*From:* "Peter Smyth"
*Date:* Fri, 22 Jul 2011 19:21:52 +0100

wrote in message
...

As a consequence of everything being so tight, a driver requesting
time
out "or special leave" as it's known) may be refused. This is the
same for
whether the special leave is at the beginning or end of the duty,
or for a
day or more. If it's for a day in advance and cover is available,
it might
be possible for that person to arrange to take a day or more of
their
leave at that time. In which case, that time off would be shown as
leave
and he would be paid as normal and it wouldn't go against them.
This is
normally the case if more than the allowed time off for funerals is
required.

One of the few exceptions for not granting special leave would be a
funeral. A driver phoning in to say that they have to wait in
because
somebody is late turing up, a plumber etc. is late finishing, they
have to
pick up their children from school etc. will normally be given
short
shrift and told to "be in on time or you'll be booked" because if
they're
not in on time, it may be that their train (or another train later
because
a spare is already being used) is cancelled.

Is it possible for drivers to agree to swap shifts with each other?

Peter Smyth



Drivers can swap shifts, and indeed many do, especially those who like to
work at certain times of the day, such as lates, earlies or middles. You
can also swap rest days. The problem is getting somebody to change with
you at the last minute. If you're on a similar shift it's not so bad, but
there has to be a minimum of twelve hours between shifts. Therefore,
whilst a person who should be doing an early turn that day can swap their
shift for a late turn, the driver on the late turn couldn't swap their
shift for the early turn, unless they were rest day the day before.
Otherwise, in an extreme example, a driver finishing at 01:30 in the
morning on a late turn could then book on at 04:55 the same morning for an
early turn.

Drivers are not allowed to do overtime (the unions won't allow it) unless
this is unavoidable due to getting back late when finishing their duty, or
it is additional overtime (normally a few minutes) on certain duties as
agreed by the unions. As a consequence, After they have finished their own
duty, a driver can't then "do a rounder" of another duty because that
driver will be in late.

Roger

On Fri, Jul 22, 2011 at 02:51:02PM -0500, wrote:

Drivers are not allowed to do overtime (the unions won't allow it)

Why do the unions have any say in the matter? If a driver wants to work
overtime, and his manager has work for him to do, then it seems crazy to
stop them.

--
David Cantrell | A machine for turning tea into grumpiness

Never attribute to malice that which can be explained by stupidity
-- Hanlon's Razor

Stupidity maintained long enough is a form of malice
-- Richard Bos's corollary

In message , at 11:53:32
on Mon, 25 Jul 2011, David Cantrell remarked:
Drivers are not allowed to do overtime (the unions won't allow it)

Why do the unions have any say in the matter? If a driver wants to work
overtime, and his manager has work for him to do, then it seems crazy to
stop them.

You seem to be overlooking the "collective" in Collective Bargaining.

If the unions have decided that they'd prefer more jobs (which equates
to more subs and also an easier sell that every member needs a 'living
wage' without overtime), rather than fewer jobs with flexibility via
overtime, then everyone gets lumbered with that decision.
--
Roland Perry

On Mon, 25 Jul 2011 12:16:23 +0100
Roland Perry wrote:
If the unions have decided that they'd prefer more jobs (which equates
to more subs and also an easier sell that every member needs a 'living
wage' without overtime), rather than fewer jobs with flexibility via
overtime, then everyone gets lumbered with that decision.

If overtime is available what is stopping someone from doing it? If the union
rep doesn't like it surely thats a case of tough ****?

B2003

In message , at 11:44:36 on Mon, 25 Jul
2011, d remarked:
If the unions have decided that they'd prefer more jobs (which equates
to more subs and also an easier sell that every member needs a 'living
wage' without overtime), rather than fewer jobs with flexibility via
overtime, then everyone gets lumbered with that decision.

If overtime is available what is stopping someone from doing it? If the union
rep doesn't like it surely thats a case of tough ****?

