Long working hours

Carryfast:

Janos:
Signing your HGV licence…the longest suicide note ever.

To be fair being shut up in a factory or an office for 8 hours plus over time is no holiday.

i

In our game, 8 hrs is school hours…and we are the worse for it.
Not wishing to get into a cut and paste debate ala Brexit thread, and speaking anecdotally, I don’t know, and have never known anybody who works the hours I do, and that includes some taxi drivers.
I think it is only a truck driver who knows that feeling of exhaustion after a 15hr day driving a 44t truck. It is not a normal tiredness.
We work too long in an unhealthy environment.
You need to fight every day to reduce its effects. If you don’t, you will turn to mush and almost certainly die young.

I worked in engineering factory’s , most were 7 -5 , but lots on 6-2 , 2-10 , there were loads with diabetis , heart problems etc etc etc
Loads of mates gone who were roughly my age , 59 ,
I lost my brother , 47 yrs , was a cnc machinist , worked 6-2 , 2-10 , his hobby was fishing , loved the outdoors , 100 times fitter than me , died of mnd , have a look at all the footballers , rugby players who have it , died of it , ex rangers , fernado Riksen , young , fit , but gone
I’m afraid when it’s time to go itS time to go , doesn’t matter if you do 15 hrs a day driving a lorry or a few training on a football pitch ,

Let’s be realistic, it’s not sitting in a office or packing a shelf or picking in a warehouse that most drivers say they could not do, or would not do
It’s working for the normal hours, 38 hours a week at 10 or 11 quid a hour
The other side of the coin is if most truck drivers were paid a very good hourly rate for 40 hours driving a truck they would still want to put in 60 hours a week
In this game being all for yourself and being hungry for money goes hand in hand
It should be proper pay for proper hours worked, time and a half after 38 or 40 hours, never happen
It’s like sometimes you read here, someone who brags he gets 20 quid a hour for working a Sunday or bank holiday, thats nothing to brag about, you are still working for less than you should,
If any warehouse worker or shelf packer or office worker did the same hours as a truck driver does they would probably be better off than the truck driver as they might get time and a half for the extra 20 hours
Needs must and all that, but having a bit of respect for yourself goes a long way,
Two weeks for the price of one, it’s madness, as for tramping that’s another story

All the usual suspects moaning and ■■■■■■■■ about the long hours/ rubbish pay etc (yawn)——and still doing the job. If it’s annoying you that bad, leave! Nobodies forcing you all to stay! I left the driving side for a couple of years, was office based, mon -fri, 8-5 and after 6 months I knew I made a mistake. Back driving now because I actually like it, have my breaks when I want, listen to what I want on the radio, decide if I want to talk on the phone.

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Janos:

Carryfast:

Janos:
Signing your HGV licence…the longest suicide note ever.

To be fair being shut up in a factory or an office for 8 hours plus over time is no holiday.

i

In our game, 8 hrs is school hours…and we are the worse for it.
Not wishing to get into a cut and paste debate ala Brexit thread, and speaking anecdotally, I don’t know, and have never known anybody who works the hours I do, and that includes some taxi drivers.
I think it is only a truck driver who knows that feeling of exhaustion after a 15hr day driving a 44t truck. It is not a normal tiredness.
We work too long in an unhealthy environment.
You need to fight every day to reduce its effects. If you don’t, you will turn to mush and almost certainly die young.

The question is what’s gone wrong with the industry to need and to make it worth paying, a driver for a 15 hour shift.When the wheels can only turn for 9/10 hours max.What’s the other 5/6 hours being used for. :confused: Let me guess hub system or distribution type zb loads of hours spent going nowhere.

But I usually felt that being paid to drive a truck was like being paid for a hobby.
As opposed to almost literally feeling suicidal after 5 days of working in a factory for 40-45 hours let alone a year or two of it.

GOG47:
All the usual suspects moaning and ■■■■■■■■ about the long hours/ rubbish pay etc (yawn)——and still doing the job. If it’s annoying you that bad, leave! Nobodies forcing you all to stay! I left the driving side for a couple of years, was office based, mon -fri, 8-5 and after 6 months I knew I made a mistake. Back driving now because I actually like it, have my breaks when I want, listen to what I want on the radio, decide if I want to talk on the phone.

