Hermes and couriers

[DMBParticipant @dmb]

Previous poster said "(courier) couldn't speak word of English". So what? That individual has to be admired for effort. Just as long as he can read and correctly interpret road signs to drive safely, good luck to him, hope he succeeds in self – improvement, rather than saying " I can't" like some wooden legged Brits. BTW, I am British born n bred!

[HowiParticipant @howi]

You cannot have it both ways, cheap anything and decent wages do not go hand in hand.

We all want better pay for ourselves but begrudge others (delivery drivers, fruit pickers and othervlow skilled work)

Society has to be fair for all.

I doubt if there are many on here that live (survive!) on the basic state pension.

I doubt if you have given a second thought to how they are to survive with rising fuel/food prices even with state benefits.

[Howard LewisParticipant @howardlewis46836]

Some years ago, for six months, I worked as a parcels courier.

It could be frantic. Start work at 0700, sort parcels, load van with parcels in correct order, set off.

Some days you had three parcels, all supposed to be delivered by 0900 in three different towns / villages, about 12 miles from each other! Some hope!

And then the girl in the office asking for an immediate collection at a point furthest from where you are, whilst heading from it!

You work a 13 hour day for peanuts (NO overtime )

The courier companies get rich (Some only use self employed people ) but the workers don't!.

If you pay peanuts, you tend to get monkeys, who will cut any possible corner

Howard

[John RutzenParticipant @johnrutzen76569]

My latest disaster story about Hermes. I got sent some wheel castings from a seller on Ebay. Tracked, got as far as 'out for delivery'. Next message was 'returned to depot due to damage'. Then nothing for a few days. Then ' can't be delivered due to damage'. Then it's apparently disappeared into Hyperspace. Maybe it just vanished. I can't see how anything can be so damaged that it CANNOT be delivered. I've got my money back from the seller but there is no way to find out from Hermes what actually happened. Plus it's not replaceable.

Edited By John Rutzen on 06/08/2022 12:28:31

[Joe McKeanParticipant @joemckean81940]

I applaud anyone that gets out there and try's to earn a living instead of sitting at home living off benefits, I have been a courier driver / rider on and off for the past 20 years or so years and can tell you it is not the drivers and riders that get rich, the working day is long and tiring and the pressure can be relentless.

My big gripe about self employed couriers, deliveroo and all the other fast food delivery drivers and cyclists is that the vast majority if not all do not have business insurance for their vehicles probably because their salary wouldn't cover it.

Some may disagree with this statement but I still know a lot trying to earn a living in this industry .

[V8EngParticipant @v8eng]

Posted by Joe McKean on 06/08/2022 13:06:00:

I applaud anyone that gets out there and try's to earn a living instead of sitting at home living off benefits, I have been a courier driver / rider on and off for the past 20 years or so years and can tell you it is not the drivers and riders that get rich, the working day is long and tiring and the pressure can be relentless.

My big gripe about self employed couriers, deliveroo and all the other fast food delivery drivers and cyclists is that the vast majority if not all do not have business insurance for their vehicles probably because their salary wouldn't cover it.

Some may disagree with this statement but I still know a lot trying to earn a living in this industry .

You might not be applauding one who hits you and is uninsured because of not declaring business useage.

[Joe McKeanParticipant @joemckean81940]

You should have noticed that my gripe is with those that are not insured for business usage and it about time that the authorities clamped down on it as basically they are driving without insurance while they are using it for business purposes.

[V8EngParticipant @v8eng]

OOPS! Sorry.

Edited By V8Eng on 06/08/2022 21:17:33

[CirclipParticipant @circlip]

Lot to be said for walking a mile in another mans shoes.

Regards Ian.

[Tony Pratt 1Participant @tonypratt1]

Posted by Circlip on 07/08/2022 08:57:50:

Lot to be said for walking a mile in another mans shoes.

Regards Ian.

Lots of these couriers are foreigners who come over here for the good life and they should at least do a proper job, but to be honest before the online shopping explosion a lot of couriers were still not the best!

Tony

Edited By Tony Pratt 1 on 07/08/2022 09:24:24

[Michael CallaghanParticipant @michaelcallaghan68621]

Over the years I have had problems with Hermes delivery drivers, but it’s mainly Amazon drivers that are a problem. I found one inside my car on the driveway. It was unlocked as I had just put a loading it and was getting more items from the back of the house and walked around the corner to see the driver in my car. He had my coat in his van, which had my phone in it. I asked him what the hell he was doing and got the standard reply. No English. I can’t say I was happy and a few weeks later I ordered a cctv set up from Amazon, only to find that the driver had stated he had delivered it, but had nicked it. Amazon replaced the set up. So just take care.

