had a delivery today in paisley 20 pallets containing 400boxes sports kit.
got to the drop and find out the company has no means of getting the frieght off.ie no forkie not even a pump truck where i could move each pallet to back doors and hand them down that way.this is one of these companies that thinks the driver is there to do the handballing.god how i upset the bloke when i put him straight on a few home truths.i drive you tip.then the gaffer came along and said you got a problem driver,no problem here mate,got a cuppa, paper and feet up no problem.he said you’ll need to hand them down to the guys,i said if you think for one moment that i’m handballing 20pallets then your mistaken.he replied i’m going to call your boss,yeah go ahead mate he’s got my number,tell him to give me a call when to pull out thanks.he came back 5mins later just take the freight away,no problem bye.
now it got me thinking,i am like most drivers,i will help most people out the odd 1 or 2 pallets is fine 3 at a push,but 20 is taking the mick,this is one of the grey area’s in this job.no company will put a figure on what they require you to handball,basically it’s down to the driver’s,until one say’s sorry i ain’t doing that,what does your company expect and is there a limit on what they allow you to do.or is it up to you to make the decision. 
i got the backing of my boss would you
the job im on now only do jobs that are palletised if i get to a job and it requires handballing i will tailift it off but i wont strip the pallet, its company policy.
like one job the other week 2 cheps with tile adhesive on to a diy shop in nelson i arrive at shop and ask the owner where he wants the pallets dropped the cheeky [zb] said the driver normally strips the pallets and puts the stuff on the shelves needless to say the pallets are still in our warehouse.
Another job i went to the collection note said 1 pallet weighing 13 kgs when i got there it was a carton so i phoned the yard as instructed and the gaffer said tell em if its not on a pallet it does’nt get picked up so the company put it on a pallet and banded it up.
I’M NOT A SLAVE I’M A DRIVER
simon
On a similar,but slightly different note…
I arrived at one of our customers shops last week.I go to this shop about twice a week,and am virtually on the payroll,with me making the staff a cuppa.However,I arrived one day last week,and 1 of the 6 pallets I had for the shop had gone over.A classic case of a large pallet,behind a small pallet,result? large pallet falls over.
Of these 6 pallets,5 are on the top deck,and 1 on the bottom.I took the manageress up onto the top deck, (Not company policy.) and she surveyed the damage.I told her she could have the one pallet on the lower deck,but the other 5 she couldn’t due to the one that had fallen over,blocking the way of the other 4 alongside.(Following so far?)
She looked at me,and said she would have no stock if I took them back,but I said to move them was dangerous,and I wasn’t prepared to move it.
Back at the yard,I summoned our 2 managers into their office,and proceeded to read them the riot act,telling them I was paid to deliver stuff on pallets intact,and not handball them off the top deck of a trailer due to the incompetance of the pickers/loaders.To which they were forced to agree when I showed them the pictures I had taken with my digital camera that I had in my bag.
So far I haven’t heard a thing.A result maybe?
Ken.
I worked for Palletways for quite a while! I was the lucky one because we only had 2 Artics for delivery & most of that was for B & Q builder’s yards than such type! But I was always happy to help because I was on Job and knock! 
I always felt sorry for the rigid drivers who had up to 14 Pallets on and quite a few were to be hand balled! 
Saying that I have hand balled 14 Pallets before! All heavy stuff! But that’s why I am on the Sick!
For me, from now on all loads come off as there are put on! I will be quite happy to supervise the drop but I am not touching loads again!
Oh as a foot note.
I know quite a few drivers who have been under suspicion of helping themselves, mainly because they helped split/unload!
Businesses that cannot cope and unload a wagon do not deserve the delivery!
IMHO.
I don’t mind a bit of handballing, but it depends on the circumstances some places I’ve been to are small business and I don’t expect them to have the kit, but if they are willing to muck in then so am I. Did go to one place in Newcastle it was a medical research lab and they didn’t have any kit for handling trucks, but the lab girls came out to help, believe me it was better being in the back of the truck helping than sitting in the cab reading a paper. 
I do draw the line at big warehouses, they should have the kit and staff to do the job.
SimonRS2K:
the job im on now only do jobs that are palletised if i get to a job and it requires handballing i will tailift it off but i wont strip the pallet, its company policy.
like one job the other week 2 cheps with tile adhesive on to a diy shop in nelson i arrive at shop and ask the owner where he wants the pallets dropped the cheeky [zb] said the driver normally strips the pallets and puts the stuff on the shelves needless to say the pallets are still in our warehouse.
