eagerbeaver:
That’s a good post (as usual) Franglais. I know I am stating the obvious here, but the main reason for drivers wanting to know each others wages, is so that they know where they are in the scheme of things.
The real issue is this; How much compared to other occupations are truck drivers worth?
The technical difficulty/skill involved in driving an artic is minimal in my view. I know this because even I can do this with ease. However, the risk and exposure within the job and the potential consequences of driving errors are huge. So what kind of financial ’ reward ’ is an acceptable level?
Personally I believe that being paid less than many completely unskilled and ’ risk-free ’ occupations is simply ridiculous, and the more educated amongst our ranks (certainly on here at least), have discussed the reasons why the pay within the haulage sector is so low.
My view is that we need to change tactics within our discussions to anyone who will listen, we need to start focussing on the responsibility required within the role and also the consequences that follow when our job is not carried out correctly.
Reading that I’m reminded of a friend of mine who’s a chemical engineer up at BP. He gets paid a ridiculous wage for what is, in essence, a Homer Simpson job. He sits in front of a computer pressing a button every few minutes. His reply to any ribbing he got was “I don’t get paid for what I do, I get paid for what I CAN do”.
Transferring that to lorry driving, we’ve seen what happens when things go wrong. People die and people go to prison. Unfortunately, the wages on offer are attracting the wrong calibre of person. As wages drop, people of a higher calibre move on. And so the cycle continues. You’re quite right in what you say, driving a lorry is easy, driving it well is not. For a lorry to be well driven it needs the right person. Someone who isn’t paid for what they do, but paid for what they CAN do.
Agreed Beaver, and another good thought provoking from Franglais…edit and good points there from CC too
There might be a few out there do the job as a hobby, where money isn’t important, up to a point i do the job because i enjoy it and its all i wanted to do (no, not attend a steering wheel but actually drive a lorr, and fortunately i can still do so within reason), but it makes sense if you have a skill as such or take a pride in your work enough that you get good at it, that you try to find a happy medium where you do the job you want to but also find the best pay you can, we aint doing this for charity though that once fine word has been fouled by the greedy people now running so many charities.
Unless we have an idea what the extremities are on pay we wouldn’t have a clue whether we were being paid well or not, this leads to regional variances where drivers in some areas are being beggared whilst others are sitting quite pretty, thing is those lads in bad areas if they are away all week and for driving 50 miles on a monday morn and home again on a friday night can put another £200 in their pay packet, well if they learn what can be earned elsewhere it gives them food for thought.
Also no one has to stay where they were born unless its an idyll where we’d do anything to stay, we ourselves would like to live in the middle of nowhere but the realities of jobs/pay/costs means we all have to make compromises.
I have a simple formula for comparing jobs, divide the top line by the number of hours you actually work, factor in an allowance for shifts/nights/weekends/bank hols and what exactly the job entails, this will give you a mean average hourly rate…DO NOT include night out pay, this is not pay and unless you live like a bloody hermit self catering and locked inside the bloody lorry like a prisoner then you will spend all or more than you get in subsistence.
Juddian:
Agreed Beaver, and another good thought provoking from Franglais…edit and good points there from CC too
There might be a few out there do the job as a hobby, where money isn’t important, up to a point i do the job because i enjoy it and its all i wanted to do (no, not attend a steering wheel but actually drive a lorr, and fortunately i can still do so within reason), but it makes sense if you have a skill as such or take a pride in your work enough that you get good at it, that you try to find a happy medium where you do the job you want to but also find the best pay you can, we aint doing this for charity though that once fine word has been fouled by the greedy people now running so many charities.
Unless we have an idea what the extremities are on pay we wouldn’t have a clue whether we were being paid well or not, this leads to regional variances where drivers in some areas are being beggared whilst others are sitting quite pretty, thing is those lads in bad areas if they are away all week and for driving 50 miles on a monday morn and home again on a friday night can put another £200 in their pay packet, well if they learn what can be earned elsewhere it gives them food for thought.
Also no one has to stay where they were born unless its an idyll where we’d do anything to stay, we ourselves would like to live in the middle of nowhere but the realities of jobs/pay/costs means we all have to make compromises.
I have a simple formula for comparing jobs, divide the top line by the number of hours you actually work, factor in an allowance for shifts/nights/weekends/bank hols and what exactly the job entails, this will give you a mean average hourly rate…DO NOT include night out pay, this is not pay and unless you live like a bloody hermit self catering and locked inside the bloody lorry like a prisoner then you will spend all or more than you get in subsistence.
What happens with these (rare ) intelligent discussions though J, is that they invariably end up in humour or abuse simply because they very quickly get exhausted. Often it ends up with ’ Drivers are their own worst enemy ', and then we all give up and pick on rigid drivers.
