I always reverse park too no matter what sort of parking, especially the case at supermarkets where brain dead muppets fly around at ridiculous speeds, i’m going to fill a trolley with tins of baked beans one of these days and accidentally shove it in front of one of these fools and walk away.
Juddian:
I always reverse park too no matter what sort of parking.
As do I - for much the same sort of reasons, too. But my point wasn’t whether or not reverse parking etc is a good idea - it was the DHL approach of having it a formal policy, to the extent of having purpose-made signs erected all around the car park, and also encouraging (worse yet, instructing in the case of on-site security bods) folk to snitch on their co-workers for Failing to Comply Wiz Ze Directive. This just so encapsulates their approach to many aspects of Elf’n’Safety - Issue a blanket directive, discipline folk for failure to comply, rather than encouraging staff to actually think about what they do (and how they do it). It’s this attitude that leads to great big thick ring-bound volumes of detailed instructions on how to do everything from climbing in/out of the cab to wiping your backside.
Sorry - almost started a mini-rant there…
Juddian:
I always reverse park too no matter what sort of parking, especially the case at supermarkets where brain dead muppets fly around at ridiculous speeds, i’m going to fill a trolley with tins of baked beans one of these days and accidentally shove it in front of one of these fools and walk away.
No longer a problem at my local Tesco - they have fitted some vicious speed bumps.
Got a mate on for bca, he does the auctions and not main fleet but hes says he takes home between 580 and 800 a week.
Not 11+ either.
I think there is a big pay range in all sectors.
I’m currently on general plant work & hiab, nothing special. Working weekdays only, no nights out and usually no more than 10 hours a day never really straying very far yet earning rates that surpass nearly everything else I see advertised. It’s a dirty job that’s quite physically demanding and you need to have a thick skin to do it but years in the job make it easier.
90% of my work is driving “my” 8w, 9% is yard duties helping to clean and repair things or run errands with a van. 1% is covering a step frame loader with potential wide loads and STGO 2 loads.
But I see jobs that are essentially the same paying £11 ph.
CookieMonster:
Rickers:
Wide loads - just depends how wide and where you’re going. I did a wide load job from Fordingbridge to Alton once and the paperwork routed it via Salisbury and A303. Took 4 hours to do a normally hour long journey. Not to mention the 3 hour loading and unloading time. If you end up doing longer routes you could long out the hours as long as you don’t mind driving slow or with an ■■■■■■.Tanker drivers get paid well but is it worth it? You’re driving a moving bomb, it’s dirty, you can’t take your phone with you and you’ve got to be on the ball 100% of the time.
Car transporters get paid really well but that’s because they have to tramp in low roof cabs, constantly have to measure their height and you’ll be the first one responsible if there’s any damage to the goods.
Where do you get that idea about tanker work?
Firstly, it’s really clean work, as there’s no contact with the products and all equipment needs to be washed down after deliveries.
Secondly, you can have your phone with you. True, you might not be able to use it during deliveries or take it on certain sites, but that only really applies to flammable loads.
Thirdly, moving bomb?? Maybe if you’re carrying explosives, or possibly at a push compressed gas.Sent from my SM-G973F using Tapatalk
I’d take moving a live bomb or missile over moving fuel or gas any day, the containers can withstand an awful lot.
ETS:
Why are people saying car transporters are hard (physical) work? It’s not like you have to push the cars onto the thing yourself…right? Is it because the straps are in hard to access places, that’s the one obviously difficult thing I can see. Other than the fact you have to live with half a car dangling in front of your forehead all day…
It is all the straps, and besides facing the elements in the process, it’s the relative mental effort of the whole thing.
The reason why pay in transporters remains relatively high whilst the rest of the industry has sunk, is precisely because the loading aspect is relatively complex and unpleasant, and small bumps (like occasionally clouting a tree branch) could have a disproportionately high cost, meaning that the employers can’t just farm it all out to agency workers or dare to have experienced drivers walking out in anger over small incremental attacks.
Couple of mates,on for bca.
One of them reckons reckons on a bad week,he’ll do 150 cars…and on a good week he’ll do 250.
That’s a thousand straps on…and a thousand straps off!
CookieMonster:
Where do you get that idea about tanker work?
Firstly, it’s really clean work, as there’s no contact with the products and all equipment needs to be washed down after deliveries.
Secondly, you can have your phone with you. True, you might not be able to use it during deliveries or take it on certain sites, but that only really applies to flammable loads.
Thirdly, moving bomb?? Maybe if you’re carrying explosives, or possibly at a push compressed gas.
There’s really very little risk in carrying fuels nowadays. Most serious risks and hazards that required skill and experience to identify and manage, have been engineered out, and although fuel work still requires discipline and gumption in order not to make a mess of things, the level of discipline now required is not in short supply.
Also, the money paid in the past for fuel was not predominantly because of the risks taken or difficultly attracting candidates, but because the oil industry is very profitable, their drivers were extremely well-orgsnised in unions, and when those high pay rates were first set (in the 60s) they were operating within an economy where there was a policy of low unemployment, where unions overall were strong, and with a left-wing Labour government in power (1964-70).
