Work colleagues

[Bairnardo]

Wal*Mart will be absolutely rubbing their hands with glee at the thought of what they'll be able to do to their workers in a few months' time.

This.

What Asda staff are talking about there is just the thin end of the wedge. The reality of the move towards powerful organisations from govt down doing whatever the f**k they want and daring people to do something about it is just beginning to bite. Brexit and an impending Tory majority will make it many times worse.

[Cerberus]

These things are never good for the employees.

Straight off the bat if they can move people from department to department then they probably won’t need as many staff.

[parsforlife]

"I think at my age, why would I be able to start going to different departments and doing different jobs?"
Start by retiring you job blocking old twat!
Supermarket shopping has been irrevocably changed by the 2008 financial crash, Asda it seems are just catching up.

It’s a really bad attitude. Most contracts these days make some mention of ‘any other duties that the business requires’ and moving departments is very very far from an unreasonable expectation.

That said I’m somewhat suspicious of such quotes being used, I’m sure there must have been someone better placed to articulate concerns over the impact on their work/life balance, how this may impact on their rights for reasonable considerations to flexible working etc and that the offer of a 2% payrise in 6 months time not being a sufficient compromise with suspicion that a similar increase would of happened under an annual pay review, meaning in say a years time employees will have had no benefit from the change in contract and indeed if breaks now become unpaid(or how nightshift pay is calculated) then they may actually be worse of for ‘time spent at work’

There’s probably a decent compromise to be made. If you look at Aldi(which is the direction Asda are moving) as an example employees are relatively quite well payed and have decent opportunity’s to learn and progress, but they are expected to be quite flexible and work in combined roles, the ‘i do checkout, he works warehouse, they stack shelves, he cleans...’ is well dead(rightly) if the checkouts are quite everyone chips in and is re-stocking, if it’s particularly busy then the staff all head to the checkouts. It works well for both staff and business.

They’re are plenty of times business try and shaft they’re employees with change of conditions, but there’s also quite a few times it’s mutually beneficial.

I once sat in a meeting that was going on way too long with management explaining why we were moving to monthly pay, they were rolling in all typical overtime payments etc in. It was quite simple really, it provided a secure monthly payment that didn’t jump up and down, virtually every member of staff would earn more over the year(as the overtime we were working 45 weeks a year was payed for all 52) and the business was saving significantly in admin costs, yet there was 2/3 absolutely seething members of staff over virtually f**k all, some were even talking months later about how we should have gone on strike.

[Bairnardo]

4 minutes ago, parsforlife said:

 

It’s a really bad attitude. Most contracts these days make some mention of ‘any other duties that the business requires’ and moving departments is very very far from an unreasonable expectation.

That said I’m somewhat suspicious of such quotes being used, I’m sure there must have been someone better placed to articulate concerns over the impact on their work/life balance, how this may impact on their rights for reasonable considerations to flexible working etc and that the offer of a 2% payrise in 6 months time not being a sufficient compromise with suspicion that a similar increase would of happened under an annual pay review, meaning in say a years time employees will have had no benefit from the change in contract and indeed if breaks now become unpaid(or how nightshift pay is calculated) then they may actually be worse of for ‘time spent at work’

There’s probably a decent compromise to be made. If you look at Aldi(which is the direction Asda are moving) as an example employees are relatively quite well payed and have decent opportunity’s to learn and progress, but they are expected to be quite flexible and work in combined roles, the ‘i do checkout, he works warehouse, they stack shelves, he cleans...’ is well dead(rightly) if the checkouts are quite everyone chips in and is re-stocking, if it’s particularly busy then the staff all head to the checkouts. It works well for both staff and business.

They’re are plenty of times business try and shaft they’re employees with change of conditions, but there’s also quite a few times it’s mutually beneficial.

I once sat in a meeting that was going on way too long with management explaining why we were moving to monthly pay, they were rolling in all typical overtime payments etc in. It was quite simple really, it provided a secure monthly payment that didn’t jump up and down, virtually every member of staff would earn more over the year(as the overtime we were working 45 weeks a year was payed for all 52) and the business was saving significantly in admin costs, yet there was 2/3 absolutely seething members of staff over virtually f**k all, some were even talking months later about how we should have gone on strike.

 

You can say its inflexible but you arent accounting for the basis on which they were hired. 