We all know that there are too many poor drivers within our ranks, and I think Cavey has put it well in this respect. Crap money often attracts crap people, and pride is becoming a dirty elitist word sadly. So where does this lead us…? Education? Do we need to start patronising the dumb? Or is the dumbing down simply symptomatic with society as a whole? Thought provoking for sure, and no immediate answers will come on here, but we MUST start educating each other within the industry or the whole cycle will continue.
We have to stop driving aggressively, we have to stop littering, we have to stop driving under the influence and we HAVE to start acting more professionally. And to top all of this WE MUST stop working for companies who pay poor wages. I really think a demonstration needs to happen and we need to get some kind of drivers union.
Very difficult to achieve the above, but it CANNOT be impossible.
Thanks, EB. You’re raising some good points and I’m asking the same questions. I, we, can see the faults in the system and see that it could well get worse, and I’m afraid it really will get worse.
Recent history has treated others worse than us though hasn’t it? Classic case is the nurses. I think we all know they train for a long time to do a valuable job that many of us would find emotionally straining. They provide care 24/7 through the year. And for years they had little trouble recruiting, but in the past few years it seems less want to start. Why? Maybe because we as a society tend to measure worth by wages more now? I can see how making a fundamental difference to people’s lives is rewarding in itself. But how does it feel when your efforts at compassion are quantified by someone who has never stood in your shoes? Albion was saying about her main client’s management changing, those at the top have never walked on the shop floor. They can see the figures but don’t always see what they mean. In management of the NHS and private companies alike there is too much uninformed nterference in day to day running.
If there is too great a divide between the haves and have-nots there is a recipe for unrest. It can be a difference of reward- Juddian says his boss is well off, but rewards his drivers well. OK. But the likes of Phillip Green who take huge profit from a company while the workers loose their pension is a clear scandal. It may be legal but it’s wrong. How can they live with themselves? It’s because they are isolated. There is too great a divide. The pay difference between CEOs in this country and the workers is at a high point and the gap is increasing. Yes, extra qualifications, extra risk, and responsibilities should be rewarded, but not to the excessive levels we currently see.
And there is a very serious problem with some contracts given to senior management of some companies- too often we hear of managers sacked but escaping with a “golden parachute”.
Sorry, I’ve gone off on one again, and short of volunteering to be a be a benevolent world dictator I’ve no real answers.
Always remember for any intractable problem there is always simple cheap solution.
And it’s always wrong.
Edit. Typing at same time as posts fron EB Juddian and Cavey.
Here’s another line of thought- I don’t have the time at the moment to dig out the references but will try to later if anyone asks, grass needs cutting-
In experiments prople were asked to perform some tasks, if they believed they were helping out they would perform these tasks willingly. Of they were asked to do a little bit more they often would. If they were paid to do the same task and then asked to do extra for no more money? Well obviously most refused. By monetising Everything we devalue Everything.
I can see why it’s done, sure, but it is surely a case of a useful tool being applied too often?
On another tack there have been many sci fi novels about future society where everyone works for a day or two a week. Where we’re headed now is a society where a few people work full time (or more) while others are unemployed.
We really do need to recognise that capitalism as we currently have it is broken. It’s done us quite well for a century or two but it’s now in it’s end game. An increasing population with limited resources and increasing automation of jobs will not work after the next few decades. I’m not talking about tomorrow or the day after of course, but sooner than many think.
What we need is politically difficult choices made now, for the future good. But that will not happen because politics is always about the next election. Democracy is famously awful for the long term good, but it’s better than the alternatives.
I can’t see any way to get there from here- but what about the universal income schemes? Everyone has an income to live on reasonably well. Those who chose to work can for extra money. No one is starved into a poorly paid job. Those of us who actually like being active can be. My week driving a truck will give me extra to fund my hobbies the next week. Will it all be automated? It won’t pay to be. Sorry to swear but if I’m only paid a little bit extra to drive then I’ll be cheaper than a robot. Remember I’m driving through choice not to buy bread. If no one wants to be a coal miner that’ll be fully automated. If we wanna drive there will be a place for us.
Sorry again, way off track of current pay and conditions.