Even by 1990, there were serious attacks occuring against fuel tanker drivers and their unions, and although there have been skirmishes since, pay and conditions now have mostly been forced down to ordinary levels, especially for any new entrants (with any higher rates paid being purely the minimum necessary due to adverse shift patterns or to get drivers to put up with the highly authoritarian management culture).
Shell was, iirc, the last FTSE 100 company to close its final salary pension scheme to new entrants in 2012, although by then it didn’t employ any fuel tanker drivers anyway, who had long since been pawned off to contractors competing against each other to drive down their workers’ pay and retain/win the contract.
Since I moved up to Teesside I’ve been looking round for work, and I was shocked at how little they want to pay drivers, plenty of the ADR tanker work is less than £11 per hour, petrol tanker work was up to £18 per hour, but the shifts would make your head spin, Stobarts were paying £9.35 per hour 
As with most things it looks like a race to the bottom where wages are concerned, in real terms drivers wages have fallen, it’s a bloody awful industry and I can’t wait to win this weeks euromillions!
commonrail:
Couple of mates,on for bca.One of them reckons reckons on a bad week,he’ll do 150 cars…and on a good week he’ll do 250.
That’s a thousand straps on…and a thousand straps off!
Yup (well almost cos if 4 points of security are demanded sometimes 2 straps and 2 wheelchocks will do, same difference), could be a lot more if you need to tranship around the wagon due to vehicles sizes and drop order, and for all those cars on the middle and top decks you have to crouch or kneel down to get the bloody wheelstraps on and in place, little wonder why current or ex transporter drivers have a conspicuously short list of body parts that don’t ache or partially seized up, me included 
250 is heavy going, he is probably ferrying to cover 4 or 5 loads in a day (though where i worked we regularly did 4 x 11 car loads over a 65 mile radius, sometimes 6 days on the trot, with two of those loads being ferryback or transfer loads from the midlands factories, we were still strapping underbody then so half the time spent strapping up, safer too), and if ferrying the same product you have the vehicle set up with everything already in place so straps and chocks are all to hand and in the correct slots.
One poster above asked why transporter driving is considered hard, well apart from the above on a distance run you might well cover 700kms delivering 11 vehicles outward over 5 drops, collect and deliver a backload of 11 tipping on the way back, and reload for the next day.
With the state of the roads now and the increase in population leading to current and increasing traffic issues i doubt you could cover the ground in the time any more.
Just bumped this up for the knob called elsalad read through this as I stated nothing to prove and not ■■■■■■■■ and I’m not a doctor
And for the record they were LOHR Mk5’s
Judehamish:
Bad week on car transporters I take home £750, good week £850. Not including weeks with quarterly damage bonus.Never worked a Saturday, and I get three or four weeks a year paid compulsory rest on top of my holidays
What are the going rate bonuses for bumps, scratches, and the full “fell off the top deck” damage then? 
“There goes his bonus” - in my neck of the woods…
m.a.n rules:
on fortuitous I was wrong and apoligise,every day is a school day. as for the rest we’ll have to agree to disagree.
Are you a tanker driver? Or have been?
It’s all gone downhill these days. Driving petrol tankers in the 80’s was far better paid than any car transporter or wide load. It may have changed now, well tankers have for sure. I know a guy who works for Hoyer and he is on well above average money but in comparison to the 80’s the hours are crap and pay not so high. He does shifts where as I was on days (job & finish) Regarding transporters which I also did a bit of back in the day (almost normal wages back then) seems to have improved (wages wise anyway) but is far harder and dirtier work and generally longer hours.
I know a couple of lads on transporters now back in the UK and although they are happy (above average wage) but not a lot above they say it is really hard work.
Jake the things you mention are true, but sadly in too many cases the drivers themselves have been responsible for the diminishing of the job, particularly in specialist sectors.
There was no ■■■■■■■ contest between transporter and fuel tankers, both were well unionised and both paid very well, the big names in transporters and fuel suppliers all paid better than the new or up and coming.
Job and finish is all very well, it applies where i work, but as always the short sighted rip the arse out of it flying around without a minute to live and sooner or later a new broom arrives in the office who asks the simple question ‘why are we paying 48 or however many hours when a percentage of the drivers are barely working half and seldom two thirds?’'.
Again the hard of thinking tear arses never twig they have set in stone sometimes over many years journey times (their own, others with a working brain never rushed round like their arse was on fire anyway) that they will be expected to sustain, plus cover the second run or whatever else the new gaffer establishes as the new normal.
Don’t get me started on the crew who take the ■■■■ out of the full sick pay schemes, they’ve destroyed some superb jobs with their selfish greed.
Driver pride in their work is another thing that has disappeared, if drivers arn’t going to do their jobs and look after their tools then why should a company invest in seriously expensive high grade equipment, might as well let the logistics mobs with their fleet spec stuff do it, it’s going to look 5 years old battered and bent by the time its seen a year’s work anyway, the own account operator might like to have high image out there, the others couldn’t care less.