[CirclipParticipant @circlip]

"Lots of these couriers are foreigners who come over here for the good life and they should at least do a proper job"

Be VERY careful what you say Tony, cos ANY criticism of 'Foreign' workers invokes the scream of racism.

Regards Ian.

[Tony Pratt 1Participant @tonypratt1]

Posted by Circlip on 08/08/2022 09:23:35:

 

Edited By Tony Pratt 1 on 08/08/2022 09:43:16

[Nigel Graham 2Participant @nigelgraham2]

They think they are coming for decent work with proper conditions, and some at least are likely paid what to them is a lot of money.

It's the employers ripping them off who are ultimately responsible if the service is shoddy by poor employee treatment.

[Anthony KendallParticipant @anthonykendall53479]

Posted by Circlip on 07/08/2022 08:57:50:

Lot to be said for walking a mile in another mans shoes. Regards Ian.

Very much agree.
Reckon a day as a courier delivery driver would make many desk-jockeys appreciate the cushy life they have sitting on their rumps.

[Tony Pratt 1Participant @tonypratt1]

Posted by Anthony Kendall on 10/08/2022 08:58:52:

Posted by Circlip on 07/08/2022 08:57:50:

Lot to be said for walking a mile in another mans shoes. Regards Ian.

Very much agree.
Reckon a day as a courier delivery driver would make many desk-jockeys appreciate the cushy life they have sitting on their rumps.

Are we meant to feel sorry for the couriers who do a crap job? One of my worse jobs ever was as a 'desk jockey' with a vile bullying manager sitting right next to me for 8 hours so not all cushy.

Tony

[Anthony KendallParticipant @anthonykendall53479]

Posted by Tony Pratt 1 on 10/08/2022 10:49:03:

Posted by Anthony Kendall on 10/08/2022 08:58:52:

Posted by Circlip on 07/08/2022 08:57:50:

Lot to be said for walking a mile in another mans shoes. Regards Ian.

Very much agree.
Reckon a day as a courier delivery driver would make many desk-jockeys appreciate the cushy life they have sitting on their rumps.

Are we meant to feel sorry for the couriers who do a crap job? One of my worse jobs ever was as a 'desk jockey' with a vile bullying manager sitting right next to me for 8 hours so not all cushy. Tony

I think most of the desk jockeys have never worked hard but keep telling us they do.
Have they worked on a building site or worked on the land?
If they tried real work they would soon be back behind their cosy desk with their cosy life, producing little of value, irrespective of whom sat next to them.
It's fashionable to knock couriers – but try it and see how you get on.

[SamsarandaParticipant @samsaranda]

I worked not as a courier but spent 9 months as a milkman many years ago, I had left the Air Force during a recession and engineering jobs were scarce at the time. I don’t think I have worked as hard physically as I did then, start at 4.30 am load your milk float, milk crates are surprisingly heavy, then out doing deliveries and covering about 20 miles a day on your feet, finish if your lucky about 2.30 pm if your unlucky and collecting the monies it was a 5.30 pm finish. No national minimum wage then, but in retrospect I had never been physically fitter than I was then. Great respect for anyone who is delivering. Dave W

[Anonymous]

Are the tracking systems for these and similar ….. services ….. any better in the UK than on this side of the pond?

So often these days, tracking consists of: shipped … in transit …. delivered. (Often preceded with several days of "label generated"  ).

None of this tells me any more than an email telling me the vendor has shipped.

Edited By Peter Greene 🇨🇦 on 15/08/2022 23:02:09

[John RutzenParticipant @johnrutzen76569]

I've actually got an apology out of Hermes but no parcel! They say they are sending it back to the sender which is only fair because he refunded me. However I haven't got any explanation as to what actually happened that prevented it being delivered.

[SillyOldDufferModerator @sillyoldduffer]

Posted by Anthony Kendall on 11/08/2022 09:58:09:

Posted by Tony Pratt 1 on 10/08/2022 10:49:03:

Posted by Anthony Kendall on 10/08/2022 08:58:52:

Posted by Circlip on 07/08/2022 08:57:50:

Lot to be said for walking a mile in another mans shoes. Regards Ian.

Very much agree.
Reckon a day as a courier delivery driver would make many desk-jockeys appreciate the cushy life they have sitting on their rumps.