Each to their own as the saying goes…but thats not the point. We all need to earn or take home what we need to live on comfortably…i am retired but still work, so a minimum wage to me would be pocket money…but that doesnt mean i cant comment on what low wages are being offered, or that I would want to work for ■■■■ money…we all have standards as well. The problem with this industry is drivers say Im alright jack and dont worry about what a decent wage should be for everyone, and i have had many jobs in my lifetime because i wont take abuse from some jumped up little git in the office who knew nothing about transport in the first place, or because the wages were too low for what they expected me to do..hence the 15 hour day being a part of the norm, which is ok, if your getting well paid for it, then there are drivers who boast about what theyre taking home, but include their nights out..i dont think its fair to work max hours, minimum rests for peanuts, and truly believe that a fair wage should be £500 take home + nights out. I earn a good wage for what i do, will help out where i can, because i have a good boss, who pays me more than our foreign drivers, but doesnt push or encourage us to run bent, not that i would anyway, i am 100% legal all day every day. At the end of the day i have become chilled, i dont worry about the way others drive, if they want to do it, let them, so long as it doesnt put me in danger, i see drivers who opester the goods in about the time its taking to offload/load, thats not my concern, but others become a nuisance and instead of waiting till theyre called, cant wait to get to the next job, that maybe because of how theyre paid, a bonus perhaps, a time limit is another, pressure is an issue for drivers..from their office..pestering us, because weve been there too long…then get on the phone to them and not me, its not my fault, but seem to get the blame, seems theyre worried about upsetting the customer, but let the drivers have it instead…enough said.
When I got my first job as a TM, drivers were going on strike for a pound an hour. They got it, but inflation soon devalued it to less than they were earning before.
The company I worked for did a big exercise on wage differentials. There was a questionnaire which asked (among a lot of other stuff) us to compare jobs like nurses and librarians; assembly workers and lorry drivers etc. No prizes for who people thought should be paid the most, since the only time the assembly workers saw drivers, they were hanging around drinking tea.
As for the OP’s question - I entirely agree that the only thing that matters about the wage you are paid is whether it is enough to get you out of bed in the morning. There is no shortage of jobs in this country so we could all quit and get a job in a warehouse or a supermarket if that’s what we wanted to do.
It seems to be human nature to envy others. “He gets more/fewer nights out than me”. “She gets all the easy runs”. “Why does he get a new lorry”? and on and on. I am retired now with a fairly reasonable pension, but I enjoyed my time as a driver. While others were ■■■■■■■■ and moaning about real and imaginary differences; I got on with the job and made the best of it. Setting off in some beautiful part of our country at 6 am on a frosty morning and watching the sun come up over the Mendips, the Malverns, the Cairngorms, wherever, is hard to beat as a workplace.
You know you’re in a dead end job - when “coming off driving, and putting in for becoming a manager” is a DEMOTION.
If there are McD’s managers out there on 3 or 4 different rates of pay between £7ph and £8.50ph, then I guess there are going to be transport managers on real duff pay as well.
Double Digits for drivers, at least - is one step back towards being “Kings of the Road” again though, at least.
No, I’m not talking about two fingered actions either.
Just to echo other sentiments already posted here; I don’t give a ■■■■ how much anyone else earns, I do however care very much how little some people earn.
lizard:
Who gives a monkeys what others earn or what hours they work to earn that wage.
Such information can counteract the lies that bosses tell that they “can’t afford” to pay more. If it is obvious that some drivers are getting more, it helps to generate discontent amongst those at the bottom. Indeed, poor industrial relations in the worst firms, can often impose costs that help to eliminate market competition and develop market share for (and therefore employment in) better firms.
That’s why in the old days, unions often had the tacit policy of causing constant disruption and shutting down some of the worst firms with fatal industrial action, because in an economy with full employment, those workers would soon be absorbed by the remaining employers with the better pay and conditions, and the consolidated (i.e. monopolised) marketplace would allow the remaining firms to bargain hard with any customers who didn’t want to pay the necessary price to sustain decent pay and conditions.
The worst employers, meanwhile, would forfeit their capital permanently - and the credible threat of industrial action against the worst employers, also dissuaded lenders from providing new capital to new market entrants whose only intent was to undercut the established players.
Hence, workers sharing information amongst themselves is never a bad thing for workers. It helps promote solidarity, promote organisation, and promote theoretical knowledge, and cut through the lies peddled by bosses who understand the system all too well. Even just the open expression of discontent can promote collective action - which is why almost every repressive system tries to stifle communication.
My hourly rate is considered low but the full package works out fairly decent, course if I suddenly stopped doing nights out my wage would drop considerably and also my enjoyment of the job.
Yes I know bonuses, night out money muddy the waters a lot.
However my lot have just given us a 6% payrise so perhaps things are looking up, but it’s all relative really as I made my fortune as a fluffer.
Dipper_Dave:
My hourly rate is considered low but the full package works out fairly decent, course if I suddenly stopped doing nights out my wage would drop considerably and also my enjoyment of the job.
Yes I know bonuses, night out money muddy the waters a lot.
