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seasoned drivers.... clear something up please

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plastictaffy

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I know a guy who, for four sundays and three rest days only cleared 3200, over a basic of just over 2300. Not really worth the RDW in my opinion.
--- old post above --- --- new post below ---
Your working for the wrong TOC then! ;)

I like my trains to have 2 fully qualified, safety critical members of staff on board thank you.
Oh lets not go down the DOO v Crew working route again please! :lol:

A man after my own heart, 455driver. We could do with a few like you at my depot. There's plenty at my depot that would happily get rid of us guards for a few bob in the pay packet.
 
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455driver

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Tax and NI soak up half the money so I dont think its worth it!
Okay its still a lot of money in its own right but the time off is more important to me.

As somebody up thread said-
You can live to work or you can work to live!
 

Railengineer

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Your working for the wrong TOC then! ;)

I like my trains to have 2 fully qualified, safety critical members of staff on board thank you.
Oh lets not go down the DOO v Crew working route again please! :lol:


Enjoy it while it lasts! Not long before SWT start to thin out traincrew I hear.
 

455driver

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Enjoy it while it lasts! Not long before SWT start to thin out traincrew I hear.

What's that got to do with me?
I don't work for SWT anymore!

It will be a sad day when the guards on SWT suburban routes are gone, the trains will be wrecked and fare dodging will go through the roof (and probably lose more money than is saved) but the accountants rule and they can sniff a (short term) saving even if it costs more in the long run.
 

jon0844

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As proven elsewhere, if you don't see the fare dodgers or those who upgrade themselves to first class, it probably didn't happen. Thus the accountants don't have much to worry about, until revenues fall - and that can be probably be blamed on something else.
 

red2005

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I know a guy who, for four sundays and three rest days only cleared 3200, over a basic of just over 2300. Not really worth the RDW in my opinion.
--- old post above --- --- new post below ---


A man after my own heart, 455driver. We could do with a few like you at my depot. There's plenty at my depot that would happily get rid of us guards for a few bob in the pay packet.

I think a lot of those drivers would soon change their minds once they have to experience a couple of things a guard has to do!........breaking up fights......making your way through a crowded train to reset a pulled passcom.......dealing with idiots messing around wit the train doors.....couple of Saturday nights of this and many other things I think they'd realise the grass ain't always greener......if it is all you have ever done/known as DOO it's one thing but going to that from having worked with a guard and knowing everything was covered to doing it all yourself???.......good luck!!

no pay rise would make me vote for DOO......some things just ain't worth the money.
 

HarleyDavidson

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Enjoy it while it lasts! Not long before SWT start to thin out traincrew I hear.

That's interesting considering that they don't have enough to go around now and the lack of route & traction knowledge makes diversions if not difficult, nigh on impossible, when the service goes pear shaped.

Also with more drivers electing not to work their rest days and the trial of the new system of booking rest days failing abysmally in a week, it should be interesting to see how they cope. And I don't work rest days. :)
 

sarahj

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Plan is, learn to live within your basic, then when you do, do overtime, restdays you can treat it like a bonus and spend it as such. Getting into a position where your having to do restdays etc just to make ends meet becomes a spiral of tiredness, mistakes and then a return to the real world. Yes, as a driver you can take home £70 grand a year, or for us conductors 2500 a month take home. But you will have no life if you 'have' to do this.

455, sometimes as a guard/conductor/whatever, when your filling in a form, the only words you can put down are 'refer to driver'. I'm just happy that I dont often get these 'please explains' much.
 

TheVicLine

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None of the drivers I have spoken to want DOO and I certainly don't want the hassle of it.

However you've got guys in every depot who work non stop RD's, who knows what they will do when the offer of a few extra £1000 to drive DOO is waved under their noses.
 

sarahj

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I always think it will be the new drivers. A wad of cash will be offered to go DOO. And its the newbies you have to watch out. trying to get new drivers and conductors to join a union is getting harder, esp the younger ones.

Of course that wad of cash will come back to haunt them when someone does a passcom in coach 11 of a packed rush hour train.

FCC drivers agreeing to do, DOO with 12 cars on the BML is the start of a slippery slope for us. and soon, when we are all one big happy family, it will be, well they do it, so why not you.
 

red2005

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I always think it will be the new drivers. A wad of cash will be offered to go DOO. And its the newbies you have to watch out. trying to get new drivers and conductors to join a union is getting harder, esp the younger ones.

Of course that wad of cash will come back to haunt them when someone does a passcom in coach 11 of a packed rush hour train.