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Well good for you.
Speaking as one of the ‘usual suspects’ :smiley: I did.
I didn’t leave,.I put my money where my gob is, told them I’d had enough of years of ridiculously long hours, maxing out, weekending and all the rest of the crap, and cut back to a 4 day week, …ok,.I’m still doing sometimes up to 50 hours, but I feel better for it,.especially the 3 day weekend…despite the cack dozy prattles on about… :smiley:

GOG47:
All the usual suspects moaning and ■■■■■■■■ about the long hours/ rubbish pay etc (yawn)——and still doing the job. If it’s annoying you that bad, leave! Nobodies forcing you all to stay! I left the driving side for a couple of years, was office based, mon -fri, 8-5 and after 6 months I knew I made a mistake. Back driving now because I actually like it, have my breaks when I want, listen to what I want on the radio, decide if I want to talk on the phone.

[quote/GOG47"]
You sound like you are part of the problem, not the solution.

Medical opinion has stated there are 750,000 premature deaths per year due to people working in excess of 55 hrs per week. Long hours are endemic in haulage.

There is a shortage of drivers, because no fool wants to do the majority of jobs on offer, due to excess hours and poor pay.

The average age of a truck driver is mid to late fifties, as most young people are not interested in the job you love. Older employees cannot flit from job to job, due to service time and pension and mortgage committments.
So either you are a cretin, or you have a steady job with regular hours.
In which case, good for you…but what you say has no credence in this discussion

I work for myself, and can come and go as I please, and work when I want, but to make a profit sometimes I have to fall in with what other drivers have to do, and it is not a pleasant experience working 12-15hrs.
If people said nothing, then nothing would be done.

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Janos:
Medical opinion has stated there are 750,000 premature deaths per year due to people working in excess of 55 hrs per week. Long hours are endemic in haulage.

There is a shortage of drivers, because no fool wants to do the majority of jobs on offer, due to excess hours and poor pay.

The average age of a truck driver is mid to late fifties, as most young people are not interested in the job you love. Older employees cannot flit from job to job, due to service time and pension and mortgage committments.
So either you are a cretin, or you have a steady job with regular hours.
In which case, good for you…but what you say has no credence in this discussion

I work for myself, and can come and go as I please, and work when I want, but to make a profit sometimes I have to fall in with what other drivers have to do, and it is not a pleasant experience working 12-15hrs.
If people said nothing, then nothing would be done.

The same medical ‘opinion’ which states that evryone is living longer so retirement age has to be extended and increased. :unamused:
While long hours have more to do with the ‘way’ in which the transport industry is being forced to work by productivety limits and prohibitive costs meant to remove truck journeys from the roads.
Which is why there’s obviously at least around 5 hours of ‘other work’ or ‘POA’ involved in a 15 hour shift and which obviously has nothing to do with being out on the road, keeping the wheels turning, moving goods from A to B.

robroy:
cut back to a 4 day week, …ok,.I’m still doing sometimes up to 50 hours, but I feel better for it,.especially the 3 day weekend…despite the cack dozy prattles on about… :smiley:

I’m doing Mon, Tue, Thu and Fridays. You can’t describe just how much better it makes the job not doing 5 days especially having a day off mid-week to split it up. All the crap that used to wind you up you couldn’t give a toss about.

Worst thing that happened in this industry was when the working time directive came into place and the RHA and FTA managed to negotiate POA to allow the job to continue to crack on with working hours that were illegal under the Cotton Mills Act from 1825. Yes that’s right, even almost 200 years ago they recognised that working more than 12hrs a day was bad for your health.

After of a life as a workaholic and working every hour god sends before accident I was on 4 on 4 off and loved it.

Janos:

GOG47:
All the usual suspects moaning and ■■■■■■■■ about the long hours/ rubbish pay etc (yawn)——and still doing the job. If it’s annoying you that bad, leave! Nobodies forcing you all to stay! I left the driving side for a couple of years, was office based, mon -fri, 8-5 and after 6 months I knew I made a mistake. Back driving now because I actually like it, have my breaks when I want, listen to what I want on the radio, decide if I want to talk on the phone.

