Shift move cuts pay • Drivers at one of TNT
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Express UK's biggest distribution centres in the North-East are bracing themselves for a pay cut of up to £120 a month as the company starts to re-organise shift patterns at its 27 depots.
Eleven of 454 drivers at TNT's site in Houghton-leSpring, near Durham have lost premium-rate early morning shifts from which they could earn about £6 gross a day, says the Transport & General Workers Union.
Instead, morning drivers are being asked to start work later, which the TGWU is afraid will put unfair pressure on them to meet deadlines before 12:00hrs.
TNT says that the new shifts will affect around 200 of its 1,000 drivers, none of whose basic 39-hour week will be jeopardised.
The company will not comment on individual depot changes, but says the re-organisation is being introduced to suit its customers' increasing need for before-noon deliveries. It says that over the past 18 months there has been a 16% increase in demand for morning deliveries, which now account for more than 50% of its business.