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Post by rambo on Jan 7, 2015 12:22:56 GMT
I agree it is a difficult situation.
What does not help is UNITE not saying what pay rate they want. Whilst I do sort of understand the point 'drivers know what the pay rate is before they start', people still have to put food on the table and need jobs. Every company that I know of have new drivers queuing up to start. I for one don't want £millions for driving a bus, but what I do want is a decent pay rate accross the board. How can you pay someone the same rate at midday and midnight? How is it right to pay drivers an extra £1.30 per hour(approx) to work weekends. An extra £1.30 per hour to work on your day off is not right either.
I for one think that if the public want decent bus services, they must be expected to pay for it, however, public transport should be publicly owned and subustersised.
Will the strike make any difference? probably not, unless driver keep up the pressure.
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Post by sid on Jan 7, 2015 12:30:54 GMT
With Arriva Kent Thamesside not striking, the infamous 160 will be a 'normal' service! If AKT go on strike I doubt if anybody will notice the difference.................sorry couldn't resist
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Post by sid on Jan 7, 2015 12:32:11 GMT
Maybe I'm a little naive, or is this Unite doing a bit of pre electioneering? If I work for company A and I have a contract that pays me £x pounds p/h, but company B pays more, why should I then expect my employer to match company B's hourly rate? I think you've summed it up very well, and why should drivers at company B who are on a higher rate want to strike?
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fl70500
Driver
Its me from BE
Posts: 217
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Post by fl70500 on Jan 7, 2015 18:58:53 GMT
There may well be company B paying more than A but in contract award terms Company A wins because they can do it cheaper. Our wages being low should not be the deciding factor in a tender process that's the point of getting an even rate of pay. One company can run the route well and still lose.
Unite fail as they not releasing figures of what we striking for and the top earners may lose out, this would need to tackled stage by stage. But as Bus Drivers we stand together, most of us all got to run cars and families and this is getting harder and I do enjoy the job but if I have to change to earn a fair amount then will have too.
Will not cross a picket and we do need support, we work hard and do long hours and should be rewarded as the companies do, but we don't. We get told to smile on the job and this is getting more difficult by the week.
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Jan 7, 2015 20:31:39 GMT
Will there be bus replacement trains
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Post by ServerKing on Jan 7, 2015 21:47:28 GMT
Will there be bus replacement trains Perhaps not I can just see the headlines
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Post by snoggle on Jan 7, 2015 21:51:24 GMT
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Jan 7, 2015 22:07:43 GMT
There may well be company B paying more than A but in contract award terms Company A wins because they can do it cheaper. Our wages being low should not be the deciding factor in a tender process that's the point of getting an even rate of pay. One company can run the route well and still lose. Unite fail as they not releasing figures of what we striking for and the top earners may lose out, this would need to tackled stage by stage. But as Bus Drivers we stand together, most of us all got to run cars and families and this is getting harder and I do enjoy the job but if I have to change to earn a fair amount then will have too. Will not cross a picket and we do need support, we work hard and do long hours and should be rewarded as the companies do, but we don't. We get told to smile on the job and this is getting more difficult by the week. well said mate agree with u 100% I am not even in the union but I will not cross the Picket line,
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Post by 6HP502C on Jan 8, 2015 3:21:33 GMT
Word on the street is that some drivers who feel they may stand to lose out won't be striking.