FCC drivers agreeing to do, DOO with 12 cars on the BML is the start of a slippery slope for us. and soon, when we are all one big happy family, it will be, well they do it, so why not you.

well I think if that is the case there lies the peril's of recruiting trainee drivers 'off the street' as they haven't been railwayised yet lol......i know for a fact that the driver's on my current course who are all internal wouldn't sell out for a few extra quid that's for sure and they certainly had no hesitation in joining the union!

me personally?.......I don't think you can put an era range on something like that as i have heard many an old hand be brutally honest in a mess room environment when i was a guard and say they'd get shot of guards tomorrow for a decent pay hike! and i have heard old hands say they wouldn't touch DOO with a barge pole

i think a lot of it depends on the individual driver and their motives for going to work to do the job really!.....i think most people that go to work for the love of the job wouldn't go down the DOO route but i wonder what the money motivated employees young or old would say if the DOO option was put to them?

just a thought?

Red
 
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Clip

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well I think if that is the case there lies the peril's of recruiting trainee drivers 'off the street' as they haven't been railwayised yet lol......i know for a fact that the driver's on my current course who are all internal wouldn't sell out for a few extra quid that's for sure and they certainly had no hesitation in joining the union!

me personally?.......I don't think you can but an era range on something like that as i have heard many an old hand be brutally honest in a mess room environment when i was a guard and say they'd get shot of guards tomorrow for a decent pay hike! and i have heard old hands say they wouldn't touch DOO with a barge pole

i think a lot of it depends on the individual driver and their motives for going to work to do the job really!.....i think most people that go to work for the love of the job wouldn't go down the DOO route but i wonder what the money motivated employees would say if the DOO option was put to them?

just a thought?

Red

For that you only have to look at the historical evidence before you ;)
 

carriageline

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It's true, some people (not just drivers and guards) will sell each other (and the T&Cs) down the river for a couple more quid p/hour. We wouldn't have DOO now if that wasn't the case!


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 

red2005

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It's true, some people (not just drivers and guards) will sell each other (and the T&Cs) down the river for a couple more quid p/hour. We wouldn't have DOO now if that wasn't the case!


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

oh of course!......I totally agree......if someone is money motivated to that level they'd sell their own mothers down the river for a few quid and they wouldn't let a thing like age or time served get in the way!

and that is my very point......it's certainly not just the younger drivers/guards/members of staff that are most likely to cave in to it!.....i could imagine there is many an old hand that has fancied a nice little pay day at a colleagues expense!

brutal but it happens
 

HarleyDavidson

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IMO its the younger one's who just see £££'s, as they don't have the knowledge or experience, they don't see the full & bigger picture or the hidden consequences of accepting what's been put before them.
 

Clip

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IMO its the younger one's who just see £££'s, as they don't have the knowledge or experience, they don't see the full & bigger picture or the hidden consequences of accepting what's been put before them.

You cannot tell me that these young people you speak of outweighed the 'Elders' in the mess room when the ballot was put to them about going DOO can you?
 

SPADTrap

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IMO its the younger one's who just see £££'s, as they don't have the knowledge or experience, they don't see the full & bigger picture or the hidden consequences of accepting what's been put before them.

Thanks for that :mad:
 

455driver

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You cannot tar everyone with the same brush, there are good and bad old hands just as there there are good and bad newbies, boil in the bags, microwave etc etc drivers.

All that really matters is that there are enough good ones across the boArd to keep the bad unsure at bay.
 
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HarleyDavidson

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You cannot tell me that these young people you speak of outweighed the 'Elders' in the mess room when the ballot was put to them about going DOO can you?

In an increasingly large number of depots, yes. Because the number of senior drivers retiring is increasing too. So they don't have many to ask or seek advice about what they are letting themselves in for.
 

muz379

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Plan is, learn to live within your basic, then when you do, do overtime, restdays you can treat it like a bonus and spend it as such. Getting into a position where your having to do restdays etc just to make ends meet becomes a spiral of tiredness, mistakes and then a return to the real world. Yes, as a driver you can take home £70 grand a year, or for us conductors 2500 a month take home. But you will have no life if you 'have' to do this.

455, sometimes as a guard/conductor/whatever, when your filling in a form, the only words you can put down are 'refer to driver'. I'm just happy that I dont often get these 'please explains' much.

Exactly , im a guard and what I did was the first 3 or 4 months did no overtime whatsoever and just lived off my basic so I got used to how much I could gurantee have coming in . And then after that started doing rest days and that . I know if I want it the money is there and I can add another £800 to my take home in a month if I put in all the sundays and a lot of rest days - Ive not done that much more yet ive had a couple of months with £300-£400 extra . When I get paid though I just transfer all of my overtime money and commission into my savings account and then use it to buy stuff as a treat . Like say I want a new car I know I could put in 6 months of overtime save the money and buy it. At the moment I am saving for a holiday next year because I didnt get one this year for personal reasons . You see loads of people though who haven't cut their cloth accordingly and have to do sundays just to make ends meet .

