I`ve got one mate on there employed by RM, he has been with them since he was 15, he is nearly 60 now…dead easy work, bordering on pathetic, no wonder stamps are so expensive 
And I had a lad approach me last week who is in there on agency @ EMA, he is getting THREE shifts a week, the place is flooded with agency, and to keep all of them sweet for when they need them, they are all doing three shifts each 
localboy:
I worked on the artics there for years, great job just so so boring.
I can’t think of any shift they would have that is longer than 12 hours after taking off the breaks you would legally be required to take!
I used to have a 318 which involved doing a collection from Ashford in an artic, return to base, swap for 17t, and then running upto PRDC via maidstone in that 17t to drop Maidstone mails off, and then pick up from PRDC and run down to Portsmouth. Then back to PRDC, and home with the kent mails. Start time around 11:18am finish time 00:54. You get 90 minutes deducted as “Unpaid meal relief” on this shift I only did on thursdays on my duty pattern. If you work it out, the “on duty hours” are 12hr06m. you don’t get the full 90 minutes deducted until you pass the 12 hour on duty point… 12.06 - What a swizz!
No driver I recall - got such a long duty ‘all week long’, except maybe the overnight hastings 17t driver, who had 2 days of 18:07 start and 08:36am finish. Wot a killer! - I only did that one once as Overtime as I’d had two days off on “NON stat leave” that week (counting as zero hours the two days). Oh, Yes - The duties DO have those weird “odd minutes” start and finish times like that…
Getting stuck in the heathrow M25 traffic on the way down to Portsmouth around tea time - was the worst aspect of that particular shift.
I, of course - took as many thursdays off as odd days as I could - not just because it got me “more holiday for my buck” if you like - but I also got to bank 4:04 hours when having that shift counted as “8 hours against” when having it off as well. 
m1cks:
Winseer:
FFS. The working week at RM is 36.25 hours. Balance of staff will NOT let you work more than a 48 hour week. POA is NOT recognized at RM.48 hour average over the 26 week reference period. As overtime you can do 60 hours in a week which lets you do a potential 23 and 3/4 hours over your basic hours.
That’s the deal the contract agency people get. Find out how many full timers get SA of over ten hours per week - “not many” last time I looked.
Because the job is NOT salaried as such, your basic hours are the 36.25 if you have a duty pattern with no SA on it. You’d think they’d come up with 3 or 4 shifts to use all that up - but you’ve still got too many 5 and even 6 day shifts, especially at the smaller offices.
The maximum overtime you could get was still 11:45 per week right upto the time I left. If they’d been handing out 20+ hours per week overtime at the time VR was offered to me - I would have thrown it in their faces, and grabbed a duty open to get that amount of regular docket with both hands - believe me!
Hi
I’ve been worked by manpower in Baginton and Crick, they paid decent hourly rates but is crap from January til Summer(2-3 shifts per week).
But 2-3 shifts at £18ph is just as good as 4-6 at £9ph plus you get more time off
m1cks:
But 2-3 shifts at £18ph is just as good as 4-6 at £9ph plus you get more time off
The lad who approached me was on nights, and he wasn’t on that type of money 
He was ex-RM who had took redundancy, and had gone back via an agency, TBF, he wasn’t too employable
What he wouldn’t do, and what he would do were pretty much cloud cuckoo land and very very far removed from the real world 
m1cks:
Winseer:
FFS. The working week at RM is 36.25 hours. Balance of staff will NOT let you work more than a 48 hour week. POA is NOT recognized at RM.48 hour average over the 26 week reference period. As overtime you can do 60 hours in a week which lets you do a potential 23 and 3/4 hours over your basic hours.
In 2010 the maximum available at my depot was 11:45. You could get 23.75 hours if you were indoor and picking up indoor overtime.
The moment you do over “driver full time hours” in any one day that week - you are subject to the full time driver’s WTD.
There were some drivers that had come off driving to get the extra overtime in. Dumb move though really, as the hourly rate is lower, so it’s questionable that you were really any better off for all those extra hours.
Same applies to 17t duties on overtime, which paid a lower rate than the artic runs. The latter would rarely be the longest shifts, with a harmonization to make them C1 runs between 10.5 and 11 hours in length.
The last time I got anywhere near 23.75 hours in a single week was before I’d picked into a driving duty. I was working on the trains before I got my licence.
