A UPS driver is claiming he had a mental breakdown after witnessing a gang execution during his daily route. Even worse, he claims UPS ignored pleas to relocate him even after it became known the gang was seeking information about him. California resident Sergio Cervantes was in the middle of his route when he saw a gang execution that left one man dead, Courthouse News reported. In his lawsuit, Cervantes alleges he held the man as he died, making him a target of the gang members responsible for the shooting. The same gang members also approached Cervantes’ fellow drivers, asking where Cervantes could be found, according to Courthouse News. Cervantes said he was diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder and claims he asked the company for a different route. But, according to Cervantes’ lawsuit, the company was unresponsive and often ignored his requests. In an email to Courthouse News, UPS spokeswoman Susan Rosenburg said employee safety is “paramount” to the company.
Category Archives: UPS
Losing Your Job with Style
From Preload Supe to the national stage
Many of us banged heads with Heather Poe when she was preload supe on boxline 7 at the Commerce City building in Denver. Now she’s married to long time lesbian partner Mary Cheney. “Very happy to announce that as of this morning, Heather and I are legally married (at least in DC), 20 years to the day after our first date,” Mary Cheney posted on her Facebook page. The former vice president and his wife, Lynne, were “delighted,” according to a statement provided to The Daily Caller.
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Mary Cheney, daughter of former Vice President Dick Cheney, and longtime partner Heather Poe have married in Washington, D.C., the family confirmed on Friday.
Poe and Mary Cheney have two children, a son and daughter born to Cheney.
MSNBC
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Funny how the Republicans embrace gay marriage when it’s their family, but want to deny the right to everybody else. Can you say… hypocrites?
Tell Us How You Really Feel
This pretty much hits it right on the head….
Employee horror story from Complaints Board
I have been reading many of the complaints that are included in this site and would like to share and sympathize. I worked for UPS from 1985 until 2002 as a delivery driver. UPS changed dramatically after the death of its founder Jim Casey in 1987. From that day forward nothing mattered to management other than the almighty dollar. Customer service is a joke. Employees are treated like slaves. Working conditions are third world at best. UPS had a solid reputation during the late 80’s and early 90’s but there was a dramatic shift to the bottom line at all costs. Early on management was promoted from within but as all companies move toward a lower wage this trend stopped. This is by far the worst place I ever worked in my life. Supervisors who are in way over their heads is the norm. Safety is a afterthought. Most centers need to be audited by OSHA. But employees who speak up or take action are targeted for suspension and termination. Work weeks of 55+ hours for drivers is a regular occurrence. Let me explain in detail. As a driver you could start work at 8:30am and will not be off the street until 9:30 or 10:00pm. Fatigue is commonplace. During my time I nodded off routinely when I was driving. Safety at UPS is a smokescreen. Prozac is taken like candy by drivers, divorce is ramped, hypertension is common, production levels are unrealistic, management is unskilled and combative, and injury is considered weakness and lazy. I spent 17 years at this “hell hole” and was paid very well for my services. But I came to the realization that it was just not worth it. I quit and am happier for it. Most complaints that you may have are a direct result of a poorly managed company where stress is used as a tool for greater production, no matter what the cost to employee or consumer.
Don’t lose that 1.75 seconds per stop
Delivery Drivers to Pick Up Pace by Surrendering Keys
LOUISVILLE,Ky.—United Parcel Service Inc.,already designs its delivery routes to avoid left turns,so as not to
waste time waiting for a break in oncoming traffic. And the company requires drivers to walk at a “brisk pace,”which
it defines as 2.5 paces a second,to keep things moving fast
But at an investor conference here,executives said they had hit upon another cost-saving strategy:take away the drivers’keys. They said the company will save $70 million a year by going to a “keyless”system in which drivers will start their vehicle with a fob hooked to their belt.
Currently,UPS drivers are required to carry key rings on their ring finger to avoid wasting time searching for them.
During UPS’s driver-training school,instructors yell out,“raise your hands!”Candidates caught without their keys lose
points.
Still,wrangling with keys can eat up valuable seconds,UPS says. Once a driver stops,he or she has to take the keys
out of the ignition,and then turn around and use them to unlock the bulkhead door to get to the packages.
Soon,drivers will wear a digital-remote fob on their belts and will be able to turn the engine off with a button that will
unlock the bulkhead door at the same time.
That automatic door opening will save 1.75 seconds per stop,or 6.5 minutes per driver per day,while also
reducing motion and fatigue,said David Abney,UPS’s chief operating officer.
Mr. Abney acknowledged that the company is “obsessive.”Each night,when drivers return from deliveries,UPS industrial engineers study data from computers aboard each truck. The data show details such as how much drivers idle,how often they back up,whether they are wearing seatbelts,or even seem to be going out of their way for lunch. The information helps shape new procedures.
“We”re obsessive about efficiency,”Mr. Abney said.
There’s One on Every Route
What would happen if I were to go to the UPS Store or even to the UPS Terminal in Evansville and drop my packages just inside the door? Would they be properly taken care of, picked up, addressed, and delivered in a timely manner? I’m going to go out on a limb and assume they wouldn’t, nor would UPS employees be too pleased with me dumping boxes right inside their breeze way where people walk.
So, I have to ask, why is it ok for a UPS driver to assume he’s the center of the business universe and drop packages at the most convenient place for them? 99% of the UPS drivers I encounter are bent on interrupting my business to sign for a package, that may or may not even be within seeing distance. I’ve been interrupted on the phone, while talking with another customer, even bothered when on my way to the bathroom.
NOTICE – UPS Driver, you are not the most important person in my day to day dealings, wait your turn and do your job.
