truck driver

associate

delivery driver

engineer

hgv technician

Allied-Bakeries

Like many have said before. you have no life as a Driver in this company. especially on the Class one side of driving. on day shift, you could be working days, back shift or mid-afternoons.. Night shifts are no better. you could start working at 1 pm or 23:30 pm, if someone calls in sick or is on holiday then it's a nightmare! you can guarantee that your shift pattern will get messed up.

you are paid for a 9 hour day and a half-hour break. Total paid is 9.1/2 hours. salaries and working times are agreed per site. Gateshead and  Glasgow are salaried sites. what you see is what you get..

However, some and I mean one or two shifts you will do less than the 9.1/2 hours stated. but shifts in the Glasgow branch are now well over 11 hours heading for 12+ hour shifts. you do not get paid any extra for this. There is no overtime rate for extra hours worked you are salaried.
if you want overtime, then you have to work an extra day for it...
there's a good bunch of guys in most of these depots, They look after each other...But the managers will give you a Hard time and Blame you for everything.. only the union guys, who for some reason seem to have the best runs and easiest jobs in the place never get blamed for anything..(Funny how things like that come about)

However, there is a culture of Blame the driver for everything! if he can't prove it's not his fault Blame him. This has come from the main boss via his managers who are put under pressure to meet targets.

one thing that has not been touched on is! This is not a driving only Job as a Class one driver you are expected to not only Drive sometimes Double Deck trailers, But to also Unload them and load on empty baskets when your done unloading product.

here's how that works! If your double deck trailer is full, then you could have as many as 1700 baskets, ten baskets high ten loaves to a basket (100 loaves of bread) may not sound like much but times 800grams by 100 and you get 80 Kilograms and that is the lightweight bread!  Scottish Plain (which Lol is made in Ireland) is far far heavier. And how do you manage to move these 1700 baskets of food product.. by wheels? no! don't be silly! that would be too easy! with a trolly of some sort, Are yea Daft.. No, why on earth would Allied bakeries spend money on any of those things. 
when all they have to do is hand you a lump of metal rod, with a Hook at one end and a handle that cuts off your circulation at the other...

Oh, they do have proper hooks. but those hooks are for a select few. Most of the time it makes your own!

well, when you are given this fantastic piece of Victoria workmanship, you are then expected to Drag the 80Kg or more of produce up the length of a 45-foot trailer, 
but fairs! fair! to aid you in this endeavor! they put easi slide Plastic runners on the floor of said trailers and trucks to help you drag the product up and down the trailer..  The only problem is! this is fine while the trailers and trucks are new. after a couple of weeks and many many Forklift trucks slamming product 40 baskets at a time onto the back of the trailer or truck, the plastic starts to break and warp, leaving edges that a basket can jam into and either pulling your arm out of its socket or Shocking your spine! 
at least several times a day a stack of baskets topple over because someone is pushing the product and it jams on the floor.

as for PPE Good luck with that one! I have heard of drivers who have had to buy there own boots. because either the boots supplied by Allied have fallen apart or they just never received any footwear. (allied foods are supposed to supply boots uniform and gloves as part of the Job)
 
One thing that I almost failed to cover is the height of the Double Deck trailers! inside anyone over 5'10" would be bouncing there head off of the roof on both top and bottom decks! for a long time no one over 5'10" was allowed to load or unload the trailers but like many things Allied! managers have not enforced this rule and pretty much ignored it if anyone taller than 5'10" loaded or unloaded a trailer...However, none of these Rules apply to the Drivers! they don't care if your 6'6" you're still expected to bend your back or twist your head to one side while you empty the trailer.try dragging 80Kg while your back is twisted and your head is twisted onto your shoulder

Recently at the time of my leaving. it had transpired that the Baskets had become very brittle and had many sharp edges on them. it would seem that any new baskets that the company bought had a lot more recyclable material in them 20% or more. whereas the older baskets had little to no recycling material in them. Allied claimed at the time that they knew nothing about this.. Hogwash!

Broken Baskets are now routinely missed and have bread placed into them. There are many instances of baskets being held together by there design and not because they were safe. I have heard of many stacks of bread falling over when someone tried to deliver the product to a customer or on the shop floor, no one bothers to report this anymore as basically, no one cares! if you do report it there is a stewards inquiry about it and the person reporting it doesn't want to take a chance on getting blamed for it...

As for the vehicles themselves! Allied has invested in some pretty ok vehicles! but the problem is that there are simply too many drivers using them. they are maintained well enough and all of them get a monthly service with mechanics onsite to deal with any problems.. but no one cares! literally dozens of drivers using the same vehicles. even the newest vehicle is going to look like a pound of mince. if no one looks after it..