Stanley Mitchell:
m1cks:
But 2-3 shifts at £18ph is just as good as 4-6 at £9ph plus you get more time offThe lad who approached me was on nights, and he wasn’t on that type of money
He was ex-RM who had took redundancy, and had gone back via an agency, TBF, he wasn’t too employable
What he wouldn’t do, and what he would do were pretty much cloud cuckoo land and very very far removed from the real world
Do elaborate… 
Winseer:
Stanley Mitchell:
m1cks:
But 2-3 shifts at £18ph is just as good as 4-6 at £9ph plus you get more time offThe lad who approached me was on nights, and he wasn’t on that type of money
He was ex-RM who had took redundancy, and had gone back via an agency, TBF, he wasn’t too employable
What he wouldn’t do, and what he would do were pretty much cloud cuckoo land and very very far removed from the real world
Do elaborate…
Ok, where do I start ?
He approached me, lets get that out of the way, I dont advertise, but he know`s a mate of mine, so he knew a bit about the operation
He wants to drive nice shiny Volvo`s, not scabby DAFs [his words, not mine], he wants distance work and he likes a challenge, he doesn’t want to cab hop and he wants a truck he can call his “own”
What he doesn’t want are ; NO nights out, no shifts over 12 hours, no early starts, no late finishes , NO London, no multi drop, no weekend work and nobody is to use “his” truck at weekends, as they get trashed
He knows we go everywhere and beyond, and the drivers are out all week, so why approach me in the first place ■■?
Have I elaborated enough ?
Stanley Mitchell:
Ok, where do I start ?He approached me, let
s get that out of the way, I dont advertise, but he know`s a mate of mine, so he knew a bit about the operationHe wants to drive nice shiny Volvo`s, not scabby DAFs [his words, not mine], he wants distance work and he likes a challenge, he doesn’t want to cab hop and he wants a truck he can call his “own”
What he doesn’t want are ; NO nights out, no shifts over 12 hours, no early starts, no late finishes , NO London, no multi drop, no weekend work and nobody is to use “his” truck at weekends, as they get trashed
He knows we go everywhere and beyond, and the drivers are out all week, so why approach me in the first place ■■?
Have I elaborated enough ?
You mean, he wanted a good job in this industry?
What a madman he must have been!
Rjan:
Stanley Mitchell:
Ok, where do I start ?He approached me, let
s get that out of the way, I dont advertise, but he know`s a mate of mine, so he knew a bit about the operationHe wants to drive nice shiny Volvo`s, not scabby DAFs [his words, not mine], he wants distance work and he likes a challenge, he doesn’t want to cab hop and he wants a truck he can call his “own”
What he doesn’t want are ; NO nights out, no shifts over 12 hours, no early starts, no late finishes , NO London, no multi drop, no weekend work and nobody is to use “his” truck at weekends, as they get trashed
He knows we go everywhere and beyond, and the drivers are out all week, so why approach me in the first place ■■?
Have I elaborated enough ?
You mean, he wanted a good job in this industry?
What a madman he must have been!
Like I said, why approach me for a job, when we do the opposite @ very good money…
I dont need to advertise, and my lads have been with me for years, they LIKE the job, please dont confuse the issue 
Howcome they take 90 mins off you ? Bit tight
Yes, I suppose there must have been some of the drivers who thought they’d easily get another job with those kind of restrictions. I wasn’t one of them. I am up for working lates, nights, weekends as a preference rather than a line in the sand I won’t cross. I’ll do any job if the money’s right.
Now I find myself in a full time job again where I do Sunday-Thursday which doesn’t bother me, and get overtime on every other friday if I want it. Flat shift payment.
The wage is higher than what I was getting at agency, and since I was working there a lot on agency anyways - “I might as well bang away at it wearing the uniform” I thought.
At RM - I took the VR offer because my rather cushy duty was closed down, and the “new duty patterns” were total crap. Even very senior drivers were getting 12 hour day shifts, wednesdays off instead of saturdays, and other anti-social combinations that in my mind were almost designed to get as many of us to walk as possible. Since the maximum payment was for 24 years service and I had 22 in hand, I was always going to get a top-end of that range. I can understand why others of my age and seniority didn’t take it up though - because being on days or 17t duties meant you got a whole lot less, and a lot of the guys had never had another job, and were not confident enough that they could get another in short order. A couple of the guys that left before me went to Morrisons, but most of those who left around the same time as me actually went to early retirement - and total boredom in many cases. I was not aware of any of those “contemporaries” going onto agency like I did, and taking their chances. It was the large london offices like Nine Elms and Twelve Trees shutting down that flooded places like Manpower with ex-RM drivers who then found that they couldn’t get the work back at RM - unless they were VERY flexible about it.