Loren wrote:
Okay, serious question here, to anyone who may know either from experience, or study: What is it about postal service jobs that is so stressful? Never having had a postal job, I obviously lack insight on the issue. From what I am able to observe, I can't fathom what is so stressful about delivery jobs or back room sorting jobs. I can see how the customer service counter jobs can be stressful, but having worked many years in retail customer service myself, postal service counter jobs seem somewhat less stressful - I can count on one hand the number of times I've been in a post office and heard customers screaming at employees, however it happens regularly in retail.
I dunno, I postal jobs just don't seem anywhere near as stressful as a whole lot of other jobs, can someone enlighten me? I'm honestly curious.
Loren
Well, the PO phased out "Letter Sorting Machines" about 10 years ago where the clerks had 2/8 of a second to see the address and 3/8 of a second to key out either the first 3 digits of a 5 digit zip code or the last 3 digits depending what the zip code was unless the letter had a special zip code that called for a memory code to be keyed or if there was no zip code send it to a special code where the machine was turned down to only 50 letters a minute so clerks could key everything from memory.
Now mail is processed in "automation" with optical bar code readers but someone still has to load the 7 to 20 pound trays of mail onto the machines and cull out all of the nonuniform mail. Someone also has to work sweep side of the mail unloading the bins into trays and dispatching them out.
Automation clerks work a rotation of these 2 jobs 8 to 10 hours a night.
The machines all operate at decible levels the postal union is constantly complaining about.
Carpel tunnel syndrome, back injuries and deafness are 3 of the many health adventures that are rank at the PO.
The maximum weight limit for a clerk to be required to pick up is 70 pounds. Some clerks are assigned to operations where they do nothing but sort heavy boxes day in and day out.
Window clerks?
They usually have 7 to 12 thousand dollars worth of stamps in their drawers that they are held accountable for. If they come up short it comes out of their pay check.
If you see them at the windows at 7 AM its a safe bet they've been there since 4 AM sorting mail to the PO boxes.
The grand bulk of the mail gets moved between 5 PM (last pickup at the boxes) in cancellation and 2 AM after its been processed in automation and goes out to the associate offices for distribution.
Working during the day is done by a skeleton crew by comparison. If you want your mail Monday morning there have been people sorting it for you all Sunday night.
It takes really high seniority to get onto days and even more for weekends.
Ok, mail carriers do get to work days and have Sundays off but not only do they spend the whole day out in the elements (frozen snot on their moustaches et cetera) they're held accountable for all their mail as well. They have to sign out for registered mail, collect postage due, what ever.
They are allotted x amount of time to do their routes.
The time allotted does not change summer to winter.
ALL first class mail that arrives at an associate office in the morning has to be delivered that day.
Management has 20 minutes before the end of tour to tell employees if they have to work a mandatory 10 hour schedule.
Its not unusual to be asked to work 60 hour weeks.
Vacation time is allotted by seniority.
Incidental time off is alloted by a quota system. Currently you file for it in triplicate.
In many cases all sick leave must be documented with a letter from a doctor (even in cases where the employee has over a couple hundred hours of accumulated sick leave).
If someone has a substance abuse problem anything they do wrong is excusable as long as they are seeking medical help. Their fellow employees are expected to pick up the slack around them.
Its just about impossible for a veteran of the armed forces to be fired unless they do something physically violent.
Their fellow employees are expected to continue working around them no matter how caustic their behavior becomes.
I used to interpret PO versus Union grievances.
What episode was that in? 