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by spectra72 3099 days ago
Interesting. I used to work in a UPS hub in Colorado as a unload manager. As I was in "management" I was explicitly not in the union. Actually, having been a manager, even though 20 years has passed I can still never rejoin the union at UPS.

One time in my area a yard driver had backed up to the unload bay with one trailer door open. Trucks were usually loaded so full that opening both doors to a trailer would allow the packages to start spilling out. So they'd carefully open a single door to the trailer and back it to the bay and then an unloader would remove a few rows of boxes, giving sufficient clearance to open both doors without spilling. After those few rows were removed, we'd call the yard drivers and they'd come back and and pull the trailer out a few feet, open the other door, and then back the trailer back to the unload bay. We'd then unload the entire trailer.

During one of these movements, a few packages fell out of the trailer onto the ground. The driver simply unhooked the trailer and left it about 15ft off of the unload door with the packages just sitting on the ground. They weren't supposed to pick up packages. That was an unloaders job. I, as the manager, was supposed to get one of my guys out there to move the packages, and then call the yard drivers to come back, re-hook to the trailer and back it in.

Well, this time, I simply went out there and threw the packages back in the trailer myself. All of my guys were deep into unloading other trailers and there is constant pressure to get those trailers emptied and moved, so pulling a guy out of one trailer to come outside and pick up a couple of packages no small disruption.

Not 5 minutes later there was a driver and a union steward yelling at me with a grievance in hand. I was taking work from union employees by picking up these packages and thus had to allow the union employee his grievance worth 2 hours of his pay.

I'm actually shocked that management is out there delivering packages.

2 comments

It's going to feel like a certain long German word when we replace those people with robots.
Thank you for sharing your experience. I have been with the company for a year now (prior to that I had number of years as dev) and to be honest, I am not too familiar with union side of UPS. But I had multiple conversations with higher managers & leads and they told me how they went out delivering packages. Lead developer who manages team I work in, been with company for 15 years, has driver delivery jacket hanging in his cubicle that he received when he was delivering packages few years ago.

Just recently I got this email: "Directors, A Peak Volunteer Request has come in for Maryland. The request is strictly for Driver Helpers. They are looking for any volunteers that are able to give at least one week.[...]"