarded as normal?
Have you ever worked 8 hours let alone + 1 hour overtime in a factory.Trust me the average driver will be running for the exit after just 4 hours to save their sanity.
While in all the years I worked as a driver 15 hours was never regarded as ‘normal’ it would only be the result of breakdown or other unforeseen circumstances.Although at worse I did a short while on general haulage where the guvnor expected me to put in more than 12 hours to compensate for waiting/loading/unloading time.Which bearing in mind the max 9/10 hour driving time limit is what such hours are all about.In answer to which I had the bottle to say no I’m parking up it’s a night out and that’s all it really takes.Or no I’m starting later to compensate for a late finish if it’s a home every day/night commuting type job.IE 15 hour shifts are all about reduced daily rest periods.It’s up to the driver to just say no.
The silly thing about 15 hour shifts is that the drivers that object to it - are turning down being paid by the hour to DO it.
Drivers that are salaried and get pushed to work 12-15 hour shifts - have plenty of reason to be objecting - but all-too-often DON’T in case it results in them getting the push…
Perhaps we drivers should just stamp our collective feet a lot more - and just refuse to sign up to “lousy full time contracts” that would have ANYONE working overtime “unpaid” hmm?
My experience of Airport freight btw is limited to Brum, Coventry, Stanstead, Heathrow, Luton, but oddly enough NOT Gatwick which is the nearest to me.
I didn’t get to handle the actual handball work or airfreight containers… It was just a straight trailer swap or pull into yard with an empty curtainsider to get loaded by forkie with a load of containerized stuff that had just cleared customs inbound. That’s it.
I’ve not done “indoor work” at Airport depots, nor do I want to, there or anywhere else. Leave that kind of stuff to the Tax Credit Chasers…
I have no wish to work at any venue where over 50% of the job is “doesn’t involve the truck”. 
I’ll happily drive it, load it, tip it and book it - but I don’t want to get involved with “picking” or “admin”, unless I’m being paid both job’s wages to go with that, which ain’t gonna happen - so let’s just stick to my own job, rather than do everyone else’s for them eh? I’ve had it with getting bollocked for “letting down some manager, for not covering their job properly for them” whilst trying to keep my own job on the straight and narrow on top… 
Socketset:
I think it’s fair to say that the hourly rate is deliberately kept miserable so that drivers will work 15’s to make a living - if you could have decent wedge only doing 10’s drivers would say no to anything over.
And that would be a problem.
For the pointy shoe brigade.
I’d put a different point of view to that:
On a right-through hourly rate - if the rate is LOW then I would rather have a flat shift, that I might make some time on.
If the hourly rate is HIGH - I’m more motivated to do an extra run, and put the hours in.
If I need to take home £100 a day, and the job is only offering me minimum wages to get there - then I’d rather get less hours at a higher hourly rate than plump for unlimited hours available at a venue that’ll have me working 12-15 hour shifts every damned day for near minimum wages.
Think about it: The more hours you do at lesser hourly rate - COMPOUNDS the loss you make!! You only get to live each hour you work once - so why bust yourself up chasing higher hours at lower rates?