Another job i went to the collection note said 1 pallet weighing 13 kgs when i got there it was a carton so i phoned the yard as instructed and the gaffer said tell em if its not on a pallet it does’nt get picked up so the company put it on a pallet and banded it up.
I’M NOT A SLAVE I’M A DRIVER
simon
simon,you should have asked him if he had a price gun to save him another job 
gardun:
I spent most of last Friday delivering cages of mainy sweets and slabs of pop. Most of the drops seemed to expect me to at least help them unload the cages into their store rooms as well. Got pretty cheesed off with it after a few drops, so I made a point of putting the cages on the lift, lowering it and staying in the truck “organising” the empties and the next drop. Problem was, because I was agency, I didn’t know for sure what the regular driver did although most of them seemed to think it was expected for me to help. Since I had to take the empties away with me, I couldn’t drop them and go 
40 or so slabs of pop take some moving and the diet ones are no lighter
gardun,i talk to a few drivers who work for spar up here in scotland and they are doing much the same as you,in respect of the cage’s.wot they do is drop of the full cages for the shop and return in the afternoon to pick them up after the shops have emptied them,just a thought mate,and if they ain’t empty by the time they return they get picked up the following day,give it a go.
The best handball job I had was as a drayman.
Double manned, working for a week on the agency for the Federation Brewery out of West Brom / Wednesbury. ( I think - its been years ago )
17 drops with everything from barrells to crates, my superior (Mick ) and I drove all around the South Coast in a 17 ton M.A.N.
After sweating our watsits out taking the brew into the pub cellars,the worst thing happened at every drop.
The manager / ess of every drop would give us 2 bottles of beer !! 
"Don’t worry , it’s part of the job " said Mick.
After a week at the firm ( HIC 
!) and a few trips to the bottle bank the next morning, alas, it was no more.
That week of handball was surprisingly refreshing !! 
Cheers,
Niall.
p.s. K/K - glad to know you are not a ‘YES’ man !!
If I get to a delivery where they expect me to unload, I have a choice, I unload and get $50.00 extra, I pay a lumper service to unload my trailer, the cost of which is refundable. If I don’t want to unload or a lumper service is not available on site I place the problem in the hands of my company and they will usualy hire agency workers to ofload my trailer, the latter takes time because an ageny has to be found, then the workers have to travel to where i am.
In temps of over 100 degrees inside that trailer I will not unload myself for even $200.00 
Surely some of these businesses can afford at least a pallet truck - you can buy them in DIY tool shops now for next to nothing!
If the businesses can’t be bothered to buy one then I don’t see why the driver should have to break his back.
[/quote]
Nice one kitkat! It’s not only handballing, it’s splitting down pallets as well. When I worked for Blakes (Chilled Distribution), we had to split down everywhere - Safeway, Sainsburys, Tesco and so on. Because Blakes was a third-party consolidator it would often take 3-4 hours to break down 26 boards, the warehouse staff used to disappear when we arrived. I don’t do it anymore, I refuse point-blank. Some places threaten to reject the load, my reply being “do I look as though I give a sh__!”.
Anybody been in Safeway Warrington lately? They’ve banned drivers from entering the warehouse.
I was in there Sunday. Went to check and secure the rest of my load, after they’d tipped their stuff, before pulling off the bay. These monkeys are paid by the number of boards they unload so they won’t touch anything else. They’d taken a couple of stacks of boards off, and afterwards, dumped them halfway along the trailer, right in the centre. I asked the Supervisor if someone could possibly move them either against one of the sides, or up against the load - I got a string of abuse and threatening behaviour for my trouble.
They seem to have their own set of rules. If I was abusive to one of their members of staff I’d get banned. I’ve even been sacked in the past for abusive behaviour so I’m very careful when responding to any irate muppet. So why is it acceptable for them to do it to us?
Over the years I’ve been driving I’ve found that as you move up to bigger trucks, you unload it less .
I started on transit’s and pallets were a rarity, most of the goods were loose items just thrown in the back so “handballing” it was.
Much the same with 7.5 tonners although the pallet quantity started to increase but many places weren’t equipped with a fork-lift or a pallet truck so you still had to break the load down and handball.
17.5 tonners were luck of the draw. Sometimes you’d get a load which was all on pallets and you’d reverse on a bay or open the curtains and get it forked off but sometimes it was either in cages (Brake Bros for example, Spar shops etc) or worse still, on pallets but you had to break them down and handball the stuff in (M, S & T from Whitwood Ind Pk, just before Scottish Courage and Royal Mail on the left). I hated that job 
.