If you weren't hired to do any/all tasks then it is unreasonable to expect you to take them on in an enforced change of contract IMO. 

[Bairnardo]

4 minutes ago, ThatBoyRonaldo said:

Asda is owned by a group of the wealthiest individuals in human history and we are talking here about minimum wage workers being threatened with the sack. Which side you're on should be a pretty easy question.

If the contract needs changed then whatever - change it for new entrants. Turnover in supermarkets is so high that most of the people who chose to remain on the old contract would be gone within a few years, and meanwhile the Walton family lose some pocket change.

At least they've got the GMB representing them who will actually stand up for them rather than USDAW who must be the most useless spineless b*****ds in the entire trade union movement.

Yep. Always amazes me to see people lining up to take the side of the big companies and shit all over other working folk. What we are talking about here is effectively the same as telling teachers they are now the janitor or some shit. 

"Lazy b*****ds" in response to workers feeling like they have no alternative but to strike is my favourite of the genre. An utterly abysmal shout. 

[Cerberus]

I bet a number of these Asda workers will still vote for the Tories cause they don't like Comrade Corbyn.

 

[beefybake]

11 hours ago, parsforlife said:

No, she was expected to reply on her return to work, and not totally ignore anything sent whilst she was off.

Surely the fault lies with the person who sent the mail.

[parsforlife]

You can say its inflexible but you arent accounting for the basis on which they were hired. 
If you weren't hired to do any/all tasks then it is unreasonable to expect you to take them on in an enforced change of contract IMO. 

It’s really not. It’s a bit of a joke that someone should think themselves above moving boxes etc, sure if your hired for one role and asked to do something that your not skilled to do then it’s unreasonable to ask you to do such a role. Using your analogy if a teacher was employed for a 40 hour week but only 35 were filled with teaching role then it’s absolutely reasonable to ask them to assist the janitor with their remaining hours. ‘I’m a teacher, I’m not helping with that’ is a ridiculous attitude and rightly ignored.

Yep. Always amazes me to see people lining up to take the side of the big companies and shit all over other working folk. What we are talking about here is effectively the same as telling teachers they are now the janitor or some shit. 
"Lazy b*****ds" in response to workers feeling like they have no alternative but to strike is my favourite of the genre. An utterly abysmal shout. 

Can I make it clear here, I don’t side with big companies, they need to be held to account way way more than they currently are, paying a fairer share of tax and treat employees better(e.g if you hire 3 people on a ‘12 hour week’ but actually expect them to regularly work a 15 or 20 hour week with no supplement for the extra hours(e.g 1.5x hourly rate) then your taking the piss and need a hounding.

[Jacksgranda]

5 minutes ago, beefybake said:

Surely the fault lies with the person who sent the mail.

I don't think so.

[Bairnardo]

Can I make it clear here, I don’t side with big companies, they need to be held to account way way more than they currently are, paying a fairer share of tax and treat employees better(e.g if you hire 3 people on a ‘12 hour week’ but actually expect them to regularly work a 15 or 20 hour week with no supplement for the extra hours(e.g 1.5x hourly rate) then your taking the piss and need a hounding.

 

Teachers do far more than their contracted hours, most of them take work home with them. Do they get to turn round and demand that time be recompensed?

 

 

That same principle applies to lots of people who are pressured into working linger than their contracted hours for no extra pay. A real terms pay cut. This is the shit employers get away with. Its nothing to do with being "above" certain types of work. If you hire me on a contract to do X and Y, and you want me to do Z, you can wither f**k off, or you can come with ingredients for my consideration.

 

If you dont have enough of X and Y for me to do in any given week, tough shit.

 

And yes, I have left jobs before (in fact every job I have ever had since I am currently working notice) because the terms became less favourable than I deemed acceptable.

 

 

(ETA I was attempting to quote your firdt bit, I see I have covered some of the same ground in your second bit)

[parsforlife]

Surely the fault lies with the person who sent the mail.

 

?

 

Email does not require instant response. If an email is sent at 9am on Friday looking for a response by close of business the following Thursday then there is ample time for someone to respond between their return to work on Monday and the deadline .

 

If you phoned someone on a Friday needing an answer that day and that person was off then your absolutely at fault. But a message that offers reasonable time for a reply(let’s say 15 business hours) is perfectly acceptable.