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Post by Steve80 on Jan 8, 2015 4:13:51 GMT
I don't support this strike. When you apply for a job you are informed of the rate of pay at that company. If you don't like that rate then don't take the job. There is a garage 5 minutes down the road that pays more? Apply there then!!! You wouldn't take a mobile phone contract at £60/month and then a year later demand they reduce it because all your friends are on a £40/month contract!!! The thing is that if they do this they might take an average of pay across London and impose that. Meaning a pay cut for some. I get over £14/hour at the moment and I'm not accepting and striking for potentially £13.... Unite haven't told me what they want the end result to be. Yes they why equal pay but what do they want that pay to be??? Because I'm sorry to say that all I care about is the figure in my bank every week and my ability to pay my mortgage and other bills. Might not be the right attitude but I do this job to pay my way and my family's way not for the love. But the way things are going, if we don't take a stand now then you will suffer a pay cut one way or another. Remember, Unite just want to ask the companies to sit around the table and talk about it but the companies are refusing to do so. Its not about the figures just yet. Imagine if you lose your job for whatever reason, may it be for dismissal or you had to leave and you then come back to the job. You be going on a starter rate of £9ph and how long would you have to wait for another significant increase on your pay? 2 years? 5 years? Or maybe even 7? The way I see it, its for the best if we do go on strike. The drivers have voted and the Union has now set the dates. If we continue to work on the strike date then we should all be worried on what the companies could do to us staff knowing that the strike was deemed a failure and the unions would be classed as worthless. As for the other comments, if I knew that company was paying more than the company I'm currently in then I probably would have joined them. Its no point joining them now as I would have to go on their starter rate and would have to wait 5 years before I could earn more than what I'm currently getting.
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Post by Steve80 on Jan 8, 2015 4:19:52 GMT
Madstuntman has hit the nail squarely on the head. The pay rates are no secret and no one is forcing new starters to accept a job with a company paying them less than established drivers In an ideal world, yes, bus drivers London-wide would all get paid the same. However, this is not an ideal world and in the world of competitive tendering differing pay scales can make all the difference. Comparisons with Tube and DLR drivers are not valid because they all work for the same company; London's bus drivers do not. Unite do lots of good work but on this occasion they will not be successful I'm not sure how successful this strike will be. Those drivers on the higher rates of pay are going to be very reluctant to strike because there's really nothing in it for them. One driver I was speaking to said what's the point in striking for lower pay? He's got a point. Drivers will not all be brought up to the highest rate so, inevitably, there will be some drivers who end up taking a pay cut. Turkeys voting for Christmas anyone? I'm going to need to think long and hard what I'm going to do on the 13th Attachment Deleted
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Post by Steve80 on Jan 8, 2015 4:58:52 GMT
There may well be company B paying more than A but in contract award terms Company A wins because they can do it cheaper. Our wages being low should not be the deciding factor in a tender process that's the point of getting an even rate of pay. One company can run the route well and still lose. Unite fail as they not releasing figures of what we striking for and the top earners may lose out, this would need to tackled stage by stage. But as Bus Drivers we stand together, most of us all got to run cars and families and this is getting harder and I do enjoy the job but if I have to change to earn a fair amount then will have too. Will not cross a picket and we do need support, we work hard and do long hours and should be rewarded as the companies do, but we don't. We get told to smile on the job and this is getting more difficult by the week. Yes, I think the T33 route was one of Metrobus's best performing routes yet they still lost it. Arriva have lost the 109 yet looking at the performance chart and especially when you compare it to the other routes, you may wonder how did they lose this route. My garage have had the 201 for a few months now yet whether I do the route, I'm always picking up my bus upto 15 minutes late. The last time I did this route in the evenings, which is a 30 minute service, my leader was constantly running over 20 minutes late. This was good for me as I was leaving 2-3 minutes late knowing that I wouldn't pick up so many passengers but I was still getting to the end point late as the running times are very poor and the recovery time was only 5-6 minutes. Now, whether I get the 201 I just simply exchange the route to another driver. I can also talk about the other routes like the 3. Got a letter stating they made a competitive bid so they had to move the route to another garage. The result is now driver changeovers are done mid route with maximum 45 minutes break so passengers are inconvenienced even further if the drivers is late for their meal relief. Others here have also mentioned abut the poor changeovers on the 172, 188 and 343. The C10 gets a fair bit of bad press too. Definitely agree with your other comments about the job getting harder. We even got brand new E200 buses that can barely move to a decent speed I like the job as well but only after yesterday in fact, when talking to a friend about prices of house and mortgages then I realised how poor the pay really is. Anyway, I have no intention of moving on just yet. I really need to drive those buses on the 109
