Canada Post Strike

[Hockeyguy15]

Originally Posted by Oil Stain

It doesn't bother me all that much if Canada posters get some perks, but if we are talking about something not being rational, then being able to bank sick days is exhibit A.

Sure, not all people will fake illness to get a doctor's note, but a large portion will take what they think is entitled to them, and if they went to all the trouble of banking up loads of sick time, many are going to use it.

I've worked enough around unions to know how union culture is. If postal workers are wanting to be compensated for their lost banked sick days then they likely intended to use them. If not, then why would they care?
They would just take their sick days when they are sick and bring in a doctor's note. The average person isn't sick anywhere close to 18 workdays a year anyhow.

If they intend to use the days to get time off then why wouldn't they use them when they were able to use them? Why would someone bank 200 sick days over years of work and all of the sudden decide to use them?

I believe when they retire they get paid out for any of the days they didn't use. Almost like a bonus, like some of us get every year. They never get a bonus at Christmas time or year end so maybe it was a trade off?

Your point makes no sense to me. I don't see someone saving up all these sick days over years and years then decides to fake doctors notes to take them.

[WilsonFourTwo]

Originally Posted by darklord700

The idea of banking sick days is sick. Sick days are to be use when you are sick and not as vacation days.

I missed a day last week (first time in a loooooong while), and am being pressured to "Make up the time".

Frankly, the idea of banking vacation time is (imo) ridiculous.

[darklord700]

Originally Posted by Hockeyguy15

At what point did I say use them as vacation days?

You never did. It's no denying that no one on average needs 100 or 200 sick days ever in their life. If you have an major surgery and need to take 3 months off, I can agree with that. But most government workers are just using sick days as vacation days. If they don't feel like working, just use one of the sick days without the need to show any doctor's note.

Nobody in the private sector can bank sick days, sometimes not even overtime. Why should civil servants who get pay by my salary in personal income taxes get this kind of benefit?

And should a normal healthy person get sick 1.5 days a month? Most of the people I work with, myself included, many call in sick 4 days a year and that's stretching it a bit. Some seems to never call sick in the few years I work with them.

[Zevo]

Pretty much every government union job allows you to bank sick time. I work at Victoria General Hospital and belong to HEU. We can bank 6 months worth of sick days, which when I started sounded rediculous. Since I started there 4 yrs ago, I know one guy that was off for 2 1/2 months with prostate cancer surgery, 2 women who tore muscles in their shoulder/arm, one is still off work, and one woman who broke her leg. Banked sick time really came in handy for them. There are people who abuse it but then that can be said about just about anything in life.

I'm from Calgary originally and have always hated unions. I have a better appreciation for them now that I belong to one, but they still can drive me crazy. The strugglers that get paid the same as me RGMFG.

[Bring_Back_Shantz]

Originally Posted by darklord700

You never did. It's no denying that no one on average needs 100 or 200 sick days ever in their life. If you have an major surgery and need to take 3 months off, I can agree with that. But most government workers are just using sick days as vacation days. If they don't feel like working, just use one of the sick days without the need to show any doctor's note.

Nobody in the private sector can bank sick days, sometimes not even overtime. Why should civil servants who get pay by my salary in personal income taxes get this kind of benefit?

And should a normal healthy person get sick 1.5 days a month? Most of the people I work with, myself included, many call in sick 4 days a year and that's stretching it a bit. Some seems to never call sick in the few years I work with them.

This has nothing to do with the topic at hand, but I HATE that argument, it's absolutely ######ed.
We all pay each other's salaries whether we're in the private sector or public.

[darklord700]

Originally Posted by Bring_Back_Shantz

This has nothing to do with the topic at hand, but I HATE that argument, it's absolutely ######ed.
We all pay each other's salaries whether we're in the private sector or public.

Except in the private sector we pay each other's salary in terms of the value we bring to the table. But in public sector, since there's no competition, so I would have no choice but to pay for your, say, banked sick time.

If I don't like, for example, the Bay allowing their employee banking sick time and jacking up prices, I can go to Sears.

I have an in law working for the government who doesn't like to work right after Xmas. So every year, she uses banked sick time and gets almost all January off while getting pay 100%.

How does that make me feel when I have to fight off post holiday depression and the cold to go to work and pay her salary every January?

[bizaro86]

Originally Posted by burnin_vernon

As for the regular carriers with their own routes, the only reason they are done early is because they do not deliver their routes according to the corporations case plan.

My carrier finishes earlier because he consistently delivers mail to my house every second day.

[Hockeyguy15]

Originally Posted by bizaro86

My carrier finishes earlier because he consistently delivers mail to my house every second day.

Doubtful. Pretty easy to get fired when you don't deliver the mail.

[Ashartus]

Originally Posted by Hockeyguy15

Doubtful. Pretty easy to get fired when you don't deliver the mail.

It's quite common for me and my neighbours not to get mail on Fridays, particularly if it's a really nice day out (if it was just me it could be coincidence, but no one else gets any either). We also often get delivery notices claiming that our carrier tried to deliver a package a couple of days earlier, but someone was home all day and no one had really come. But our community has centralized mailboxes handled by a contract worker, not a Canada Post employee.

