Manual Labor

[STLFeeder]

So the newbies (drivers) who start at 14 something an hour will make 28 an hour in 2 years? That is great and well worth sticking it out for 2 years to get that kind of pay. I think you drivers are worth every penny you have earned. Sure we all make up a great team but you won't see preloaders making deliveries (unless they are a combo worker perhaps). Drivers are the ones who interact with the community and they are the ones who are hauling heavy packages up the stairs to the 5th floor only to find out the customer is not home.

Manual labor workers out here are paid very well if you are legal to work in this country. Most of them are also in their own unions. We (my city) also have the manual day labor workers who work for next to nothing and I am sure they work extremely hard.

I have not met any drivers who thought they were better than anyone else. The guys I load for are down to earth and just want to make it to retirement. The drivers I see out in the community are too busy working to look down on anyone and seem very humble to me. It takes time and training to be a driver but with PAS you can take a person off the street and train them to load in a day (they may not be that great but most of the packages will get on the right truck).

Actually its 2 1/2 years now...

 

[cashmen]

Why are you guys even responding to this clown?
He obviously doesnt know anything about UPS and sounds like he just darn jealous or a postal worker gone Postal!
We drivers know how hard our jobs can be and thats all that matters!
As far as I am concerned, Tiredofitall can take his post and shove it up his A S S since thats where his brain is!

 

[toonertoo]

forgot to metionTired of it all, we never downgrade anothers job. Any one who works hard deserves to be well paid.

We have our uniforms paid for because ups wants us to all be uniform.

Our trucks are loaded for us because with a DOT there are only so many hours we can work.

Our routes are set up because it the most economical way someone set them up to be run.

Most of us, who complain about things complain to others who do the same job, because with the nature of our jobs we always work alone, and dont have much time to socialize with others. Mostly this site is UPSers, although all are welcome.



Do we work hard, yes we do. Are we stupid truck drivers, absolutely not.
And not everyone can do it.

Could I roof, lay brick, or pick up garbage, no, possibly, and absolutely not.

But this isnt a site for them to complain.

Are most of us uneducated idiots, No not since the big hiring frenzy of the 70s, when most of us were hired we had to be in college to get an interview.

So why ever you are mad, thats too bad. No one here has ever downgraded another position, although braveheart pretty much covered anything that you said.

We get paid well to do a job that is important and we are in the public eye each and every minute we are on the road. From our trucks that are not clean like they used to be, to being polite and going the extra mile for the customer, and then running the next few stops to make up for having to wait for an invalid to answer a door, to trying to deliver to a door that needs a sig with a pit bull guarding it, to using our own personal cell phone to try to contact the person so we can get it delivered. Driving in weather that puts our safe driving at risk, as well as our lives, to working in heat that would kill some people, to climbing in trucks built for Wilt Chamberlain 100+ times a day.

WE get paid well, I never heard anyone say we didnt. Are there things that could be better, of course. Are there things that could be worse, definetely.

But we have the right to voice our complaints and concerns, and you have the right to be jealous.

And you have the right not to come here if it makes you mad. Since you have told us off, I expect we wont hear from you again, but if you are true UPS you will stay around, and converse.

 

[helenofcalifornia]

Well said, Toonertoo!! Most of us waited to drive - I waited 8 years. We all knew it wasn't an easy job, but being a preloader all those years and getting up early isn't easy either. Yeah, we are well paid. Though I dare say that money goes a whole helluva lot further in the heartland rather than on either coast. EVERYONE should get a decent living wage and life should not be a constant struggle, but it is. My knees and shoulder are shot and I doubt that I will make it to retirement age working at UPS . But I still like my job and get a great sense of accomplishment out of it every day even though I am just another well-paid blue collar worker. I would rather be out in a truck talking to my customers than sitting at a desk pushing paper.

 

[reydluap]

Toonertoo,

 

[reydluap]

Toonertoo, well said

 

[ragu]

Say what you want about this guy but the "Dumpy looking oaf" comment made me laugh out loud because I see a few of these guys every day, and any time you can throw a Carl Lewis reference into your post I'm happy.
As far as being uneducated he's probably right, I wouldn't be doing this if I hadn't flunked out of college.

 

[helenofcalifornia]

Driving is not for everybody.

 

[trickpony1]

Helen-
try to get in feeders as soon as you can and you may be able to walk when you retire.
Not qualified? it doesn't matter....sign the feeder bid sheet anyway.

 

[Braveheart]

Ok you got me on that landfill one. And that is where I would like to take my P1000 sometimes.

 

[rngri4]

Great post, Braveheart! Not everyone can do this job, it is difficult, that is why we are paid well. Most of us are not dummies, we like what we do for the most part. A lot of us have degrees, I went to school myself for computer design back in the late 70's.

Not to be stupid, and I apologize, because I am not, I am asking a serious question here, but does any of that Late 70's computer design education even apply today?

 

[scratch]

Not to be stupid, and I apologize, because I am not, I am asking a serious question here, but does any of that Late 70's computer design education even apply today?

It doesn't apply today at all, I am in my late forties. There were no personal computers back then, they were all very large and slow monsters compared to what everyone is looking at right now.

My point I was trying to make is that a lot of people driving these brown trucks do have a degree. Once I was at a party with a group of friends and we were talking about our education and career paths. Only about a tenth of the people were actually working in the field they went to college for. As for me, learning those resistor codes and stone age programming was extremely boring, I was kind of pushed into that field before I had really decided what I would like. I was PT at UPS, pulled lots of double shifts,money was too good to leave for other jobs in my younger years.

 

[cashmen]

Well i got a bachelors degree in teaching and Ive been driving for 11 yrs cause I have 4 kids and the Insurance alone is the main reason I stick around at UPS, if the Insurance was crap, I would be out of there in a heartbeat!
We all can bitch about other people's job and how well they are paid and so on, but the fact is a job is a job and we all bitch about our jobs no matter what kind of job it is!

Life goes on

 

[browniehound]

i have a BA and choose to drive for a living. I have 2 words for you Tired, !!!!!

 

[moreluck]

"i have a BA and choose to drive for a living. I have 2 words for you Tired, !!!!!"

Brownie.....I love word games.
Let's see

Fill Up ?
Fight Ugly ?
Fold Under ?
Feel Unique ?
Forego Urges ?
Forgive Unreliability ?

 

[browniehound]

Its actually chinese for something. as in egg FU yung

 

[over9five]

Firearm Unloaded?
Franklin University?
Foolish Undertaking?
Far Underground?
Fat Undergraduate?

 

[cashmen]

There you go...Fat Undergraduate!
I always hate it when customers say the friend-word(fed-Ex)

 

[CTOTH]

Well said, Toonertoo!! Most of us waited to drive - I waited 8 years. We all knew it wasn't an easy job, but being a preloader all those years and getting up early isn't easy either. Yeah, we are well paid. Though I dare say that money goes a whole helluva lot further in the heartland rather than on either coast. EVERYONE should get a decent living wage and life should not be a constant struggle, but it is. My knees and shoulder are shot and I doubt that I will make it to retirement age working at UPS . But I still like my job and get a great sense of accomplishment out of it every day even though I am just another well-paid blue collar worker. I would rather be out in a truck talking to my customers than sitting at a desk pushing paper.

I agree Helen, I find myself feeling much better at the end of the sort each night than I ever do leaving the office at the day's end. As soon as I can, I too, will be in brown and behind the wheel.

Great posts, all of you. With the exception of the fool who started the thread.

 

[Aky-Al]

well said!