Well after being quite on class 2 job market and having to do van multi drop, One of my agancies i signed up with came up trumps FOR ONCE and got me a new job on class 2 for Exel (Ikea contract)
Let me tell you, this is a back breaking job, but to compensate the money is excellent!!! £11.20ph
Its 2 man crew but even with a porter i’m black and blue after lumping sofas and kitchen units up flights of stars each day, and finding it hard to get up in mornings though being physicaly knackard!!. Got fantastic drivers mate with me though, so no need for sat nav Problem i’m having at moment is all the tight streets i have to deliver too, and theres been a few bum squeeking moments around Englands country garden (Kent) that i can just about fit my Fiat cinqeucento though never mind a truck.
Hopefully will keep me on till xmas, until i’ve saved up for class 1
done that job as well mate, both as a porter, and driver. it’s my least favourite driving job of all and hope i never have to do it again
one bloke i went with was so fit at it i had to really give it everything to try to keep up with him, bloody shattered by the end of it. it’s not easy trying to hump
big double mattreses up flights of stairs when your arms and legs are already
spent is it, it’s such a relief to get back in the truck again
good idea to take some basic tools with you for when you can’t get the settee
through the front door
one bloke i went with was so fit at it i had to really give it everything to try to keep up with him
I’ve totaly given up even trying to attempt to keep up with my porter.
Today i was in the worst of all areas. 12 drops in SW London. Chelsea and Fulham ect. Nearly all flats, nowhere to park, and the tightest streets you could fit a truck into. I swear that if i so much as sneezed i would have took off 100 car wing mirrors.
For a very short while I’m gad to say I delivered Cooker ranges. These bloody things weighed in at about a quarter of a ton, which two of us were meant to shift. Yes I know all about health and safety. One prat in london wanted us to carry it up the stairs to the 5th floor. When I refused he said you can use the builders hoist around the back. Which meant carrying it up a ramp on to the roof of the first floor across the roof up the hoist (which was rated at less than the weight of the cooker) along the scaffolding on to the fire escape to the end of the building through a window along the hall and into to the flat. I left it in the foyer! just inside the front door. The plus side of the job is we went to some really nice places and met some nice people. These things cost up to £7000 delivered one to a two up two down in Rochdale.
I used to deliver beds for dunlopillo at pannel on agency.
the mattresses were flippin heavy and odviously there was a lot of stair work involved. went to one house near guildford and the snotty cow would not let us in her house until we took our ( steel toe capped ) shoes off. ( she pronounced it ooorrrrrrrfffffffff ) explained to her about health and safety but she was adamant that we were not coming in her house with our shoes on.
needless to say the very heavy bed stayed on the driveway.
another job i had was delivering table tennis tables. these were about six foot square and very heavy. it was always stipulated that on delivery somebody was there to help me get it into the house / garage etc.
went to one house , old dear of about 70 to meet me and she told me it was to go in the games room in the attic of a four story house.
that one was left in the garage.
I’ve always hated delivering to private addresses. Having always worked for Plumbers Merchants and now a Timber Merchant I’ve always had a mix of site deliveries and private addresses (and trade deliveries to private addresses). On reflection Cast Iron Baths are the worst thing I’ve ever done for weight but people are generally realistic about the prospect of you getting where they want it and compromise. It’s when they want you to make 20 trips to the bottom of their 120 foot garden with a divisable load that really ■■■■■■ me off.
Fella the other day wanted a load of skirting and architave in 6m lengths put in his garage and hadn’t even cleared a space…expected me to move his bloody stuff out of the way first!
In my experience, Builders Merchants, of which I’ve seen many over the last couple of months (but that’s another story), invariably have a notice that goods are delivered only to ‘kerbside’.
Once it is on the customers property. It is their problem.
Hence a few days ago being woken at an ungodly hour. About 0930. Ungodly for me. With a delivery of about 15 sheets of plasterboard. Which I then had to haul into the garage, in the rain.
It’s always worth establishing the ‘Company Ethos’ and if the customer requires service beyond that level of service, then the customer ‘bungs’.
Krankee:
In my experience, Builders Merchants, of which I’ve seen many over the last couple of months (but that’s another story), invariably have a notice that goods are delivered only to ‘kerbside’.
Once it is on the customers property. It is their problem.
