What the Five-day Week Means in E.s.d.
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EADERS of the previous article will recall that it related n. part of an interview with a haulier who wished to know
which would be the better vehicle to use over a regular route of 210 miles each way; a 6-tOnner or a 7-8-tonner.
I pointed out that the 6-tonner was better than the 8-tonner because of its advantage in speed, but that if he had traffic enough for it a 12-tonner would be the most economical of the three.
We had gone into all the figures together and I had satisfactorily proved my point to the extent of showing him that, under the conditions of a six-day week and 10-hour or 11-hour day, the cost per ton with a 6-tonner would be 28s. 9d., the cost with an 8-tonner 31s. 5d., and with a 12-tonner only 24s. 8d.
Calculations Upset by 44-hour Week
He had decided against the 12-tonner because it was probable that opportunities for full loads would not always arise, Then he upset the whole apple-cart by telling Erie that the firms from whom he was collecting and to whom he was delivering were open only five days a week and working 44 hours.
'That's a nice thing to say," I said, " after we've gone through all these calculations. Now we'll have to do the whole lot again."
"I'm sorry," he apologized, "but there it is. I'd completely forgotten that."' " What are the actual hours that these people are open for collections and deliveries? " I asked.
"From 7.30 a.m, to noon and from 1 p.m. to 5.30 p.m. on Mondays to Thursdays," he said, " and the same on Fridays, except that they finish at 4.30 p.m."
" We'll begin by calling the two termini 'home and • away,'" I said, "so as to avoid confusion. I will assume that the 6-tonner is available empty to load at ' home' at 7.30 a.m. on the Monday morning. He takes an hour to load and, as we have already agreed, needs eight hours' travelling time. By the time he reaches 'away' it is 5 o'clock, and he has done nine hours' work, Will it be any use starting to unload at 5 p.m. when they are closing at 5.30 p.m.?"
" Not a bit. Most of the men there will be putting their jackets on at 5,15 p.m., so if he gets there only at 5 o'clock we've had it' for that day."
Very well, then," I said, "presumably he'll park the lorry and finish at 5 p.m. and you will have to pay him subsistence for Monday night.
Tuesday morning, I take it, he will be on the job at 7,30 a.m. and will have unloaded and loaded up again ready to be off at 9.30 a.m. He takes eight hours to run, but, of course, doesn't arrive at ' home ' until 6 o'clock in the evening, having done 10 hours' work, and must then park the vehicle until the next morning.
Cost of a Week-end Away "On Wednesday he does the same as on Tuesday, but backwards. That is to say, he unloads and loads at 'home' and gets back to 'away' by 6 p.m. On Wednesday he stays at'away and you pay subsistence for that night. Thursday is the same, and he gets back to 'home' by 6 p.m., and on Friday he reverses the process and reaches ` away ' at 6 p.m. once more. He cannot do anything with the load until Monday morning. Now," I said, "he is stuck at away for the week-end, and that is going to cost you something."
"How do you mean, cost me something? It will be Friday, Saturday and Sunday nights' subsistence," "That and some more," I said.
"Why, what more can there be?"
"Let's look it up," I said, and I thereupon turned to R.II.22 and under para. 11(A) found what I wanted. "Here it is," I said, and read out to him:— " ' When a worker's period of rest occurs away from his home depot he shall be paid 9s. in respect of each period of rest not exceeding 15 hours' continuous duration. When any such period of rest exceeds 15 hours, the worker shall be deemed to be on duty and shall be entitled to be paid (in addition to the 9s.) at the time rate which would be payable if he were actually at work for the period he is resting in excess of 15 hours, bid not in excess of 24 hours or 23 hours, according to whethei he is a fiveor a six-day worker. If the period of rem exceeds 24 or 23 hours, as the case may be, these arrangements will continue to apply until the worker resumes actual duty.' • "The first thing I want to know is, are your men normally five-day or six-day workers?"
"These men, at any rate, are five-day workers," he said.
"In that case, we have to take the 24-hour period, which means that he will be assumed to work nine hours on Saturday, that is 15 hours from 24, then another nine hours on Sunday."
"And have to pay them subsistence on Saturday night and Sunday night, too? " he asked.
"It will," I replied. " Up to now, you might note," I said, "that the man has worked 49 hours up to Friday, plus nine on Saturday, that makes 58 from Monday to Saturday, and then the extra nine hours on Sunday, which, as you know. do not count in the guaraateed week.
"In addition, he has five nights' subsistence allowance due to him, Now," I said, " let's.get on to the second week's work, because here we are on Monday with the vehicle at away,' fully loaded, ready to start next week's work." Going into that, it was easy to demonstrate that for the five days Monday to Friday inclusive the procedure would be much the same as the previous week from Tuesday to Friday and the vehicle would end up at "home" on the Friday night fully loaded. .
"Now here' a point," I said. "On that first Monday the vehicle was empty, ready for loading. In this, the third Monday, the vehicle is loaded, and must be unloaded before it can start away on that third Monday. morning."