However my lot have just given us a 6% payrise so perhaps things are looking up, but it’s all relative really as I made my fortune as a fluffer.
Hourly rate is vanity, take home is sanity… etc
Exactly how it is for thousands of us drivers and why many stick with the job.
£9 an hour basic for me, breaks paid guaranteed 9hours a day. Ot after 45 hours.
If I did a basic week with no nights out I’d get about 350 in my wage packet - however stick on 10 or so hours OT and 3 nights out and I’m coming out with around 500, even more if a Saturday morning is chucked in.
To come out with 500 - 600 a week you’d have to earn roughly 33-38k a year in a different job, that’s Police / fireman level at a guess and even they work shifts.
I don’t think it’s as bad as some make out - for the skill level required. Yes we hold a very responsible position and we’ve seen all to well recently the devastation if one of us gets it wrong, but end of the day it’s a big box on wheels that we point in the right direction.
However it DOES irk me that 20 years ago I was earning similar to now, I think that’s what most get miffed about and obviously the influx of foreign drivers takes some of the blame. We used to be paid well and were much better thought of than today. Luckily with the decent trucks etc available now new drivers are attracted into the job - can’t think what else would persuade them to take the test.
I enjoy the job - and I’m sure even most of the moaners do. I’ve had chances to move away from it but I’ve come back because I wasn’t enjoying the new job as much as I enjoy this. I work for a decent company with good kit and a customer base that means it’s pretty steady work. A TM who also helps out if you want a favour is a help too.
eagerbeaver:
It matters when your local postman ■■■■■■ all over your wages for simply putting letters through a slot in the door
That same Postman is the one who stands up for himself and is prepared to go on strike to defend his pay, pension and terms and conditions.
We have recently been balloted for industrial action and I’m confident of a huge yes vote tomorrow.
I spent quite a few years on delivery, it’s hard work and takes it’s toll later in life. There’s no way I’d go back, what I do now is far easier.
How many of those on here who complain about low pay for truck drivers then complain those manual workers, who are traditionally unionised and more importantly stick together, who take industrial action to protect pay and conditions?
eagerbeaver:
It matters when your local postman ■■■■■■ all over your wages for simply putting letters through a slot in the door
That same Postman is the one who stands up for himself and is prepared to go on strike to defend his pay, pension and terms and conditions.
We have recently been balloted for industrial action and I’m confident of a huge yes vote tomorrow.
I spent quite a few years on delivery, it’s hard work and takes it’s toll later in life. There’s no way I’d go back, what I do now is far easier.
How many of those on here who complain about low pay for truck drivers then complain those manual workers, who are traditionally unionised and more importantly stick together, who take industrial action to protect pay and conditions?
Exactly, do you remember the name calling here when the Hoyer lads went on strike for better terms, wouldn’t mind but their shift pattern is bloody 'orrible, i wouldn’t do it for the money they were on.
£8 or £20 an hour it’s what you take home that counts. I think one of the most unfair things is tax credits. How can it be fair for 2 people to do exactly the same work but one takes home more because they are claiming tax credits for 4 kids and the other has no kids. Top that off with family allowance and one worker is miles in front of the other on take home money for no extra work. Is this fair ?
Odd days:
£8 or £20 an hour it’s what you take home that counts. I think one of the most unfair things is tax credits. How can it be fair for 2 people to do exactly the same work but one takes home more because they are claiming tax credits for 4 kids and the other has no kids. Top that off with family allowance and one worker is miles in front of the other on take home money for no extra work. Is this fair ?
Tax credits/benefits are another reason why so many jobs pay ■■■■ rates. Many employers know workers will get their money topped up by the government so they don’t need to cough up as much. Even the Tories have recognised that the country is subsidising work house employers.
TiredAndEmotional:
Tax credits/benefits are another reason why so many jobs pay [zb] rates. Many employers know workers will get their money topped up by the government so they don’t need to cough up as much. Even the Tories have recognised that the country is subsidising work house employers.
Nail hit squarely on head, but you are incorrect in saying that the country is subsidising these employers.
£8.50ph ain’t so bad, unless you are one of the suckers earning it & topping their £8.50ph up to £10.50ph.
The OP has a good point here apart from the fact that most here are actually interested in what truck we drive, my point is that some fools are more bothered about what smart lorry they are going to be offered rather than what wage they will get. The most important part of any job is how much you will be paid and not what vehicle you drive (provided it’s not a f***ing Ford Cargo) LOL
) intelligent discussions though J, is that they invariably end up in humour or abuse simply because they very quickly get exhausted. Often it ends up with ’ Drivers are their own worst enemy ', and then we all give up and pick on rigid drivers.
