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'Off duty' problems in hours scheduling
Page 31
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• The widespread uncertainty and dissatisfaction caused by the lack of a definition of -on dutyand "off duty" in the new legislation governing driving hours from next March was made clear at the second of the three one-day seminars in London last week organized by CM and Business and Industrial Training Ltd, (CM November 28).
. Answering questions on his paper on drivers' hours and productivity, Mr. W. Fairbairn said that even the statutory half-hour rest period after 5 sours duty might possibly be construed as -on dutyby the courts, especially in a case where a driver had been briefed about his responsibility for a particular load. Was he, for example, off duty if he sat in a cafe drinking his tea but keeping an eye on his vehicle?
Mr. Fairbairn suggested that in most reasonable calculations the half-hour would be regarded as off duty, so the regular working day would be 11 hours plus the half-hour break, But there was no guidance except commonsense and past experience in deciding what might constitute "off duty" for the purpose of making full use of the permitted 121-hour spreadover.
He suuggested, however, that many drivers might be able to avoid compliance with hours limits or records; in a lot of short-distance delivery jobs involving a daily mileage of below, perhaps, 60, the man never drove more than four hours. And when driving no more than four hours a day for the whole week, one was exempt.
Many delegates thought the proposed new rules—especially on records—were unworkably complicated and in some ways ridiculous, Completion of the detailed record form was felt to be beyond the abilities of many drivers, and several pointed out that all the elaborate precautions would still not prevent the intending -over-worker" from taking an evening non-driving job, perhaps in a pub.
CM's editor, who took part in the question session, deplored the fact that the industry as a whole had not pressed harder for tachographs accompanied by a really simple record form. Now, if the tachograph was ever introduced, operators would face the cost of this on top of—and not instead of—an irrevocable system of complicated written records.
There was particular concern about the effects of the 60-hour weekly limit. Several delegates saw big problems arising with drivers running out of time towards the end of a week and having to be paid for doing nothing in order not to lose them. One delegate asked why no provision was made on the record form for a running cumulative total, so that driver and traffic office staff could see when working and driving time was running out.
Suggesting approaches to productivity, Mr. Fairbairn explained a consolidated wages scheme in brewery distribution in which there was a guaranteed 50-hour week for pay, but work was on job-and-finish lines. Men were actually doing in 47 -hours what had formerly taken 53. A trunk productivity scheme had
pushed average speeds up, and so made it possible to meet the 10-hour driving day quite easily; wage cost per mile had come down from 6.38d to 6.05d but it was not possible to isolate any particular increase in vehicle costs that might have arisen, because maintenance costs had risen for so many reasons.
Whatever other reasons there might be for having a costing system, said Mr. Fairbairn, one needed such a system in order to measure the results of productivity schemes. The unit wage cost was the vital figure, and estimation of the unit wage cost should always precede the implementation of a productivity scheme.
"Setting up an effective costing system" and "How to sell a freight transport service" were the subiects on the third day of the seminar.
In the first session Mr. Andrew Dunn, explained how a costing system should identify profitable and unprofitable activities so that profitable ones could be developed arid extended and unprofitable ones corrected or eliminated. It should give a measure of the efficiency of the operation and a basis for negotiating or fixing rates and charges," he said.
Mr. Dunn went on to outline a method of setting up and applying a costing system. Establishing an accounting code was one of the first essentials. This was to ensure that the treatment of costs was always consistent because, if comparisons were to be made, they must be on a common or standard basis.
After outlining all the items to be included in the accounting code Mr. Dunn explained the purpose of budgetary control. It was, he said, technique for stating future plans in monetary terms and providing a measurement to see how the plans had worked out in practice. He suggested that once a budget had been prepared there should be strict control over the actual results achieved. To enable trends and comparisons to be
established certain figures could be produced in the form of ratios—for example, profit to capital employed, profit to revenue, revenue per vehicle, revenue per mile and running cost per mile.
Profit, said the speaker, should be sufficient to provide for the replacement of assets in so far as depreciation was insufficient. Secondly, it should provide a reasonable contribution to expansion of the business. Thirdly, it should cover taxation and those items necessary, but not allowable, for tax purposes and, finally, it should provide a return on the shareholders' capital which was reasonable and adequate to attract further investment if this became necessary.
Mr. Dunn remarked that it was easy to apply last year's costs and add something for profit; it was even easier to accept the going rate for the traffic; but this was not satisfactory in the rapidly changing conditions in which we lived today.
The final speaker, Mr. Maurice Rounding, began by explaining that selling was only a part of the complete marketing operation and marketing could be best defined as the business of satisfying customers' needs at a profit.
Selling was necessary to convince customers that the service the operator had to offer was what they needed and was better than his competitors were offering. To be successful, the operator had to sell to his customer those points about his service that raised it above the level offered by his competitors.
Before the operator could prove to a prospective customer that his service met the needs better than anyone else's, he had to establish what those needs were. This was done by approach research. Having identified the prospective customer's needs the salesman should get the customer to agree that his needs were as stated, then demonstrate how the service could fulfil those needs.
Mr. Roviding went on to describe the characteristics and personality that should be looked for in a freight salesman and then how to train him and reward him, He emphasized, however, that it was not always necessary to employ a salesman; in fact, it was obviously far too expensive in many cases. The person who currently met and talked to the customer was the salesman and whether he be a clerk or the managing director, he would benefit from a study of the techniques of selling.