The employer will have agreed not to offer overtime, as part of the
bargaining at some earlier session with the unions.

It works the other way round as well. I got burnt by this in my very
first "proper job". I naively accepted an evening shift (replacing a day
shift) for a couple of weeks because it suited me better, and didn't ask
for extra shift pay.

The unions found out, I got an ear-bashing from the union rep and the
employer was forced to pay me the extra shift pay.
--
Roland Perry

*From:* Roland Perry
*Date:* Mon, 25 Jul 2011 12:16:23 +0100

In message , at
11:53:32 on Mon, 25 Jul 2011, David Cantrell
remarked:
Drivers are not allowed to do overtime (the unions won't allow
it)

Why do the unions have any say in the matter? If a driver wants
to work
overtime, and his manager has work for him to do, then it seems
crazy to
stop them.

You seem to be overlooking the "collective" in Collective
Bargaining.

If the unions have decided that they'd prefer more jobs (which
equates to more subs and also an easier sell that every member
needs a 'living wage' without overtime), rather than fewer jobs
with flexibility via overtime, then everyone gets lumbered with
that decision.
--
Roland Perry

That always seems to be the union's argument, whenever this has been
brought up.

Another side to whether overtime (in the form of rest day working) is
worked or not is the effect from a company's point of view. It's probably
cheaper to pay overtime than recruit extra staff. The cost of more staff
being much higher than existing staff working overtime (because of all
sorts of overheads such as uniform, nation insurance etc.}.
For a company, staff working overtime is probably a more flexible way of
covering additional work, temporary vacancies etc.

Like staff getting used to more pay, companies get used to their staff
working overtime. This can have a bad side, as the FCC work to rule last
year(?) proved, with the large amount of trains that were being frequently
cancelled due to no staff available. Because it takes so long to train
staff up, they can't suddenly say "we'll stop rest day working". They have
to allow up to six months for new, additional drivers to be trained up.

Roger

*From:* David Cantrell
*Date:* Mon, 25 Jul 2011 11:53:32 +0100

On Fri, Jul 22, 2011 at 02:51:02PM -0500,
wrote:

Drivers are not allowed to do overtime (the unions won't allow it)

Why do the unions have any say in the matter? If a driver wants to
work
overtime, and his manager has work for him to do, then it seems
crazy to
stop them.

--
David Cantrell | A machine for turning tea into grumpiness

Never attribute to malice that which can be explained by stupidity
-- Hanlon's Razor

Stupidity maintained long enough is a form of malice
-- Richard Bos's corollary


I'm not quite sure of the reasoning behind this on the Underground -
overtime is worked on the stations. Rest day working is also worked on the
mainline (I don't know if it's agreed with all train companies). It isn't
because of the amount of actual time worked. When I joined, you worked a
five day 40-hour week, Monday to Saturday. Sundays (one on, one off,
giving an average 44 hour week) were always classed as overtime. Although
they were rostered and you could say in advance "I don't want to work
Sunday", very few people did. However, you couldn't work any of your
booked rest days, although this was sometimes done unofficially or during
training.

The Company Plan was introduced in the early 90s when there were sweeping
changes made to the terms and conditions and everybody had to sign new
contracts if they still wanted their job. Apart from going onto salaried
status (paid monthly, at a flat rate, instead of hourly at enhanced
rates), one of the major changes was the introduction of a five day 40
hour week when Sundays were classed as no different from any other day and
the week ran from Sunday to Saturday. It's possible that this was when
overtime was tightened up as the only official overtime (Sundays) was no
longer relevant.

Personally, I'm neutral over the overtime ban
Whilst it might be useful to occasionally work a bit of overtime if you
need a bit of extra money, it would be too easy to get into the trap of
being used to that extra money all the time and so effectively get trapped
into having to work the overtime all the time out of need. Of course this
applies to any job, however high or low paid.

Roger