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Post by snoggle on Jan 8, 2015 9:25:15 GMT
Yes, I think the T33 route was one of Metrobus's best performing routes yet they still lost it. Arriva have lost the 109 yet looking at the performance chart and especially when you compare it to the other routes, you may wonder how did they lose this route. My garage have had the 201 for a few months now yet whether I do the route, I'm always picking up my bus upto 15 minutes late. The last time I did this route in the evenings, which is a 30 minute service, my leader was constantly running over 20 minutes late. This was good for me as I was leaving 2-3 minutes late knowing that I wouldn't pick up so many passengers but I was still getting to the end point late as the running times are very poor and the recovery time was only 5-6 minutes. Now, whether I get the 201 I just simply exchange the route to another driver. I can also talk about the other routes like the 3. Got a letter stating they made a competitive bid so they had to move the route to another garage. The result is now driver changeovers are done mid route with maximum 45 minutes break so passengers are inconvenienced even further if the drivers is late for their meal relief. Others here have also mentioned abut the poor changeovers on the 172, 188 and 343. The C10 gets a fair bit of bad press too. Definitely agree with your other comments about the job getting harder. We even got brand new E200 buses that can barely move to a decent speed I like the job as well but only after yesterday in fact, when talking to a friend about prices of house and mortgages then I realised how poor the pay really is. Anyway, I have no intention of moving on just yet. I really need to drive those buses on the 109 What is interesting about your comments about winning / retaining routes is that it is clear that operators are trying to push the absolute limits of schedules and stripping away any contingency. There are too many instances of poor schedules and under resourced PVRs which get the operator a tender win and then have to be unravelled at the operator's cost to try to restore performance. The other surprise is how schedules are put together with badly allocated running time over route sections. The need to change the S4's schedule within days of introduction was a real surprise - makes me wonder what's going on with the process that allows that situation to arise. Surely both the operator and TfL review the new schedule before introduction to ensure it's robust and logically consistent compared to the schedule that is in use with the incumbent operator? I'm not saying it has to be identical but if an existing schedule broadly works then it is surely a decent guide as to sectional run times and overall trip times.
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Post by 6HP502C on Jan 8, 2015 13:14:41 GMT
What is interesting about your comments about winning / retaining routes is that it is clear that operators are trying to push the absolute limits of schedules and stripping away any contingency. There are too many instances of poor schedules and under resourced PVRs which get the operator a tender win and then have to be unravelled at the operator's cost to try to restore performance. The other surprise is how schedules are put together with badly allocated running time over route sections. The need to change the S4's schedule within days of introduction was a real surprise - makes me wonder what's going on with the process that allows that situation to arise. Surely both the operator and TfL review the new schedule before introduction to ensure it's robust and logically consistent compared to the schedule that is in use with the incumbent operator? I'm not saying it has to be identical but if an existing schedule broadly works then it is surely a decent guide as to sectional run times and overall trip times. The 3 is ridiculous - up to 6 in service buses can be parked up at the changeover point awaiting drivers, much to the chagrin of passengers and drivers on the 59/159. The Abellio Way for certain inner London high frequency routes certainly was, or maybe still is to turn buses at late notice to plug gaps in headways, then create extra "mileage duties" for times of day where its easier to run the service and recoup lost mileage! I'm so fed up with the late curtailments that I avoid using their routes where possible. I don't know about the west operation or Beddington, but certainly Walworth and Battersea operated routes. As for nights, schedules have been negotiated for some routes that see buses crawling along and drivers more willingly arguing with passengers over fares just to lose time! I never cease to be amazed at just how slowly the N343 moves!
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Post by Eastlondoner62 on Jan 8, 2015 16:51:48 GMT
Looking at TFL website, Those with season Bus Passes and 11-15 Zip cards get free travel on other service operated by TFL provided they are carrying their pass
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