Tag: UK

Will strikes signal last post for the Royal Mail?

Posted by | Oct 5, 2007 | |

The postal strike which will freeze all mail delivery until next Thursday is “potentially disastrous”, Welsh business leaders warned last night.

Members of the Communication Workers Union walked out on a 48-hour strike at noon yesterday in an escalation of a bitter dispute with Royal Mail over pay, jobs and pensions, saying another UK-wide two-day strike would follow from 3am on Monday.

Firms were warned there will be no deliveries until late next week and it is estimated the row will cost industry millions of pounds.

The Federation of Small Businesses Wales last night warned of the potentially serious damage to businesses while the Confederation of British Industry Wales said the strike would have “a far greater impact than previous ones”.

But both groups added that the advent of e-commerce meant the strikes would be less damaging than they would have been 20 years ago, and that the more likely effect would be to hasten the demise of Royal Mail as companies looked to bypass its services.

The first signs of this were evident last night, when Royal Mail lost a GBP 100,000 contract with Warranty Direct, which said it would stop using the postal organization to deliver 12,000 letters a month.

A rolling program of strikes will start on October 15 and will continue every week until the dispute is resolved, union leaders warned.

But this could be a case of the union “shooting itself in the foot” as businesses look for alternative ways of doing business, said the FSB and CBI.

David Rosser, director of CBI Wales, said the strike, though disruptive, was still “more annoying than disastrous”.

“Twenty years ago, the impact on business would have been much greater, but the use of e-mail and e-commerce means the effect is much less than it would have been otherwise,” he said.

“The Royal Mail has significant competition in terms of business mail from other businesses and other technologies and a prolonged period without Royal Mail services will encourage companies to look elsewhere.”

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Road tech's tachomaster system helps Ceva logistics

Posted by | Oct 5, 2007 | |

CEVA Logistics has been using Road Tech’s revolutionary Tachomaster system since the introduction of the new digital tachographs and the changes in legislation introduced in May 2006. CEVA first introduced Tachomaster in order to ensure compliance with new EU and WTD (Working Time Directive) legislation, but the system’s ability to provide instantly available data and high level management reports has also allowed the company to introduce significant operational efficiencies.

Tachomaster records and analyses tachograph data from digital and analogue sources and gives transport operators a simple, highly effective tool to help them run their business efficiently. The system provides a range of real-time, high resolution management information and reports together with highly secure data storage and safe back-up. Transport companies can use the system simply to compute the driving and rest times of their drivers to ensure legal compliance, or they can employ it as a powerful monitoring and resource planning tool to give complete transparency of operations over a number of sites and help to optimise vehicle usage and driver deployment.

With over 120 sites throughout the UK, over 2000 vehicles and over 3800 drivers, CEVA was looking for a solution that would handle both the new digital tachographs and also the legacy analogue recording system which would take some time to phase out. “What we wanted was a best of breed solution which would merge analogue and digital tachograph data management into one coherent, secure solution,” says Andy Jenkins, CEVA Logistics’ Manager Operations Training. “We looked at a number of systems before making a decision, but Tachomaster was by far the most user-friendly.”

The real time web-based approach used by Tachomaster means that information captured at driver debrief is made available instantly for digital tachos and within hours for analogue data. Tachomaster has developed a digitisation system for analogue charts which removes human error and improves the turnaround from weeks to hours. By integrating accurate mileage information with fuel drawings, drivers’ performance can be managed to maximise fuel efficiency.

Road Tech and CEVA worked together before the legal introduction of the new digitachs and CEVA was able to provide Road Tech with some of the early live data to test pre-implementation phases of the system.

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Statement – Industrial Action Update

Posted by | Oct 5, 2007 | |

Royal Mail said that official payroll figures show that the support for the Communication Workers Union strike amongst its members is weakening with 50 pct more people working than during previous national strike days.

Attendance at sites across the country varied hugely with up to 90 pct of our people working as normal in some offices and with around 35,000 people coming to work as usual during the first 24 hour period of action. This is around a third of the people due to be at work.

Normal service will be resumed from next Wednesday while 14.200 Post Offices are not affected by the strike action and are open as normal for business throughout.

Royal Mail is also pleased for the conclusion of a deal in principle with Unite/CMA, which represents 12,000 of our managers, over pay, modernization and pension reform.

Royal said that over the last few months Royal Mail has concluded agreements with managers in Royal Mail, Parcelforce, and the national network of subpostmasters – all within the 2.5 pct available for pay this year. All of these agreements have been reached without recourse to industrial action.

Royal Mail continues to talk to the CWU to try to agree a deal with them on pay, modernization and pensions that reflects the competitive challenges faced by the company.

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People in Retail Awards 2007 – The Winners

Posted by | Oct 5, 2007 | |

Over 600 retailers gathered on Wednesday night to celebrate the 2007 People in Retail Awards, held in association with LaSer UK.

After a glittering champagne reception, comedian Dominic Holland entertained guests with his wry take on the retail industry. Following a sumptuous meal and a lively awards ceremony the crowd danced the night away until the small hours.

Team Player of the Year – Heather McDonald- Lloydspharmacy
Environmentally Friendly Retailer of the Year – ASDA
Support Team of the Year – COMET
Store Manager of the Year North – Diane Brassington ELC
Store Manager of the Year South – Adrian Page – Homebase.
Year – Passion for Perfume – Dundee
Employee of the Year – Claire Barron – Vodafone
Online Customer service team of the year – Figleaves
Customer Initiative of the Year. – Lloydspharmacy
Training and Career Development award. – Homebase.
Frontline customer service team – Coast
Employer of The Year – Vodafone

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Apacs promotes electronic payments amid UK postal strike

Posted by | Oct 5, 2007 | |

Apacs, the UK payments association, is using the current postal strike to promote the wider use of electronic payments as firms suffer from delayed cheques.

Apacs is also encouraging consumers to make wider use of the direct debit scheme for bills.

Sandra Quinn, director of communications at Apacs, said, “The postal strike serves as an effective reminder of the benefit of direct debits. Currently, direct debits are used for 58% of all personal and household bills. They save time and effort and regardless of any external factors you can be confident your bills will be paid on time without any hassle.”

According to Apacs, the number of bill payments made by cheque has fallen by 32% since 2000.

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