Hence a few days ago being woken at an ungodly hour. About 0930. Ungodly for me. With a delivery of about 15 sheets of plasterboard. Which I then had to haul into the garage, in the rain.
It’s always worth establishing the ‘Company Ethos’ and if the customer requires service beyond that level of service, then the customer ‘bungs’.
My firm are a pretty small outfit as far as builders merchants go these days…traditional attitudes and regular customers …I’d get found out for taking ‘bungs’ in about a week…especially as they charge quite a bit for a local delivery for most non-account customers! I reckon their delivery charges certainly pay the drivers wages.
They do have a notice, but I’d feel like a jobsworth bringing out a notice every five minutes…it’s not quite straight forward ‘kerbside delivery’ either…it’s quite loosely termed… ‘reasonable assistance’, ‘nearest point suitable for the vehicle’, etc.
I take the rough with the smooth…some days are really easy money, some are slightly harder…it’s never that bad.
I used to do alot of builders merchant work, And I also used to stick to the letter of where it will be deliverd. Once had a pallet that had about 300 bundles of stakes on it, got to the drop and this guy came out and said “Just stack them over there driver”, about a 100mtr walk from where I could park. May answer was the crane won’t reach, so he went on about how I should handball them, he then got upset when I told him where he could stick that idea, and promptly dumped the pallet on a piece of grass by his drive. Also have had the same with fence panals, expecting me to walk them round the back of the house for them - “My husband said you can put them in the back drive” yeah right, front lawn do you love, cos thats the closest to your back garden that i’m getting.
If it was on a pallet then it stayed on a pallet, if not then it went no further then the beginning of their property. If people want slaves then they can pay for them, but I am not being a labourer when I had a crane on the wagon!!!
Building sites can often be the worse, espicially if you get there just before they knock off, then you can forget any help, but there are always ways to get your own back
Building sites can often be the worse, espicially if you get there just before they knock off, then you can forget any help, but there are always ways to get your own back
once went to the big barrets site at catterick.the forkie driver there was a known misery , i never found anybody who liked him.turned up on site with a fuul load of bricks one day and ask politley where would he like them ( )
his reply was “stick the zb zb zb zb zb bricks wherever you zb zb zb want.”
hence all the packs of bricks were stacked so the forkie could not get the forks into the pack
went into work next day and while doing daily checks th tm came over to me with a big smile on his face and asked if the forkie had zb me off.
why yes was my reply , what makes you say that
Building sites can often be the worse, espicially if you get there just before they knock off, then you can forget any help, but there are always ways to get your own back
once went to the big barrets site at catterick.the forkie driver there was a known misery , i never found anybody who liked him.turned up on site with a fuul load of bricks one day and ask politley where would he like them ( )
his reply was “stick the zb zb zb zb zb bricks wherever you zb zb zb want.”
hence all the packs of bricks were stacked so the forkie could not get the forks into the pack
went into work next day and while doing daily checks th tm came over to me with a big smile on his face and asked if the forkie had zb me off.
why yes was my reply , what makes you say that
Thats exactly the type of thing i mean Have done the same with bricks, also done it with pallets of roofing tiles, and one forkie really gave me the arse so he got about 12 packs of thermalite blocks stacked on a single pallet, it was as high as I could get them with the crane arm extended, would have loved to have seen him get them down
I was on the Brighton run today. Rearly looking forward to it as never been down there before. Well after today i hope i dont have to do that run again as most of the deliveries was to FLATS off the sea front. Lumping 3 seater sofas ect to 4th and 5th floors all day, then if that wasnt enough we came a little out of Brighton and had to do my other pet hate. FARMS I had a run in with some jumped up lord of the manor today. Was on farm track and was tying to find somewhere to turn around in. Found a caravan site to turn into to avoid having to reverse 2 mile down the track but i just slightly went over the lawn. He wasnt a happy chappy at all after giving him a couple of tram lines. The thing is we get sent to places that just arnt sutable for HGVs at all, but the TMs are only interested in us making that delivery no matter where. I’m still enjoying it all the same though, and its good experience with all the tight spaces we have to deliver to.
Problem i’m having at moment is all the tight streets i have to deliver too, and theres been a few bum squeeking moments around Englands country garden (Kent) that i can just about fit my Fiat cinqeucento though never mind a truck. 
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