[burnin_vernon]

Originally Posted by Oil Stain

So between the ages of 50 and retirement at 55 with likely 6-7 weeks of vacation, plus weekends and holidays off, plus 200+ banked sick days, the average lifer postal worker only needs to work about 2.8 days a week to receive full pay, and all his days off need to be filled by other workers, presumably temp or on OT effectively making them cost the system double.

Doesn't sound like a bad deal to me. What's the top pay rate?

CP doesn't make it easy to use the sick days. It's not like we can just use them whenever we want.

There is currently no top rate. Everybody gets the same pay.

I've seen about a dozen letter carriers struggle from age 50-60+ and I'm not so sure I envy their retirement when they have so many injuries that they can't enjoy it. The final 5 years or so for a lot of retirees is a real struggle.

[burnin_vernon]

Originally Posted by bizaro86

My carrier finishes earlier because he consistently delivers mail to my house every second day.

Tons of people complain (not saying you're one of them) about not getting mail. When I ask them, "what are you expecting to come?" they go quiet. It's like they think they should receive something every day.

[Hockeyguy15]

Originally Posted by Ashartus

It's quite common for me and my neighbours not to get mail on Fridays, particularly if it's a really nice day out (if it was just me it could be coincidence, but no one else gets any either). We also often get delivery notices claiming that our carrier tried to deliver a package a couple of days earlier, but someone was home all day and no one had really come. But our community has centralized mailboxes handled by a contract worker, not a Canada Post employee.

I don't know what to tell you. It would be pretty easy to see if a mail carried did not deliver their walk, first they sort the mail then they send it out on a truck to do the drop offs at the boxes so the carrier can pick it up.

If the carrier didn't sort the mail or send the mail to the truck it would be noticed by the depot manager.

No delivering the mail doesn't fly...The only way around this would be if the carrier sorted the mail, send it off on the truck and then did not deliver it but the chances of that are slim. At that point it's got nothing to do with letter carriers having a slack job and finishing early, that is just someone not doing their job.

[burnin_vernon]

Originally Posted by Ashartus

We also often get delivery notices claiming that our carrier tried to deliver a package a couple of days earlier, but someone was home all day and no one had really come. But our community has centralized mailboxes handled by a contract worker, not a Canada Post employee.

The legitimate reasons for delivering a notice card are
- Signature was required, customer not home
- No room left in CMB parcel compartment
- Parcel too large for compartment
- Actual home is too far away from CMB
- Sender has requested item to be picked up only

I've seen carriers card the parcel at the office so they don't have to carry around a box all day, thinking/knowing the customer isn't home but that is risky stuff and would get them in trouble.

[darklord700]

Originally Posted by burnin_vernon

I've seen about a dozen letter carriers struggle from age 50-60+ and I'm not so sure I envy their retirement when they have so many injuries that they can't enjoy it. The final 5 years or so for a lot of retirees is a real struggle.

Don't the mail carriers move up the ladder leaving the heavy lifting to the younger carriers when they get older?

[Hockeyguy15]

Originally Posted by darklord700

Don't the mail carriers move up the ladder leaving the heavy lifting to the younger carriers when they get older?

No...The perk of being a senior carrier is you get to pick your walk first and first dibs at holidays

[CaptainCrunch]

Well lets hope its a good long painful strike. Canada Post really stopped being relevant years ago, and its time for it to be cut down and bought to reality.

Except for junk mail I get maybe 4 things a month that I've recently converted to electronic delivery.

Its pretty much an obsolete service and a waste of effort to keep it going in its current form.

[CaptainCrunch]

nobody in the private sector gets to bank sick days, and I think its a ridiculous practice, there are better and more effective ways to handle long term disabilities.

I had an uncle that worked for the railways back in the day when they were allowed to bank sick days, it was always amazing that every second year he'd present a doctors note telling him that he needed a month off because of some non surgical required injury.

[Hockeyguy15]

Originally Posted by CaptainCrunch

nobody in the private sector gets to bank sick days, and I think its a ridiculous practice, there are better and more effective ways to handle long term disabilities.

I had an uncle that worked for the railways back in the day when they were allowed to bank sick days, it was always amazing that every second year he'd present a doctors note telling him that he needed a month off because of some non surgical required injury.

No offense but not every person is like your uncle.

Also everyone says that CP isn't relevant anymore, if that is the case then why does CP still make a handsome profit every year?

[burnin_vernon]

Originally Posted by fotze

If these sick days are hard to use, what is the value of them? If it is in case of a major illness, then I can understand. CP should grandfather them for major illnesses. You get cancer and you have 90 days, I have no problem getting those. I wonder if there isn't an epidemic of minor illness at retirement time. Undiagnoseable generalized pain?

They are banked precisely for a major illness or injury by most people. More people save them as an insurance policy as opposed to the common belief that they are used at will.

[CaptainCrunch]

Originally Posted by Hockeyguy15

No offense but not every person is like your uncle.

Also everyone says that CP isn't relevant anymore, if that is the case then why does CP still make a handsome profit every year?

Because they flood everyone's boxes with several tons of junk email per year that they get paid handsomely for.