ROYAL MAIL PEAK INCENTIVE SCHEME (UNAGREED)
Further to LTB 260/23 circulated on 20th October, Branches and Representatives will be aware Royal Mail issued communications on Friday 27thOctober as to how and when their Peak Incentive scheme would work. This was followed by a Zoom call ‘Incentive scheme broadcast’ on Monday 30thOctober.
Of course the Union is not averse to meaningful opportunities for our members to earn additional money, we nonetheless have serious concerns about elements of the design and specifically the targets for the Peak Incentive scheme.
We fundamentally believe the primary focus must be to ensure the delivery all year round of the necessary Quality of Service and USO performance. These crucial areas have to be properly addressed for the long term and not just the short term. The company have not acted in good faith with regard to section 2.5 of the BRT&G Agreement, or indeed the related National Joint Statement on Improving Quality of Service and USO Compliance and have merely paid lip service to those commitments contained within them.
Accordingly, we have grave reservations as to whether the Peak Incentive payments will be achievable for many of our members, particularly where there has been Executive Action surrounding revisions that have evidently failed. The Peak Incentive scheme therefore remains unagreed and we will of course continue to challenge Royal Mail’s unacceptable Executive Action policy and their lack of proper engagement and adherence to the IR Framework.
We have formally written to Royal Mail seeking clarification as to how units which are severely under-resourced will be able to achieve targets that are understandably viewed as simply unobtainable as a consequence of the serious recruitment and retention situation. Furthermore, we have questioned whether sufficient vehicles are in place to ensure dedicated parcel routes (am & pm), collections and core routes will be undertaken in a way that supports the achievement of the Peak Incentive targets.
With regard to upstream areas, although the Scheme references National Targets any payments are determined by the performance of Delivery Units and there is little or no opportunity for members in Mail Centres, RDC’s, Air Hubs, Distribution or Network Drivers to directly influence the level of achievement for their unit or payments received.
The position of the Union is clear in respect of the following:
- Nobody should be forced to work beyond their duty as unpaid time to achieve the Peak Incentive payments.
- There should be no detrimental impact on normal overtime arrangements.
- In all units including Mail Centres and RDC’s, normal peak Scheduled Attendance and overtime arrangements will hold the field as a prioritisation ahead of external resource.
Branches and Representatives should ensure compliance with the above, which should be monitored and challenged where necessary through the Weekly Resourcing Meetings with any points of disagreement being highlighted and progressed through the Dispute Resolution Procedure with escalation via Area and Divisional Reps, this includes where there is refusal from management to hold these weekly meetings.
Whether the unagreed Peak Incentive scheme delivers any tangible financial benefit to the vast majority of our members is still far from clear. Where there are units that simply cannot achieve the targets set by Royal Mail through no fault of their own, Branches must provide a detailed report highlighting all of the issues causing this to happen and send to Fiona Kelk – fkelk@cwu.org; This important activity will assist us in fully evaluating the Peak Incentive scheme and will help to gather evidence of the workplace realities in challenging Royal Mail’s blanket targets.
Finally, it has been confirmed by Royal Mail that the monies associated with the Peak Incentive scheme are over and above the Christmas supplement and the underpin payment (former ColleagueShare) and these will continue to be paid in the normal way.
Yours sincerely
Andy Furey Davie Robertson
A/Deputy General Secretary Assistant Secretary
Mark Baulch Carl Maden
Assistant Secretary Assistant Secretary
CWU Eastern No5 Branch 
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