As you move on to artics, it’s rare you get a handball job (apart from containers, but that’s in a league of its own really) and mainly the stuff you shift is all palletised if it’s in a box trailer, rag-sider or fridge.
I remember once when I was on agency for UPS Haulfast I had to take a load somewhere for delivery. I opened the back doors, saw it full of mattresses so jumped back in the cab and onto the bunk. The geezers then came and said that I had to handball them to the back of the wagon for them as they weren’t insured (usual story). Not happy at this I belled the office and they confirmed this. Not being in a mood to cause a ruckus I said okay (reluctantly) and jumped in the trailer and started pulling them to the back. Unless you’ve had experience at shifting mattresses you may be tempted to think that they’re reasonably light in weight. Hell fire, they’re not . I was sweating like a good’un afterwards. Never again. I must have lost a stone in weight that day .
We used to have the same craic with the bananas for the markets on a night. Co-op at Peterboro used to regularly take 22 pallets off us and because the slack zebidees can’t get their bay fixed they all need pallet-trucking off. At just over 0.75 tonne a pallet that’s nearly touching the ceiling that’s a lot of work .
I’m actually banned from all LIDL RDC’s because I told them to “do one” when they informed me I unloaded my own wagon. About time everyone else did the same I say .
As a few people have said it depends, go into some places & Yes, others with attitude & laziness No.
I delivered, or tried to deliver, a very heavy pallet loaded with a piece of engineering kit to a construction site & was told to get it off, it weighed the best part of half a ton so I tied some rope around it, tied the other end to some plant & then said could you sign this please, they had a JCB there in 2 minutes.
I also use to drive for a slaughter house where everything was hand balled off, I had no problems with this its just part of the job.
The biggest zb take how ever was Frigoscandia at Kings Lynn when I was off hiring a trailer, having about 40 blue pallets in the back I asked if they wanted to keep them, they said a very big thank you & directed me over the yard, forkie arrives with a pump truck & said OK, yes fine mate I said if you think I am unloading them for free you’ve got a problem, he phoned his manager who said I had to unload it, I said fine they are worth £3 per pallet it will cost you £1 per pallet to unload them, now get your zbing self over here with the cash or lose them. Forkie was not a happy chap that day.
Just a note to the above
I have no problem with “Handballing” if I am informed at interview that that is part of the job.
Many many moons ago, I had a job delivering plasterboard to building sites throughout the South east, Mainly London. I was well aware that the driver was expected to help 
And on may occassions I have done 2-3 runs in a day into the city and lifted and slid 23 tonnes of plasterboard on each run.
Handball is ONLY part of the job if you were informed of it at interview and accepted it.
alan:
The biggest zb take how ever was Frigoscandia at Kings Lynn when I was off hiring a trailer, having about 40 blue pallets in the back I asked if they wanted to keep them, they said a very big thank you & directed me over the yard, forkie arrives with a pump truck & said OK, yes fine mate I said if you think I am unloading them for free you’ve got a problem, he phoned his manager who said I had to unload it, I said fine they are worth £3 per pallet it will cost you £1 per pallet to unload them, now get your zbing self over here with the cash or lose them. Forkie was not a happy chap that day.
Think you’ll find the Chep’s are worth 5 times that amount actually
I never handball… although over the years i have encountered rude warehousemen who tried and failed to insist that it is my job…i simply tell them that i deliver…you unload…it is always a tailboard delivery as far as i`m concerned…unless its a container…then i only open the doors…then read the paper till its empty…a friend of mine started with bookers…he started with a week training…out with another driver…he was not only expected to unload…but to take it upstairs at some delivery points…and put it into the refrigerators…anyway he had an easy week then told them to stick it at the end…
right idea…i suppose if it in your contract then you dont have much choice…but as i said i would never take a job that includes handball…although if asked nicely i would consider helping…but i have done that in the past only for the warehouse staff to disappear and leave me to it…whereby i climb down and go for a walk, which is fine when its a full load for the same address…
have a nice day
I’ve been asked to handball numerous times and told them to [zb] off. HOWEVER recently I did an agency job that involved the odd full load of polystyrene boxes. All of it handball. No weight so it was a doddle and I didn’t feel at all abused as was were a handfull of bodies coming to pick up the stacks of boxes from the back of the trailer and take them to where they needed to go. If I’d been asked to shift them further than the back of the trailer though they’d have been told to B&Q it.