"Yes," he said, " I agree that, but what difference does it make? "
." Not a great deal," I said, "except that we want another hour on this Monday to give us time to unload, so that instead of only a nine-hour day on the Monday we shall continuously now have 10 hours on Monday. That means that we shall have really 50 hours for the travel from Monday morning to Friday night in the first week of the cycle, nine hours on Saturday, nine hours on Sunday and 50 hours from Monday to Friday of the next week. I must make that clear in order that we can get our schedule of wages and subsistence right." Having got that far, I thought the best thing to do was to keep on at this point of wages and subsistence, and therefore drew up for him a schedule of wages and subsistence as it is shown in the accompanying Table I. The reader will note that the average weekly cost of wages and subsistence is £9 9s. 9d.
For the rest of the costing I took the figures which we had already discussed, and which were set out in last week's article, as follow: First, the standing charges per week: Licence, 14s.; garage rent. 10s.; insurance, £1 10s.; interest, 16s.; overheads, £3 15s., and this new item of wages, £9 9s. 9d. Total, £16 14s. 9d.
The running costs, 50. per mile, made up of fuel oil, 1.13d.; lubricants, 0.18d.; tyres, 1.28d.; maintenance, 1.26d., and depreciation, I.65d.
"Now for the weekly mileage," I said. "You go from 'home' to away' and back twice, that is four times 210 miles, which is 840 miles, and you go from ' home ' to 'away' and stay, that is another 210 miles, making 1,050 miles a week. At 51c1. per mile that comes to £24 ls. 3d., so that your total cost per week is £40 16s.
"Now," I said, "what about tonnage? We agreed before that you got 6 tons from • home' to 'away' and an average A38 of 41 tons from ' away ' to home.' That is, 10f tons per round journey, and you make five round journeys in the cycle of a fortnight. That is 261 tons per week."
We divided the 26i into £40 16s. and obtained a cost of £1 I Is. Id. per ton, compared with £1 8s. 9d., the cost in pre-five-day-week times. The increase in cost is thus as much as 2s. 4d. per ton or 8 per cent.
"Now," I said, "let us deal with the 7-8-tonner. This is going to be awkward because you will not be able to complete a journey in a day, and I think the best thing we can do is to get together and work out times for a fortnight and see what it looks like." (See Table IL) There was not much disagreement about it. I was the only one who raised any objection. I wanted to know why there were three hours allowed for Tuesday from 10 a.m. to 12 noon and 1 p.m. to 1.30 p.m. for loading and unloading.
"Surely," I said, "that's only 21 hours?"
" he said, "but the driver will only count half an hour of that as his luncheon break; he'll be polishing lamps or cleaning his windscreen or something so that he can say he is in attendance on the vehicle for that half-hour."
• First Week Not Typical
The same thing, of course, is to be observed on Friday of the second week.
" You can take the second week," I said, "as being the typical week, and not the first one."
"Why do you say that?"
"Because you will note that on the Monday of the second week you have a fully loaded lorry.
"At any rate, we can take it that the week's work takes 60i hours-I think it will be reasonable to call it 61 hoursand that there are four nights' subsistence each week.
"You have a basic wage of £4 18s. a week for 44 hours and on top of that there is provision for insurance, that is health, unemployment, workmen's compensation, and so on, as well as holidays with pay, which approximates to 9s. a week. Then come he first eight hours of overtime at 2s. 9-r6d., which is £1 2s. 3d., and a further nine hours, to get to the 61 hours, at time and a half, which is 3s. 44c1., making £1 10s. id.
"The net wage bill, you see, is £7 19s, 4d., and to that we must add for subsistence four nights at 95., or £1 16s., so that the total is £9 15s. 4d."
I then referred to the cost figures which were given in the first article, namely, standing charges per week: Licences, £1 45.; rent, 10s.; insurance, £2: interest, £1 10s.; establishment charges, £5, and that, with wages at £9 15s. 4d., gives us a total of £9 19s. 41.
The running costs per mile were also worked out in the previous article, when we arrived at the following figures: Fuel, 1.55d.; lubricants, 0.18d.; tyres, 1.14d.; maintenance, 1.33d.; depreciation, 1.80d. Total, 6d. per mile.
"Now," I said, "you do two complete journeys out and home per week and it is 210 miles each way, so that is a total of 840 miles. Eight hundred and forty miles at 6d. is £21, so your total cost per week is £40 19s. 4d.
"Your outward load averages 7f tons, your return load 5f tons, so that the total tonnage per week is 26 tons and the cost is thus £1 us 8d. per ton."
"But that's only 3d, more than we had according to the other schedule," he said.
Effect of 30 m.p.h. Limit
"That's understandable,' I replied, "because actually you make the same journeys and in about the same time. This business of a 44-hour week for loading and unloading doesn't upset you in this case because the man makes up his lost time by travelling on the Saturday morning."
"What will it be like," he asked, "when we get permission to run these 7-8-tonners at 30 m.p.h.? "
"It will make a good deal of difference," I said. "You will be able to do three journeys per week with the 7-8-tonner instead of the two journeys. You will have a little more to add to wages, about a couple of hours for the extra loading and unloading time and, in fact, your standing charges will be £20 per week instead of £19 I9s. 4d. Your running costs for 1,050 miles at 6d. per mile will be £26 5s., giving you a total of £46 5s. per week, but for that, of course, you are carrying 39 tons instead of 26, so that your net cost will thus be £1 3s. 8d. per ton." S.T.R.