There is an atmosphere of fear in most of the depots. the union is not interested and are only interested in getting there fees directly from your wage packet every month! The union Reps themselves. well.... don't rely on them for anything they don't want to lose there easy shifts  The older guys are only winging it until there final salary pension matures. which leaves all of the other mugs that join this company to sort things out or take the Blame..

As a multi-million pound company, on the back of an umbrella company, it fathoms belief that the factory is of the same century as this one. The one shining feature, which unfortunately is exploited by management and head office, is the people. Of the ones who work their way up the ladder to management positions vs those who walk into the job from outside and graduate schemes, there is a notable difference. One manages to ensure the best of everything and supports their teams, the other sees an opportunity to progress and thus allows others to carry them onward. The sad truth is that there are many who obtain higher positions by exploiting their staff and reaping the rewards. In my time working with the company there was a distinct divide between those who worked in the offices and those who worked on the lines, with many of the HR staff completely clueless and lacking interpersonal skills beyond what was provided to them in the manual. Similarly the new managers which are on a fast track to a great salary, have no idea what they're doing, and noticeably so from an internal perspective. In my experience it was often the second in command, the deputies, who did most of the work and the shift managers who reaped the benefits. The idea instilled in all who work from the bottom is that there is recognition for hard labour, though unfortunately, beyond the words this is rarely proven and more often those in charge are sourced elsewhere. I saw many family men and women fighting for small opportunities after years in the company, only to be beaten by a post graduate with no experience whatsoever. Managers from all departments will look out for each other, so it is wise to be wary of them and keep your head down. The divide between HR and line staff, ironically, is that the HR tend to look upon the line staff as lesser or with pity. Thus communication between the two can involve a lot of condescension and patronising. The occasional training meeting, a rare time when both sides meet, is a particularly interesting one for this kind of behaviour.

I worked there for nearly a decade the only reason i stayed after the good times was i knew the writing was on the wall and redundancy was certianly coming. The last year or so when i worked there it went downhill fast. Once the bakery went to a depot management were pushing to give out warnings right left and center. If your face doesn't fit expect to have the worst route possible. If you do have a good route expect extra calls added to you. Back when i started all new staff had 9 hour routes on the coffin dodgers had 8 hour routes. About 3 years was when 75% of the routes were under 8 hours. Everyone seemed to be happy. Then came a 2% payraise and 20% increase in work this kept happening right till we were hiting 9-10 hours a day. senior management were on a hunt how to make your day worse. lower management (the ones who had a clue) would tell senior management it is not possible and stand up for the drivers but they didn't care. If you had a suggestion about how to makes some routes more efficient they would not take it on board. If a certian manager A was in you knew what ever you asked would be a straight no even if it was for something simple. The other managers would always try to help providing they can work in a way manage A would not notice. the attuide of manage A is there is a door if you dont like it. Manage A should never of been promoted from driver to manager. Manage A's attendance as a Driver was appauling on the weekends constantly phoning in sick as well as amount of customer complaints coming into the office from his customers. that manager is the reason someone has to cover nearly all his shifts as he has managed to worm out of doing them. The person covering is not a managed or being paid extra to cover him. This tactic has been used on other drivers covering from DD to IBT no extra pay. And some have done nights without getting paid the couple of pound for doing a week. 

Hard physical work, long hours, good pay after 12 weeks, very menial. On the floor for exactly your start time, after finding out which street you are allocated to and getting a trolley, setting up of the street if no decanting of product from one type of crate to another needs done, then setting up of the street i.e. of wheels, empty stacks (stowes) of crates, then collecting a full stack of heavier products first, so they're at the bottom, scanning the item at the terminal, after highlighted, entering the amount you have (product amount varies depending on product, and sometimes an error in the main distribution center (Glasgow) can occur), the walking up and down the streets looking at your chosen colour, picking and placing the correct amount of product under the correct light, entering your code, or adjusting the orders if any damaged, misshapen product is found, and continuing onto another product, if that order has been completed. Unloding of several double decker trucks with fresh bread from Glasgow, then when all streets have cleared as many orders as they can, the tidying up of the warehouse, then loading of 16, on average, and varied sized, trucks. if any breakdowns, or vehicular check failure occur, unloading of said truck, and loading of a spare, will impede and postpone thre performance of the warehouse and finish time, overtime for agency workers is standard pay.