[Crawford Bridge]

5 minutes ago, Bairnardo said:

Teachers do far more than their contracted hours, most of them take work home with them. Do they get to turn round and demand that time be recompensed?


That same principle applies to lots of people who are pressured into working linger than their contracted hours for no extra pay. A real terms pay cut. This is the shit employers get away with. Its nothing to do with being "above" certain types of work. If you hire me on a contract to do X and Y, and you want me to do Z, you can wither f**k off, or you can come with ingredients for my consideration.

If you dont have enough of X and Y for me to do in any given week, tough shit.

And yes, I have left jobs before (in fact every job I have ever had since I am currently working notice) because the terms became less favourable than I deemed acceptable.
 

Make no mistake, we'd still be working 16 hour days down a pit, for tuppence per week at the age of 13 if it was up to these c***s.

[beefybake]

4 minutes ago, parsforlife said:

 

?

 

Email does not require instant response. If an email is sent at 9am on Friday looking for a response by close of business the following Thursday then there is ample time for someone to respond between their return to work on Monday and the deadline .

 

If you phoned someone on a Friday needing an answer that day and that person was off then your absolutely at fault. But a message that offers reasonable time for a reply(let’s say 15 business hours) is perfectly acceptable.

It could be a work email address that the person seldom checks.  I mean...., if you're a part timer, on a zero hours contract.... then **ck their emails. 

[parsforlife]

Teachers do far more than their contracted hours, most of them take work home with them. Do they get to turn round and demand that time be recompensed? 
 
That same principle applies to lots of people who are pressured into working linger than their contracted hours for no extra pay. A real terms pay cut. This is the shit employers get away with. Its nothing to do with being "above" certain types of work. If you hire me on a contract to do X and Y, and you want me to do Z, you can wither f**k off, or you can come with ingredients for my consideration.
 
If you dont have enough of X and Y for me to do in any given week, tough shit.
 
And yes, I have left jobs before (in fact every job I have ever had since I am currently working notice) because the terms became less favourable than I deemed acceptable.
 
 
(ETA I was attempting to quote your firdt bit, I see I have covered some of the same ground in your second bit)

A) absolutely yes. Teachers should be demanding they are reasonably compensated for total time worked. Being attacked by b*****ds like gove never helped. If 4 teachers are working 10 hours overtime then they are being fucked over, they’re should be 5 teachers to cover the hours.

I absolutely agree that employers f**k over people all the time.

If they are paying for 40 hours work but placing expectations on their employees that typically require more hours than that then that’s wrong.

What I don’t agree with is the attitude that businesses f**k employees over then the employees should f**k the business. Pay me for a certain amount of hours, I’ll work them and go home, it’s a very simple concept. It really really doesn’t need to be a us vs them scenario.

Make no mistake, we'd still be working 16 hour days down a pit, for tuppence per week at the age of 13 if it was up to these c***s.

There’s a long way to go in workers rights. A long fucking way.

That doesn’t mean Sandra can complain cos she might need to stack some shelves.

[ICTChris]

Teachers are teachers, janitors are janitors. I don’t want teachers servicing the boiler and I don’t want the Jannie teaching the kids about Shakespeare.

[parsforlife]

It could be a work email address that the person seldom checks.  I mean...., if you're a part timer, on a zero hours contract.... then **ck their emails. 

Well yes but i highly doubt that’s the scenario.

If you work 9-5 Monday to Thursday and someone emails on a Friday then I’d expect the email to be answered Monday. If your on a 0 hour contract, get called for a shift, asked to do a dozen jobs, work through them with no break and sent home then there’s no reasonably time for you to look back through your emails and answer requests. I don’t think many who work 0 hour contracts have a personally work email address, and if they do then they need to be given appropriately time to read and reply to them

[Miguel Sanchez]

27 minutes ago, parsforlife said:

 

It’s really not. It’s a bit of a joke that someone should think themselves above moving boxes etc, sure if your hired for one role and asked to do something that your not skilled to do then it’s unreasonable to ask you to do such a role. Using your analogy if a teacher was employed for a 40 hour week but only 35 were filled with teaching role then it’s absolutely reasonable to ask them to assist the janitor with their remaining hours. ‘I’m a teacher, I’m not helping with that’ is a ridiculous attitude and rightly ignored.


