Heard a rumour it is closing. Anyone know if its true? If it is then yay!!! ■■■■■■■■■
if its not then it needs a lick of paint in drivers waiting shed.
There has been a rumour going about for a while that both Harlow and snodland are closing and moving to the new depot on the old ford site at dagenham. I’ve seen the new place not far off being finished now but if the rumours are true well that’s another thing.
The depot won’t be closing. Another contractor might take over, but that’s an entirely different matter. It won’t be Stobarts either, even if they seem to be filling the yard up of late, backhauling this and that. As long as it isn’t DHL, I can’t say I give a ■■■■! 
DHL will promise you £20ph, but neglect to inform you that such pay is only for Christmas Day Nights for shifts over 12hrs in length, and the depot will be fully staffed by full timers on contract for normal pay on those days anyway. The rest of the time it’s bog cleaner’s wages as is the case in many other places even in the southeast…
Send me your fivers in the post, and I’ll send you by return upto £100!
(Legally, I’m only obliged to send an empty envelope yuk yuk!)
There’s nowt to “yay!” about though - the change of contractor will present an opportunity to drive everyone’s wages down another notch… 
“Times are 'ard” 
you see!
Been hearing this for a while as well. So long as they don’t take the staff from Harlow I’ll be happy 
If the new contractor is Kuhne & Nagel then they might well pull a few folk in from Harlow, so don’t hold your breath! 
What’s wrong with DHL…? They have Sainsbury contract just down the rd from Snod don’t they…!?
DHL tout higher hourly rates, and then it turns out that you didn’t do “the right kind of shift” to qualify for them, thus only getting the “Basic” hourly rates instead - which of course are crap!
I’ve been offered Dartford work “upto £13ph” for example, which turns out to be only on Bank Holidays or Sunday Nights which are as rare as rocking horse crap it turns out.
PLUS you’re expected to sign up to Umbrella, something which I consider to be a fiddle. 
I approached working at Dartford DHL Sainsbury last summer via TRG who offer actual kickbacks to drivers to get other drivers to sign up with them - they obviously make a huge rake compared to other agencies out of their way of doing business it seems! I went to their fancy seminar thing, got told I’d get “40 hours guaranteed” (only the shifts and days I don’t want!) and that I’d have to pay £27 per payslip received as “Umbrella commissions” regardless if I was getting a single 8 hour shift or the full 40 hours taken as offered. I went in for what I thought was the induction day, and it turned out I was expected to attend a second occasion for THAT. Too much wasted time for too much crappy end work with too many overheads.
I never went back, and wrote a scathing email criticising the way they failed to answer my direct questions throughout the process that would have had me not waste any time on it even turning up for the initial seminar! To this day, I see TRG on various firm’s “drivers in today” sheets, so I can only assume that there are a lot of “hard-of-maths” drivers out there. 
It MIGHT be possible to make it pay if you intend working 40-60 hours per week at Sainsburys as a contractor (already self-employed!) but it’s not worth BECOMING self-employed for, as it takes too long to get established in the regular plum shift patterns that you might actually want. 6am-2pm monday to friday just doesn’t ring my bell, but I’m sure there are some out there that would consider that kind of working pattern entirely ■■■■■■■■■■■
So it’s TRG that’s the problem not Sainsbury or DHL…!? I only ask about DHL as they seem to be everywhere, to me personally on the surface they seem a ■■■■ outfit to work for so surely they must something going for them to have so many knocking on their door, what is it I wonder, hmmm…■■?
I guess you could blame it all on TRG if one considers all the lies told to be 100% theirs.
If I were DHL, and worried about my reputation as a firm being trashed by some dodgy lying firm supplying drivers, then I’d stop using them forthwith!
The fact this has NOT happened suggests there’s some smoke coming from both sides of the equation here… For instance, why don’t DHL actually take on some full timers, instead of stuff the place full of agency drivers all the time? Surely there’s enough “core work” for a certain number of permenent drivers as full timers, whilst you make up the rest from agencies.
Plus it was a DHL bird who told me that I HAD to “go umbrella”… I don’t think TRG are in this conspiracy all by themselves here let’s say…
I expect from any firm I work for nothing less than a square deal - not some “Ryanair” bullcrap where the little “extras” mean you end up a lot worse off financially.
Pick up only one shift for example, and you can end up net paying to go to work! I don’t want to be “obliged” to work 40+ hours just to make the “commission” pay for itself.
If hour one onwards were at a plummy rate, then it might be worth it - but it’s not!
In any case, I’d already gone through the TRG signup process, but of course “refusing” to do all work thrown at me got me blacklisted from day one, so I never actually got a first paid assignment from them! Penalised for refusing to be a lickcock, when I specifically offered before signup that “I would be working lates, nights, and weekends ONLY”.
Even in full time work, how many employers are there out there who WON’T take someone on with a self-chosen shift pattern? I would have thought that people up for working across weekends would be treated like gold dust, but apparently not so. You’re still expected to “do your share of 6-2 M-F” when you don’t want it. So much for “Family Friendly Employers” - The whole concept is a MYTH if you cannot pick and choose the shifts you actually want to work!
i just asked a mate of mine who has quite a few tractor units in there and he says its all rumors so its not closing apperently!! 
What? Wigglesworth?
I’d bet my left testicle that they’ll shut Snodland and maybe Harlow when the new chill depot opens in Dagenham. Ash16, tell your mate with the tractor units in there, he will be the last to know by the way & Wincanton not to far before him! Get that HP paid off stat tell him! I maybe wrong & great if I am but i’d want my finger in more than one pie than be trusting T!
The only depot that has stayed open so close to a new super depot has been Welham Green in Thurrock’s shadow and that’s because I think they own the land & it’s in a cracking location for London. Dunno the land arrangement at Snodland or the wage structure at Wincanton but i’d say the drivers are on a good shilling which T don’t like…
Hinckley will go in a couple of years & maybe Didcot when the new super chill/frozen at DIRFT opens.