In House Techs to TUPE in Sept?

[iSteve]

Hi folks

Sorry for taking so long to reply on this thread, I have been emailing/speaking to a few CWU people and wanted to hear back from them before posting a follow-up.

Originally Posted by Womble

CWU Meeting, to be held
St Elpheges Center
118 Stafford Rd Wallington.

If you live near, you owe it to your self to come

"Fight the Power"

Nice one Womble

Make sure the word gets around and amongst your co-workers!

Also do you have anyone 'official' from the CWU to attend the meeting?

Senior organisers for the CWU are always happy to meet with people who are interested in signing up new members in the workplace. This can lead to full union recognition rights if enough join.

I have just gotten off from a long phonecall with Doug Rafferty (drafferty@cwu.org). He is a CWU Organiser, responsible for NTL. He has asked me to let you all know that he is more than happy to organise a meeting with anyone (NTL-based) who wants one. He's based in Scotland but wherever in the UK you are, if you are genuinely interested in recruiting members in your workplace and build up a union presence there, he'll be there! (Thanks, Doug, that's some mileage!!)

If anyone reading would like a meeting with Doug or his fellow counterpart for Telewest, to discuss how to establish a union at your place of work, discussing organising strategies, and 'get informed' on unions or employment law, please email drafferty@cwu.org or call his mobile on 0771 450 4426. Alternatively you can PM me your details and I be happy to pass your details along to him.

Unfortunately without union recognition, at a big company like NTL, the workers views counts for about as much as an online petition. You might get some warm words of comfort, but if you want respect and a real say, a union's the only way to go!

Edit: Also, many thanks to zorroboy, great first post!! Lots of useful info there. TUPE is a horrendously complicated subject. The main thing seems to be that just because your company tells you what your rights are, doesn't mean they are correct. Oftentimes companies get it wrong themselves. This is one of those things that union membership can be extremely useful for as the CWU are able to seek legal advise, so if you feel wronged, you can consult them, and if your rights have been violated, they can either put things right, or help you take the company to an employment tribunal--and pay the associated costs on your behalf.

[Gizmouk1]

Originally Posted by unlimited

Switch Engineers are now on 90 days, dont have the figures of how many are going. There will less to keep the telephone switches running after this

There are currently 97 Switch engineers within ntl:Telewest. There are 75 Switch engineer jobs up for grabs - that figure includes seniors / AOMs (or whatever they're called now ! )

[hairy_mick]

keeping this thead alive does anyone have any thing to report about the meeting that took place in Birmingham 28-6-06 regards tupe of inhouse.

Originally Posted by hairy_mick

keeping this thead alive does anyone have any thing to report about the meeting that took place in Birmingham 28-6-06 regards tupe of inhouse.

I heard a rumour today that the Install tech's in the North West have been told they are now working for kellys. Will make some calls and check.

[pooky]

from what i have heard the install techs in the north east are going to map i hope this isnt true as ive heard kellys are much better to work for, are kellys behind bt openreach?

[Scarlett]

Originally Posted by pooky

from what i have heard the install techs in the north east are going to map i hope this isnt true as ive heard kellys are much better to work for, are kellys behind bt openreach?

as far as I am aware, BT openreach currently employ their own techs...

Originally Posted by pooky

from what i have heard the install techs in the north east are going to map i hope this isnt true as ive heard kellys are much better to work for, are kellys behind bt openreach?

Depends which part of Kellys you work for. I work for Kellys Business and at the moment i am fitting routers in the LLU dslams for Tiscalie and Opal on behalf of NTL .

I enjoy my job and i have no problems with Kellys. I cannot speak for other departments.

[pol747]

at the meeting in birmingham the midlands techs were told that they were going to avonline as of 1st september, i cant put into words of any decency how i feel about this, many telewest techs have come from contractors and the idea of going back is sickening, apparently management at this meeting were suprised at the angry reaction from the reps of managers and install techs as they thought we would welcome the move no word yet on how long tupe will last for maybe only 3 months nice xmas present eh!

