Can someone answer this
On a regular basis, the agency I’m with send out start times for example
Txt at 08:00am for an 11:00am start 3hrs notice
Am I wrong in thinking the rules are they must give you 9hrs minimum notice before your shift begins?
It’s not unusual & depends on how they sort it and how desperate you are for the work, personally I get mine a week in advance ie: I was told about M-F next week on Tuesday, but in the past it’s been the 1-12hrs before
peirre:
It’s not unusual & depends on how they sort it and how desperate you are for the work, personally I get mine a week in advance ie: I was told about M-F next week on Tuesday, but in the past it’s been the 1-12hrs before
I’m not saying its unusual either mate but is it legal.
I have done short notice shifts on many occasions but getting a bit cheesed off as the shift notice period is getting less and less, mainly I’m thinking it’s a ■■■■ take. Ex another driver has called off and they need it covered.
Double post
Technically if they phone during your daily rest it deemed wrong.
You can always say NO when they phone and insist on restarting your 9/11hrs off, but if you do it enough times they’ll eventually oblige and stop phoning you
If my agency…
Ask me for short notice cover, I ask for and get an agreed bonus.
Supply and demand innit.
You might decline an offered agency shift on the basis of “insufficient rest”.
Eg. on my day off, I might get up at 08:00am, and then receive a call at 19:00 for a 22:00 start. I would turn down this shift on the basis that I have been up all day.
Had they phoned me at 08:00-11:00 for instance, and offered me the same shift - I would have then been able to get my head down for a couple of hours in the afternoon, thus facilitating doing a stupid O’clock start, which would no doubt involve me driving around London/Home Counties roads during the morning rush hour… I’d rather not, of course. It ain’t safe.
As for picking up the dross work, which is short-term sickie cover most of the time - that is a pecking order thing that gradually gets better the longer one has been with a particular agency.
You expect to get dross in abundance when starting out though, just as would-be “Models” have to run the gauntlet of someone like Pierre Woodman, even if they have no interest in BG work once established.
“Needs Must” and “To get one’s foot in the door” kinda argument here.
You know when your pecking order has improved - as soon as you start to get booked for solid week blocks of work to cover scheduled leave of full time drivers, rather than these last minute sickies I described.
This kind of work can then be given to you the previous week, rather than on monday the week the work is to be done. The more notice you get, the more you can settle your sleep pattern to suit the shift(s) in question.
yourhavingalarf:
If my agency…Ask me for short notice cover, I ask for and get an agreed bonus.
Supply and demand innit.
Nice bonus if you can get it, but not so good if they promise it, and then don’t deliver. I always ask for any “bonus offer” in writing, at which point the “we’re desperate to cover this shift” usually gets cancelled 2 minutes later, when they’ve got someone else to take it on this pie-in-the-sky bonus offer, only to NOT ask for it in writing, so someone else got the basic job for basic money rather than muggins on this occasions
Every driver gets lied to at least once on agency, usually at the very beginning of their sign-up, to “road test” you as it were…
Agencies don’t have to ■■■■ people about, but I think they want to shake the tree as much as possible, getting rid of the more fussy drivers like me that hold out for particular shift patterns on a regular basis, rather than take on “all comers” regardless of start time, notice, hourly rate, nor even if I want to work there or not.
bigsidney:
Txt at 08:00am for an 11:00am start 3hrs notice
Am I wrong in thinking the rules are they must give you 9hrs minimum notice before your shift begins?
Yes you are wrong. Sometimes it can be as little as an hour. Agencies exist to provide not only agency support but to provide drivers when one wakes up at 4am, feels like a dog and rings in sick. It’s then usually a text around 4.30am asking if you can do it and get there as soon as you can.
Those who are the most flexible will be the ones with the most work when it is the quiet times of the year. Those demanding a notice and a bonus for a last minute rush job will be sat at home.
bigsidney:
but is it legal.
Crack on drive. If you don’t want the work don’t reply, know one likes a driver asking “is it legal” over the tiniest of things.
Conor:
Those who are the most flexible will be the ones with the most work when it is the quiet times of the year. Those demanding a notice and a bonus for a last minute rush job will be sat at home.
Not…
Necessarily.
You shouldn’t generalise. Every one can cut deals or not. Because your experience of making deals might differ to mine, please don’t infer that what I’ve been doing for many years doesn’t work.
Are they asking you to work at suchandsuch then texting the start time the morning of the shift or are you getting a random text in the morning when you dont have a shift asking if you can go to suchandsuch at a specific time?
bigsidney:
I’m not saying its unusual either mate but is it legal.
It is inconvenient and makes trying to cover a shift at such short notice tricky for some, but yes it is legal.
Hyh:
bigsidney:
I’m not saying its unusual either mate but is it legal.It is inconvenient and makes trying to cover a shift at such short notice tricky for some, but yes it is legal.
It’s only legal if you’ve had sufficient daily rest from your last shift ie 9 or 11 dependant on previous shifts worked, if you don’t like it don’t answer the phone remember your just a bum on a seat to them kerching
I don’t get this not answering my phone during my time off, they may be ringing to change your job to a better one, it could be someone asking if you want to go full time, or drive a Scania or get a decent lorry.
Do you want to work or not? The whole point of an agency is flexibility which means that to get the best from working for one you need to be flexible.
Quoting that they’re interrupting your daily rest or threatening to restart your time off is quite frankly ridiculous and a quick way to stop the phone ringing full stop.
yourhavingalarf:
You shouldn’t generalise. Every one can cut deals or not. Because your experience of making deals might differ to mine, please don’t infer that what I’ve been doing for many years doesn’t work.
I never said you can’t cut deals, I just said that when it comes to the quiet times the most accommodating will be the ones who get the work first. Chances are when you’ve been sat at home after Xmas someone else who didn’t demand a bonus will be working instead of you.
Conor:
Chances are when you’ve been sat at home after Xmas someone else who didn’t demand a bonus will be working instead of you.
In the old days…
I’d agree with that statement but because of Bogdan, Alexandru and Maresch, my phone always rings.
I have as much work 365 as I want. I drive for an own account transport operator not ESL/DHL/Wincan’tski with clowns shoes for safety boots.
A good aspect of “Is it legal?” would be when agency knows you’ve already used up all your reduced rests this week, and now wants to send you into a client you’ve not been to before that is well-known for dishing out shifts that often go over 13 hours in length…
I’ve been sent home by a client before, because I turned up having already done 3 shifts over 13 hours that week…
I was told “You might as well have turned up drunk”…
I retorted “Perhaps had you been honest with me to start with, this wouldn’t have happened”…
(I was called in at short notice to cover a late sickie’s shift @ 18:30, but when I got there got told I could cover a 20:30 starter instead, doing a job that wouldn’t book off until 08:00) - I didn’t have enough in hand to do it, so requested the run I’d originally been booked to cover, only to be told it had already left, being a cushy run, and hijacked by the full timer who usually did the later run. He’d come in 30 minutes early so he could get away before I turned up to do the same job. 
I was told I would be banned from site for life for my great sin, which lasted about a week until I got booked for a solid week at the same venue “They couldn’t get anyone else”. 
(Last week of August 2014, if memory serves…) Agency was flat-out with all drivers allocated that week…
I’m with the op , they can stuff there hours notice of work , my work is 3/4 weeks in advance , sounds like 99 % on this thread need to find themselves a decent agency !!!