Multi-drop routes were getting too many calls put on them so they could take vehicles off the road to save money. Pressure to hit time windows and achieve so called peak torque targets. Every vehicle was a bit different in terms of how your driving style is supposed to save fuel. With some it was easy and others virtually impossible. Vehicles regularly breaking down. 
Extra calls sometimes placed on you that are well out of your way because they couldn't fit them on the regular driver's vehicle. 
Management were dishing out disciplinaries to drivers with relish at one point. Particularly one vindictive manager. 
Drivers were cutting corners by taking working breaks to get the route completed on time - something that can of course cost you your license if you get caught. Management know that this is happening and are if anything encouraging it. 
Sent out on routes with no training often resulted in a long and stressful day. Get back late and interrogated about late deliveries and 'peak-torque' when they already know you've been sent out 'blind'.
The salary is good but not as good as it used to be since working more hours for the same amount is tantamount to a pay-cut.

Typical day at work depending on which department you are working in MU, PP, Dispatch, Buns & Rolls or Tray Wash. 


So we will discuss a normal day at "PP"

You come in, sign in either through security or in the front where a manager is always present. 
After signing in, you make your way to the locker and put your stuff away. 

Get changed into the required protective clothing, making sure to wash hands before entering and leaving the work area due to contamination. 

Make your way to the work area once their you will be in teams of 3 which is for rotation so no one gets tired & we are able to change position anytime we are needed to. 

Starting at the line which includes sealing the bread & putting the company logo which has the correct date. 
You will make your way further down to the stacking where you have to put the bread that is completed in the crates. 

You get a break every 2 hours & a half. which is 30-45 depending on the manager who is supervising you. 

The hardest part of the job is when someone isn't pulling their weight. 

The best part is when everyone is working together and time is passing swiftly.

Management regularly change your shift pattern so you can't plan ahead or book holidays; they will force you to cancel your holiday even if you booked it 12 months ahead.
At the end of a shift, management will give you grief for not making all your deliveries - when you try and explain they've set you an impossible route to complete within your contracted hours, they insult you and argue with you.
Very poor leadership and all round incompetency of the management has created a very unstable company with staff leaving and not being replaced and drivers have recently received a pay cut.
Cheap, old vehicles.
They say they won't make you work over the 48 hour average working time directive but what they actually do is devise a shift pattern that meets legal requirements when the numbers are on a spreadsheet but in practice it actually gives you little to no home life and insufficient rest time.
They promise to pay overtime, but don't.
Drivers are generally treated disrespectfully and not like valued employees.
Even the cheap staff bread is no longer available as often as it used to be.

From the moment I walked in the door I was made to feel really welcome. Every single person I've met has been really friendly and helped me out.  I got my job through the agency on a temp to Perm basis and I had only just passed my test. They sent me out with other drivers and on my own in a company car to review the route I was going to be taking on. There was no being thrown in at the deep end and every effort was made to look after me. I feel really lucky to have found such a nice place to work. The pay is good for the area and although the starts are early (2am for me) I am used to the hours as I was a Baker before this job. Full PPE is provided once you get taken on permanently and the vehicles are very well maintained by a brilliant VMU. Management are approachable and open to suggestions. My route used to start at 3am but I asked for an earlier window and was granted it as they realised it made sense. Didn't matter that I was a newbie driver they still listened. 
If you get a chance to work here, take it.

Don't expect much from this place if you work here as a driver, all the old timers with the most service have the easiest runs,  there is absolutely  no equality or fairness. The system of dropping off and picking up baskets within the bakery is nothing short of laughable, the management are not in the slightest bit interested in resolving the problem. They will advertise a job as 5 over 7 shift what they don't tell you is that over the six week shift cycle you will work 6 days in a row for 4 of those six weeks again no interest from management about offering anything different. This depot has a revolving door which operates at an alarmingly fast pace drivers come and go on an almost weekly basis. If you can find alternative employment dont apply here, inevitably you will end up leaving 2,3,4 months down the line and have to find something else. Management dissappointingly uninterested, you have to wonder why? Maybe they should listen to their drivers concerns because morale is at rock bottom. Somewhere to avoid..........

Used to be a good place to work when people cared about each other and helped each other . Now it's all about costs and getting maximum output from a decreasing workforce . The bread always used to be good quality but if you see it now it's poor and cheaper bread in the market place is out doing it in every way . Allied do not market there bread as well as there rivals and the whole business is failing by self minded people  who are not interested or proud of the brand they are clearly there just to do paper work and balance the books rather than bring some spirit back to the workforce and get the product back to its full quality as it used to be . Allied is a dying plant that needs watering before it is too late . (Shameful and greedy people running it now ) . Some where along the road they have forgotten about the reason why they are there and what made kingsmill a great brand originally . (A careing and proud workforce working as one ) poor environment  aging buildings and outdated  technology is all atibuting to this decline .

Top Job Titles	Average salary
Truck driver 70 salaries reported	£40,686 per year
Associate 25 salaries reported	£27,845 per year
Delivery driver 23 salaries reported	£37,591 per year
Engineer 10 salaries reported	£60,957 per year
Hgv technician 7 salaries reported	£46,794 per year

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