Can I make it clear here, I don’t side with big companies, they need to be held to account way way more than they currently are, paying a fairer share of tax and treat employees better(e.g if you hire 3 people on a ‘12 hour week’ but actually expect them to regularly work a 15 or 20 hour week with no supplement for the extra hours(e.g 1.5x hourly rate) then your taking the piss and need a hounding.
 

 

If you're a 76 year old woman who's worked on the checkouts for however long she's been there, I think it's unreasonable to expect them to go in the warehouse and start moving heavy things about. I think any manager or superior in that position who misused their staff that wildly would be much more at fault than the system that prompted it, however.

Tesco recently rolled out similar bullshit in the past month, coincidentally also at the same time the wage there went to £9 an hour: https://www.theguardian.com/business/2019/aug/05/tesco-cut-jobs-latest-redundancies-counter-staff

As much as the "everyone does everything" approach works in theory, there are multiple problems:

• Existing part time staff are often part time for a reason. Whether it's children or other outside commitments, not everyone is able to drop everything to work whenever they're asked to. This also applies to full time staff, and generally in these kinds of arrangements it's going to be harder to accommodate people the way they might have been before.
• This is admittedly irrelevant in the Tesco example, where in Metro stores there's now a maximum of 30 hours a week, 6.5 hour shifts, and no full time staff. 
• That link says 4,500 jobs were to be cut. That means 4,500 people were going to be made redundant, it doesn't mean 4,500 jobs are suddenly going to disappear. The jobs are still there, the hours are now only covered by part time staff. Again, while this might benefit different shops at their busiest hours, you're hiring several thousand part time staff. You're replacing full-time, experienced people with literally anyone who applies for a job.
• In a lot of cases, these part time staff aren't going to be as invested in the job as someone who was there full time and had been for years. Maybe they're only in the job six months, by which point they've learned to do two or three of the several roles on offer they're supposed to be able to do. Then you need to spend time training their replacement, only that falls on whatever experience you've got left in the shop, which probably isn't much since they were either made redundant or chucked it out of frustration at their ridiculous, unsuitable new working arrangements.

Regardless of all of this, whether it's new or existing staff, in a retail setting you need to know what people are suited for. You can't ask a 76 year old woman to go filling the fruit and veg, carrying potatoes and carrots around, any more than you'd start training a bunch of daft shelf-stackers to work at the customer service desk. If people are worried about being put into unsuitable roles then that's something to manage on a person by person basis, but it doesn't affect the fact that the comparative drop in conditions and work/life balance facing them isn't fair. 

[parsforlife]

Teachers are teachers, janitors are janitors. I don’t want teachers servicing the boiler and I don’t want the Jannie teaching the kids about Shakespeare.

Well yes, but a teacher tidying the classroom to help the Jannie and the Jannie handing out books to the kids to help the teacher is a perfectly ok distribution of tasks.

I honestly can’t imagine being at work and thinking ‘well I’m not doing anything right now and have another 5 hours to go, guess I’ll twiddle my thumbs, f**k everyone else, not my job’. Surely the thinking should be ‘being payed for the next 5 hours, done my duties, how else can I help my colleagues’

[BFTD]

31 minutes ago, Crawford Bridge said:

Make no mistake, we'd still be working 16 hour days down a pit, for tuppence per week at the age of 13 if it was up to these c***s.

I always thought teachers were b*****ds, but that's beyond the pale.

6 minutes ago, ICTChris said:

Teachers are teachers, janitors are janitors. I don’t want teachers servicing the boiler and I don’t want the Jannie teaching the kids about Shakespeare.

Oh aye, take away one of the few perks they have left, why don't you.

[BFTD]

1 hour ago, Bairnardo said:

Yep. Always amazes me to see people lining up to take the side of the big companies and shit all over other working folk. What we are talking about here is effectively the same as telling teachers they are now the janitor or some shit. 

"Lazy b*****ds" in response to workers feeling like they have no alternative but to strike is my favourite of the genre. An utterly abysmal shout. 

There's an alarming number of people on low wages whose response to hearing that unionised workers have better conditions is to say, "well, I don't have x, y, and z, so why should those c***s get it?"

The obvious, obvious, obvious and logical thought is, "why aren't you giving me x, y, and z as well?". Even the wealthiest Tories must shake their heads in bewilderment that so many people don't understand that.