Are we meant to feel sorry for the couriers who do a crap job? One of my worse jobs ever was as a 'desk jockey' with a vile bullying manager sitting right next to me for 8 hours so not all cushy. Tony

I think most of the desk jockeys have never worked hard but keep telling us they do.
Have they worked on a building site or worked on the land?
If they tried real work they would soon be back behind their cosy desk with their cosy life, producing little of value, irrespective of whom sat next to them.
It's fashionable to knock couriers – but try it and see how you get on.

Experience taught me the grass is always greener on the other side of the hill! Offices are full of people wishing they were outside cutting the grass whilst the worker sweating on a mower is convinced office work is 'cushy'. They're both wrong.

My ideal is a interesting high paid job well matched to my talent,flexible hours, not too hard or difficult, that allows me to produce a satisfying result to wide acclaim with no responsibility for mistakes. Never happened. Physical jobs come closer to this ideal than most office work! Office work is often dull, difficult, mismatched to the individual, with no obvious output and high responsibility for mistakes; stressful rather than cushy.

Management is by far the most difficult job in my experience because it involves tricky people problems. For example, Tony's manager probably had a manager trying to decide if Tony was being bullied or, as we say in the trade, was 'performing entirely to his own satisfaction'.

People performing to their own satisfaction at work has always been a major problem in the UK. Statistics show that Brits work hard and produce well-crafted output, but often take 20% or more longer to achieve results than others doing the same job. Low productivity is deeply embedded in Britain. Not as bad as mañana, but a seriously damaging culture that so far has proved impossible to fix because everyone else is to blame and working hard is more acceptable than working efficiently.

That a percentage of couriers do a bad job shouldn't be a surprise. In a typical workforce, 20% are high performers, 20% underperform and 60% are satisfactory. Lots of complicated reasons for under-performance and most people underperform at some point in their lives. People can move down due to illness or up if luck happens to put them in a job they enjoy. Managers usually try to match people to suitable work, but it's often impossible. They might also get rid of awkward staff by moving them to unsuitable work where they will fail or leave.

Management has a dark side because they are usually held responsible for mistakes or getting caught. Matching people to suitable work could be nepotism and moving someone to unsuitable work might be constructive dismissal, which is illegal.

Managers also have to manipulate their peers and bosses which needs a mix of skill, credibility, diplomacy and office politics. The manager gets the blame when two teams do similar work and one is less productive than the other. Could fair or not, but managers often find themselves fighting to survive with their team. Downsizing! The stress can lead to all manner of bad behaviour: lies, disinformation, propaganda, throwing friends under the bus, shredding evidence, stealing credit, blame shifting, fake results, and more. Power corrupts and it tends to get worse as one moves up the ladder. Management is like riding a tiger and managers end by being promoted to the level at which they become incompetent. Not nice to realise you are incompetent. Management jobs are high-stress, and the need to be ruthless means sociopaths tend rise to the very top.

Management methods are full of contradictions. Good managers are consistent, but have to use carrot and stick opposites and lose credibility if flipping between the two is obvious. A common tactic is to hide it by ordering junior managers to be b*stards while the big boss pretends to be cuddly, or less commonly the other way round.

Rule of thumb, jobs are 'easy' if you can be trained or no training is necessary. Common-sense jobs are often happy jobs. But quite a lot of 'easy' jobs involve hard physical work, and many nasty jobs are sedentary. Both types are difficult for different reasons. Anyone who thinks others have easy jobs is probably wrong! Ignorance is bliss…

Dave

Edited By SillyOldDuffer on 16/08/2022 10:59:01

[Brian GParticipant @briang]

Posted by Peter Greene 🇨🇦 on 15/08/2022 23:01:27:

Are the tracking systems for these and similar ….. services ….. any better in the UK than on this side of the pond?

So often these days, tracking consists of: shipped … in transit …. delivered. (Often preceded with several days of "label generated" ).

None of this tells me any more than an email telling me the vendor has shipped.

Edited By Peter Greene 🇨🇦 on 15/08/2022 23:02:09

Coincidentally, the last page I looked at before this was to track a delivery on Yodel (a few years back voted Britain's worst delivery network). Right now the driver is on drop 13 of 101 and is expected with me between 15:15 and 17:15. There is even a map showing where he is now. If I wasn't going to be in I could click to rearrange delivery and the driver's app would be updated accordingly. Several other networks offer similar information.

Brian G

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