[SLM]

Originally Posted by pol747

at the meeting in birmingham the midlands techs were told that they were going to avonline as of 1st september, i cant put into words of any decency how i feel about this, many telewest techs have come from contractors and the idea of going back is sickening, apparently management at this meeting were suprised at the angry reaction from the reps of managers and install techs as they thought we would welcome the move no word yet on how long tupe will last for maybe only 3 months nice xmas present eh!

Well this could be true as ntl management work on the lines of if its not on paper its not true eg "they think workers are really happy" then when they get lynched at the first meeting they have the balls of turning up to they are shocked..........bet that's the last one they go to as well.

[surfer100]

I was told that a senior manager said that if u know how to save me 6 million pound then they will consider not tupeing. Heres a wild and crazy idea (ntl has year on year reduced field in house numbers, but the managers seem to remain in place). Reduce the number of managers and charge an installation fee. the money saved from the managers high wages and the money from installation fees should just about cover it, or does that sound too much like common sense for them.

[hairy_mick]

I know how to save money get rid of that crock of **it harmony its been a disaster.

[pol747]

yes i believe this figure was mentioned but as any sensible person knows the last people to lose their jobs are managers and if they do the chances are they get a big fat cheque to walk away with and poor old hard working techs just get **it on. and yes why are we doing free installs when it costs so much just to get a customer hooked!

[SLM]

Originally Posted by pol747

yes i believe this figure was mentioned but as any sensible person knows the last people to lose their jobs are managers and if they do the chances are they get a big fat cheque to walk away with and poor old hard working techs just get **it on. and yes why are we doing free installs when it costs so much just to get a customer hooked!

There are always managers for managers same in most companies, funny thing is the company could well survive with a kull on managers but not without the people on the ground, the guys will get pushed once to often and the managers will be canoeing in the brown stuff without a paddle

[Escapee]

Originally Posted by SLM

There are always managers for managers same in most companies, funny thing is the company could well survive with a kull on managers but not without the people on the ground, the guys will get pushed once to often and the managers will be canoeing in the brown stuff without a paddle

I remember long ago after they had the first big cull they called planning for growth the number of managers increased dramatically in the region I used to work in.

The old department I worked in, had something like a 400% increase in managers. They were of course making workers redundant at the same time.
In fact just before the planning for growth fiasco, there was a big restructure which produced the need for a large increase in higher level engineering positions. These requirements were overtaken by events and in many regions these posts were never filled, they weren't filled in my old region because there would be no work for them. In some regions the empire building managers filled the posts, because the more people you have under you, the safer you look.

They also spent lots of money recruiting non-essential non-technical people in the NMC and BNMC, as well as recruiting non-technical people responsble for change management. The whole situation was a joke, a department with people who knew jack S**t about the network who would give an engineer permission or not, to carry out esential work.

I guess its all the things I dont like about big cumbersome companies.

[Florence]

Originally Posted by surfer100

I was told that a senior manager said that if u know how to save me 6 million pound then they will consider not tupeing. Heres a wild and crazy idea (ntl has year on year reduced field in house numbers, but the managers seem to remain in place). Reduce the number of managers and charge an installation fee. the money saved from the managers high wages and the money from installation fees should just about cover it, or does that sound too much like common sense for them.

Have to agree mind NTL needs to work on its image a lot they are well known for the lack of decent support so many wouold avoid if being charged an instalation fee. This fee would have to be in line with BT's activation fee not dearer or they will just go ADSL way.

Managers where should I start first all those managers who have no knowledge of how cable works should go. ( there are plenty) those who fail to improve their departments to customer satisfaction should go and any that get extremely high bonuses ontop of high wages its one or the other. In many companies if you have high bonus you have a lower hourly rate unless you are near the top of NTL where common sense went out the window.

After that cull there should be plenty of profit to split between shareholders and staff and employ the guys we need to keep the cable running smoothly as it used to do years ago. After 6 years the loss of service is more regular now than it ever was.