I am paying for a service, which includes picking up packages in a designated area in my business and delivering packages to my recipient. Delivery does not mean what’s easiest for the driver. Delivery should mean they are handed either to the individual receiving or dropped off in a designated area for receiving items. I will no longer sign, nor tolerate receiving packages that are out of my eye sight, nor will I walk through my warehouse searching for where they were dropped off. UPS drivers be warned, you will be wasting yours and my time if you fail to do your job properly.
EvansvilleBlog
How UPS Management Thinks
Unfortunately, they rolled it
UPS Driver Spots Brother’s Stolen Car
BAKERSFIELD, Calif. — A UPS driver was lucky enough to see his brother’s stolen car as he was on his route.
Sgt. Mary DeGeare of the Bakersfield Police Department said that at about 3:30 p.m. Thursday, a UPS driver saw his brother’s car that was reported stolen being driven in the area of Casa Loma Drive and South Union Avenue and called police.
The UPS driver followed the car until a Bakersfield police officer arrived and trailed the vehicle waiting for back up, DeGeare said.
DeGeare said that when the three people inside the car saw the officer, the driver accelerated and continued south on South Union Avenue, east on White Lane and then south on Gordon Street.
The driver failed to negotiate a turn and lost control of the car and it overturned in the front yard of a home at 4601 Gordon Street, DeGeare said.
The men attempted to run but officers located all three a short distance away, DeGeare said.
Samuel Michael Villa, 18; Robert Christopher Flores, 21, and a 17-year-old male were arrested.
The juvenile was taken to a local hospital because he ingested prescription drugs he did not want to get caught with, DeGeare said.
KERO23 Bakersfield
L&I officials have trouble getting UPS information
TheNewsTribune, Tacoma, WA The state Attorney General’s Office recently sued in Pierce County Superior Court, asking a judge to force UPS officials to turn over records inspectors think would help them determine what caused the wreck. The company has refused to release the records despite numerous requests and the issuance of an administrative subpoena, the lawsuit states. “The department properly issued and served a subpoena duces tecum upon UPS in order to support a lawfully authorized investigation of risks to the safety and health of the concerned workers,” Assistant Attorney General Robert Hatfield wrote in his pleadings asking a judge to force the company’s hand. UPS is not providing the information because the accident was investigated by local police and L&I lacks “appropriate jurisdiction to revisit the matter,” spokesman Dan McMackin said Friday. “UPS remains open to discussion with the Attorney General’s Office,” McMackin said. The crash occurred Dec. 14 after a UPS driver and his co-worker parked their delivery van on a steep hill in Federal Way. The driver later told L&I inspector Ann Benson that when he was ready to leave he buckled his seat belt, released the emergency brake and tried to start the van using its keyless ignition system. The van failed to start and the driver’s attempts to use the brakes were futile, state records show. “The package car gained speed until it struck a tree at the bottom of the hill, severely injuring the co-worker,” Benson wrote in an affidavit submitted as part of the recent legal action. On Dec. 22, L&I received a complaint from Teamsters Local 174 reporting “problems with the keyless start system used in UPS package cars,” Benson wrote. Some drivers reported the brakes did not work if their vans weren’t running, she said. Benson said she later talked to other local UPS drivers who expressed similar concerns. Union representative Matt Webby told The News Tribune last week that he has not fielded any complaints since the initial reports made to L&I. UPS last year installed keyless start systems in many of its vehicles as an efficiency measure. The system controls the ignition and unlocks a bulkhead door that gives drivers access to packages. UPS Chief Operating Officer David Abney told The Wall Street Journal in September 2011 that the automatic door-opening system would save 1.75 seconds per stop or about 6.5 minutes per driver per day. “We’re obsessive about efficiency,” Abney told the newspaper. Benson wrote in her affidavit that she asked officials at the UPS facility in Pacific for documentation related to “written procedures for use of the keyless start system; UPS’s training documentation on the use of the keyless start system; and any information related to what to do if the package car stalls on a hill and how to get the vehicle started.” Benson said she was told the company would not turn over anything without a subpoena. She delivered a subpoena to the company in March, but no records have been turned over, she said. At least three state officials tried to negotiate the release of the documents with UPS attorney Carla Gunnin, but she declined to turn over the materials, court records show. “On May 7, 2012, Ms. Gunnin emailed me to communicate that UPS believed (L&I) had no jurisdiction to investigate the issue of the keyless start system,” assistant attorney general Robert Hatfield wrote in an affidavit. The state then decided to go to court. “Based upon Ms. Benson’s investigation, the department has reason to believe that the keyless start system may have played a role in the workplace accident,” Hatfield wrote. “As the records requested by the department are essential for the department to fully conduct its safety and health inspection, the department now seeks judicial enforcement of its administrative subpoena.” A hearing before Judge Thomas Larkin is scheduled for September.
State Labor and Industries officials say shipping giant United Parcel Service Inc. is resisting efforts by state inspectors to investigate a crash that badly injured a local UPS worker last year.
But Did He Punch Out First ???
SAN DIEGO — A UPS delivery driver has been arrested in San Diego after a woman found him in her hallway watching her bathe after he had just dropped off a package at her house. Police say 43-year-old Walter Flowers was arrested for investigation of peeping, prowling and trespassing – all misdemeanors. U-T San Diego ( bit.ly/KQJnwQ) reported Flowers had dropped off a package at the woman’s house. Police say the victim, who is in her 20s, was in the bathtub for about 30 minutes when she saw Flowers watching her from the hallway. The woman chased him from the house and he sped away in his delivery truck. Flowers later surrendered to police.