Post by millring on Feb 24, 2024 18:32:07 GMT -5
I have to say up front that what I'm about to describe sounds like I think there's some conspiracy afoot. The problem is that, though it would seem to be so, I can't understand how it COULD be a conspiracy.
As I've mentioned countless times here, the reason the work situation in the Warsaw branch of the Post Office has been pretty dire for the past three years is because we are among the offices across the country who deliver most of the Amazon parcels for our county. If you live in a metropolitan area, it's likely that Amazon does their own delivery. Not so Warsaw and several other small towns. I've posted a link or two to articles from other areas of the country describing the same situation. Workers quitting. Workers getting injured. Mail failing to be delivered. Those aren't city problems and they might not even effect a majority in the country -- which is why the Post Office sees no need to address the problem.
But here's the thing that's happening in Warsaw that makes workers like me go, huh?
Today Warsaw started a "count". It will last two weeks and it measures everything about the 18 rural routes that can be measured -- mail volume, distances covered -- not just miles driven, but feet to doors, feet to stations at the office, feet between cases and loading docks, parcel volume ... everything that can be measured.
And the reason these counts are done is because:
1. Rural carriers (regulars, not subs) are only "sort of" paid hourly. We are actually paid by a calculation of an hourly wage applied to the details of the count and then, based on that caluculation, we are paid what amounts to a salary. But it's all based on the volume and accuracy of the count.
2. The Post Office needs to know how much they are gaining or losing in the process of delivery. Of course, a 10 billion dollar annual deficit makes it pretty clear that we are losing.
Now I'm getting to the nub. Every time we have a count, Amazon throttles back how much they send to our office for delivery. It's noticable to every carrier in the office. And we start to see Amazon trucks on our routes as well as those doordash type of entrepreneurial groups that deliver Amazon on commission. We bump into them all over our routes.
Today was my first day on my new Claypool route. Coincidentally, it is also the first day of a new count. Last November the regular carrier on this route quit. What happened that precipitated her quitting was that all of a sudden this Claypool route went from zero Amazon (it's far enough from Warsaw to be in the Kokomo and Ft Wayne hubs) to as much Amazon as every other Warsaw route. To put numbers to it: It went from fewer than 50 parcels of any size per day to over 250 parcels a day. Her days went from 6-7 hours a day (you might question the lightness, but it's why she chose this route) to 10-14 hour days. And because any previous count did not take this expansion of Amazon into Claypool, the carrier was simply not going to be paid for it. Two days into the Amazon deluge, she retired.
Well, the Amazon deluge never stopped. I carried the route up until Feb when I became regular and moved to another route. Every day it was still the same 120-250 parcels and a 10 hour day was light.
Remember I said today was the first day of the count? Today I had no Amazon. Zero. None. (Ran into a doordash type at a door in deep country too).
I can see how Amazon would benefit from keeping the cost of paying me for my route down as low as possible. And I can see how the Post Office could benefit as well. They keep my pay low AND they keep Amazon happy and thereby paying the post office our less-than-at-cost rate.
What I can't wrap my mind around is how such collusion could take place.
As I've mentioned countless times here, the reason the work situation in the Warsaw branch of the Post Office has been pretty dire for the past three years is because we are among the offices across the country who deliver most of the Amazon parcels for our county. If you live in a metropolitan area, it's likely that Amazon does their own delivery. Not so Warsaw and several other small towns. I've posted a link or two to articles from other areas of the country describing the same situation. Workers quitting. Workers getting injured. Mail failing to be delivered. Those aren't city problems and they might not even effect a majority in the country -- which is why the Post Office sees no need to address the problem.
But here's the thing that's happening in Warsaw that makes workers like me go, huh?
Today Warsaw started a "count". It will last two weeks and it measures everything about the 18 rural routes that can be measured -- mail volume, distances covered -- not just miles driven, but feet to doors, feet to stations at the office, feet between cases and loading docks, parcel volume ... everything that can be measured.
And the reason these counts are done is because:
1. Rural carriers (regulars, not subs) are only "sort of" paid hourly. We are actually paid by a calculation of an hourly wage applied to the details of the count and then, based on that caluculation, we are paid what amounts to a salary. But it's all based on the volume and accuracy of the count.
2. The Post Office needs to know how much they are gaining or losing in the process of delivery. Of course, a 10 billion dollar annual deficit makes it pretty clear that we are losing.
Now I'm getting to the nub. Every time we have a count, Amazon throttles back how much they send to our office for delivery. It's noticable to every carrier in the office. And we start to see Amazon trucks on our routes as well as those doordash type of entrepreneurial groups that deliver Amazon on commission. We bump into them all over our routes.
Today was my first day on my new Claypool route. Coincidentally, it is also the first day of a new count. Last November the regular carrier on this route quit. What happened that precipitated her quitting was that all of a sudden this Claypool route went from zero Amazon (it's far enough from Warsaw to be in the Kokomo and Ft Wayne hubs) to as much Amazon as every other Warsaw route. To put numbers to it: It went from fewer than 50 parcels of any size per day to over 250 parcels a day. Her days went from 6-7 hours a day (you might question the lightness, but it's why she chose this route) to 10-14 hour days. And because any previous count did not take this expansion of Amazon into Claypool, the carrier was simply not going to be paid for it. Two days into the Amazon deluge, she retired.
Well, the Amazon deluge never stopped. I carried the route up until Feb when I became regular and moved to another route. Every day it was still the same 120-250 parcels and a 10 hour day was light.
Remember I said today was the first day of the count? Today I had no Amazon. Zero. None. (Ran into a doordash type at a door in deep country too).
I can see how Amazon would benefit from keeping the cost of paying me for my route down as low as possible. And I can see how the Post Office could benefit as well. They keep my pay low AND they keep Amazon happy and thereby paying the post office our less-than-at-cost rate.
What I can't wrap my mind around is how such collusion could take place.