IMO its the younger one's who just see £££'s, as they don't have the knowledge or experience, they don't see the full & bigger picture or the hidden consequences of accepting what's been put before them.


It is mainly new ones , but I do know a few old hands who would do it as well because they have been driving years with no issue so have never had use for a guard .
 

TOCDriver

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Funny you mention that, sarahj. When I'm filling in 'late slips', I almost always write 'refer to guard'! lol Back on the subject of newbies and mistakes, most of the driving errors up here are down to experienced drivers of several years experience. I have always said complacency is the drivers worst enemy and the statistics bear me out.
 
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muz379

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Funny you mention that, sarahj. When I'm filling in 'late slips', I almost always write 'refer to guard'! lol Back on the subject of newbies and mistakes, most of the driving errors up here are down to experienced drivers of several years experience. I have always said complacency is the drivers worst enemy and the statistics bear me out.

where I work they usually manage pretty well to get the late slips to the right person ,general rule if its a delay thats happened at a station it will go to the guard . If it happens between stations it goes to the driver . There is the odd occasion like with a pass-com being pulled where the guard actually knows more about it than the driver because they have reset it and spoke to the person that pulled it .Or where a driver will know more about a station delay because it was them getting late to the train or some sort of fault getting the brakes off

As for what you have said about spads , from what I have seen at depot that was my general understanding as well , older drivers are overrepresented in the spad statistics
 
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Clip

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In an increasingly large number of depots, yes. Because the number of senior drivers retiring is increasing too. So they don't have many to ask or seek advice about what they are letting themselves in for.

I didnt ask about now and drivers retiring.
 

red2005

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IMO its the younger one's who just see £££'s, as they don't have the knowledge or experience, they don't see the full & bigger picture or the hidden consequences of accepting what's been put before them.

Na that's to much of a generalisation if you ask me..........but if you are going go down that route I'm pretty sure it's the militant older hands that do nothing but talk about the money left right and centre and won't lift a finger unless it's for 12!?

you also seem to forget that it's generally the older hands stomping their feet about money that has lead us to earning what we do ( not that I am complaining) so lets not make the mistake of thinking/believing that it is just younger drivers that see the pound signs in front of them eh!
 
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HarleyDavidson

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Read what I said.

Because they have "no point of reference" & don't know any better because they are new to the job, they're likely to vote for something that appears to be good, but in reality is 5th 17th. An example of this is the 4 day week deal on SW.

Absolute rubbish, sacrificed pay to get what? In the majority of depots no change in rostering at all, yet others have a true 4 day week and you get stupid turnarounds, where you finish after midnight, yet two days later you're starting at 0400.

They never read between the lines to see what other stupid ideas were involved either, now things are coming home to roost in the complaints about rostering and the hidden stings are being used. My attitude is tough live with it, you voted for it, get on with it, despite being told & advised not to go for it.
 

driver9000

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Every generation of railwayman is as guilty as the last when it comes to selling T&Cs but I feel this generalisation that younger Drivers are money chasers is unfair and a little offensive. I don't know the the ins and outs of life at SWT but I don't think it is entirely the fault of younger Drivers. Going further back who brought in flexible rostering? Who brought in single manning of trains? Who brought in DOO? Who brought in tiered pay scales so newly qualified Drivers are paid less than others? Who sold condition after condition during BR days and in the immediate post privatisation period trying to line your own pockets? It certainly wasn't the younger Drivers of today! It's easy to forget the mistakes of your own generation when something is happening that you don't like.

We were all the "younger Drivers" once and we're not all money chasers. Far from it!
 
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Clip

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Read what I said.

Because they have "no point of reference" & don't know any better because they are new to the job, they're likely to vote for something that appears to be good, but in reality is 5th 17th. An example of this is the 4 day week deal on SW.

Absolute rubbish, sacrificed pay to get what? In the majority of depots no change in rostering at all, yet others have a true 4 day week and you get stupid turnarounds, where you finish after midnight, yet two days later you're starting at 0400.

They never read between the lines to see what other stupid ideas were involved either, now things are coming home to roost in the complaints about rostering and the hidden stings are being used. My attitude is tough live with it, you voted for it, get on with it, despite being told & advised not to go for it.

So again I will ask you - did the younger drivers at this time that you mention outweigh the older drivers for this too happen? You still have really answered anything I put at you with regards to your statement have you.
 

HarleyDavidson

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My depot is now a young depot, so in our case yes. There's only around about 20 drivers who are pre-2000, 10 or so who in the 90's & 5 who're ex-BR. That's out of a depot of nearly 80, probably more than 80 as of December.
 
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