Some drivers also forget, together with their employers in some cases, the relationship 'tween a supplier and their customer, thinking the supplier can dictate to the customer usually ends up with a company with the right ethos taking the job away in due course.
Transporter wages goes through stages, it might stay a little stagnant over time whilst other sectors creep up, but inevitably the number of willing and competent drivers versus the demand for such causes a series of pay increases when the skilled get poached by the new high payers and the not so high payers suffer the massive damage costs of using not so competent but cheaper drivers, and don’t forget the sector is still well unionised, but with a difference, the ports and car factories (such as are left) are still unionised too and support goes each way if you follow my drift.
Yes its hard work, it always has been, but like those who do general tramping its a way of life, you either take to car transporters or you don’t, the early drop out rate of new starters in the game is very high and training and ongoing costs of new starters seriously expensive for operators, they need to recruit good people who will stay a long time and are prepared to pay well for them.
In the transporter and tanker sectors it’s the same now as its always been (this applies in other transport sectors too), those carrying their own goods are normally on better contracts than those the hire and reward transport.
The same applies where unions are concerned, those with proper unions are almost always on better terms than those without, sadly too many have swallowed the kool aid propaganda regarding unions…funny how those anti union bods don’t mind trousering the superior pay the established unions where they work negotiated over many years, one might think they were a tad hypocritical.
or difficultly attracting candidates
When was that exactly? It certainly was not the case back in the 80’s. It was a dead mans shoes job for sure. Drivers were desperate to do that work.
From what I hear nowadays basically anyone with an ADR can get a job.
Also you are correct that the risks were higher back then but I would certainly say it still has risks compared to other work. It’s stupid people that mainly make the risks as it was back then.
but sadly in too many cases the drivers themselves have been responsible for the diminishing of the job,
100% agree with that.
Juddian:
Jake the things you mention are true, but sadly in too many cases the drivers themselves have been responsible for the diminishing of the job, particularly in specialist sectors.
There was no ■■■■■■■ contest between transporter and fuel tankers, both were well unionised and both paid very well, the big names in transporters and fuel suppliers all paid better than the new or up and coming.Job and finish is all very well, it applies where i work, but as always the short sighted rip the arse out of it flying around without a minute to live and sooner or later a new broom arrives in the office who asks the simple question ‘why are we paying 48 or however many hours when a percentage of the drivers are barely working half and seldom two thirds?’'.
Again the hard of thinking tear arses never twig they have set in stone sometimes over many years journey times (their own, others with a working brain never rushed round like their arse was on fire anyway) that they will be expected to sustain, plus cover the second run or whatever else the new gaffer establishes as the new normal.
Don’t get me started on the crew who take the ■■■■ out of the full sick pay schemes, they’ve destroyed some superb jobs with their selfish greed.Driver pride in their work is another thing that has disappeared, if drivers arn’t going to do their jobs and look after their tools then why should a company invest in seriously expensive high grade equipment, might as well let the logistics mobs with their fleet spec stuff do it, it’s going to look 5 years old battered and bent by the time its seen a year’s work anyway, the own account operator might like to have high image out there, the others couldn’t care less.
Some drivers also forget, together with their employers in some cases, the relationship 'tween a supplier and their customer, thinking the supplier can dictate to the customer usually ends up with a company with the right ethos taking the job away in due course.Transporter wages goes through stages, it might stay a little stagnant over time whilst other sectors creep up, but inevitably the number of willing and competent drivers versus the demand for such causes a series of pay increases when the skilled get poached by the new high payers and the not so high payers suffer the massive damage costs of using not so competent but cheaper drivers, and don’t forget the sector is still well unionised, but with a difference, the ports and car factories (such as are left) are still unionised too and support goes each way if you follow my drift.
Yes its hard work, it always has been, but like those who do general tramping its a way of life, you either take to car transporters or you don’t, the early drop out rate of new starters in the game is very high and training and ongoing costs of new starters seriously expensive for operators, they need to recruit good people who will stay a long time and are prepared to pay well for them.
In the transporter and tanker sectors it’s the same now as its always been (this applies in other transport sectors too), those carrying their own goods are normally on better contracts than those the hire and reward transport.
The same applies where unions are concerned, those with proper unions are almost always on better terms than those without, sadly too many have swallowed the kool aid propaganda regarding unions…funny how those anti union bods don’t mind trousering the superior pay the established unions where they work negotiated over many years, one might think they were a tad hypocritical.
Very good post Juddian and I agree mostly. Yeah we had one tear arse who consequently never stopped damaging his vehicle. The rest of us kept our vehicles immaculate inside and out.(bonus involved 
)
I have lost touch and don’t really bother keeping up with the latest on transport only keeping in touch with a few mates who are still on the road. Don’t know much about transporters now at all although I must say I enjoyed my time on them many years ago. As I said in another thread I am glad my time is done as I think I had some of the best years and every aspect of the job seems to be in decline now. When I was on tankers I worked for a family run business with no union. Some drivers wanted one but the boss kept us sweet and we did very well out of it.