[quote/GOG47"]
You sound like you are part of the problem, not the solution.

Medical opinion has stated there are 750,000 premature deaths per year due to people working in excess of 55 hrs per week. Long hours are endemic in haulage.

There is a shortage of drivers, because no fool wants to do the majority of jobs on offer, due to excess hours and poor pay.

The average age of a truck driver is mid to late fifties, as most young people are not interested in the job you love. Older employees cannot flit from job to job, due to service time and pension and mortgage committments.
So either you are a cretin, or you have a steady job with regular hours.
In which case, good for you…but what you say has no credence in this discussion

I work for myself, and can come and go as I please, and work when I want, but to make a profit sometimes I have to fall in with what other drivers have to do, and it is not a pleasant experience working 12-15hrs.
If people said nothing, then nothing would be done.

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“Long hours are endemic in haulage” Correct, most people know this, to paraphrase a famous military thinker, a plan never survives first contact with the goods in staff/traffic etc. Don’t become a driver then complain when you don’t get home after a 9 hour day, go chase that mythical “shelf stacking job” that pays better.
It’ll never change no matter how much people would like it to

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Lining up to kill someone’: Truckies say … - stuff.co.nz
stuff.co.nz/business/indust … -someone….
May 18, 2021 · Truck drivers are illegally working up to 120 hours a week and say they are put in an impossible situation by their employers. Truck drivers are not legally able to work more than 13 hours …

They mentioned this on US trucking show today. That’s how to write an attention grabber headline. :sunglasses:

GOG47:

Janos:

GOG47:
All the usual suspects moaning and ■■■■■■■■ about the long hours/ rubbish pay etc (yawn)——and still doing the job. If it’s annoying you that bad, leave! Nobodies forcing you all to stay! I left the driving side for a couple of years, was office based, mon -fri, 8-5 and after 6 months I knew I made a mistake. Back driving now because I actually like it, have my breaks when I want, listen to what I want on the radio, decide if I want to talk on the

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

“Long hours are endemic in haulage” Correct, most people know this, to paraphrase a famous military thinker, a plan never survives first contact with the goods in staff/traffic etc. Don’t become a driver then complain when you don’t get home after a 9 hour day, go chase that mythical “shelf stacking job” that pays better.
It’ll never change no matter how much people would like it to

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Who is moaning about a 9hr day?..and who wants to stack shelves? The job will change when we can get rid of the cab happy, trucking lifestyle saddos, perhaps people like you,.and it becomes a proper professional job of work, recognised by a more demanding test and drivers cpc, which is then reflected in our standing and in wages too. Again, this does not really affect me directly, but wages increases would see rate increases for o/d’s.

Ah! The WTD

hse.gov.uk/contact/faqs/wor … ctive.html

What it is designed to do.
What we are “exempted from”. (Lucky us)
What is, and isn’t enforced…(Lucky us)
Can of worms.

How lucky we are not to have a “Nanny State”.

Franglais:
Ah! The WTD

hse.gov.uk/contact/faqs/wor … ctive.html

What it is designed to do.
What we are “exempted from”. (Lucky us)
What is, and isn’t enforced…(Lucky us)
Can of worms.

How lucky we are not to have a “Nanny State”.

Dead link Franglais

Sorry we couldn’t find that page (404 error)

andy187:

Franglais:
Ah! The WTD

hse.gov.uk/contact/faqs/wor … ctive.html

What it is designed to do.
What we are “exempted from”. (Lucky us)
What is, and isn’t enforced…(Lucky us)
Can of worms.

How lucky we are not to have a “Nanny State”.

Dead link Franglais

Sorry we couldn’t find that page (404 error)

Try that?

We are entitled to paid holidays, but the law isn’t enforced…

And how many times do we read here on TNUK suggestions that we can ignore rules to take breaks because they aren’t enforced? “Crack on Drive”! How many other industries celebrate the ability to work more hours without breaks?