truck driver

warehouse worker

administrator

sales executive

support worker

Brakes Group

Initial training was ok but in no way prepares you for the first day you fly solo. 
You will do 3 classroom days followed by 5 days with a driver before returning to do another 2 classroom days.

You will be assigned a manager and either a TSD (training support driver) who wear an orange bib , or an experienced driver in the early days. Due to pressure (usually shortage of drivers) your time with them will be cut short which impacts your ability to pick up the job quickly. 
Some of the TSDs are fabulous and will go above and beyond to help you to the best of their ability. Others are clearly well short of managerial standard which will become quite obvious to you. 

On a daily basis, some of the managers will help you with maps and where to go when doing certain drops, other highly paid managers are beyond useless preferring to tell you that you that you have a meat box on your truck than getting into the warehouse and sorting out issues that require management such as badly loaded wagons.

Initially, you will usually be assigned to do bulk deliveries to various locations with cages or pallets, some will require swapping or emptying some not. After a month or so, depending upon how many drivers leave or are off sick, you will be assigned to food service (you will be told by managers that this is the best part to work on) It’s isn’t, you will be given 15-20 drops, often blind, and have to pick items from a giant cage stillage to go with the rest of the order which has been picked.
You will frequently spend considerable time sorting your wagon as it has loaded abysmally and full to the brim which again takes time out of your day and adds hours on to your week. The timings given (7 seconds per item) are unrealistic and don’t take into account that you don’t know where you are going or that you may have to walk some way to the delivery point. 
A culture of working through your tacho breaks exists to try to relieve some of the time pressures you will face.
It is heavy, physical work often with broken, defective cages so be prepared to get a sweat on handballing. 

In the early days, if you are assigned bulk or logistics, you will find yourself walking around a huge warehouse trying to find a pump truck to go in your truck which adds further time to your day. If you are lucky, you may be given a sack truck to help you. You will need to lock this up at the depot but be prepared that your sack truck may well be removed by another driver! 

The salary of £39,120 is on paper a very good salary for 45 hours per week. In reality you will work 50-55 hours for this. You will not receive any overtime payment for the privilege either! 

Your days will often be planned for 10- 11 hours to which you will be met with the lines “rough with the smooth” or “swings and roundabouts “ which was another favourite. The management of the depot refuse to allow a trade union to represent the drivers at the depot which speaks volumes. 
 
Your personal life is also of no interest or concern. Be prepared for your routes to be changed overnight. You will often go to bed expecting to be in for 430 only to find that your route now starts at 6am adding more time to your day! Holiday requests will usually be met with a no because the preferential holidays will be booked by the time you join or because that many drivers have left, they are short staffed. 

You will also notice from paperwork left around the warehouse that some routes are considerably easier than others. If you are not a “time served braker “ or “face doesn’t fit” you will not be doing these considerably easier routes. 

Most of the drivers are great and will help you to the best of their ability and time.

There is an air of negativity around the depot with distribution and warehousing seemingly to work independently of each other. 

In conclusion, if you are able to power through your work regardless of anything, then Brakes may well work for you. If you get irritated or annoyed by things, perhaps consider elsewhere. 

Posting this review as a warning to other people. I left a job of 10year 4month to join Brakes and all i can say is it's the biggest regret of my working career, i attended interview got sold the dream to join them, i said i don't mind overtime but when i want to do it type thing as its technically outside my contracted hours so i got told thats fine - i was doing nightshift Sunday to Thursday 8pm til 5 30am, then when i joined Brakes and started as early as my first shift i was stuck there until 6 30am in morning - been a new starter i was under impression come 5 30am they'd say get yourself away, well how wrong was i - apparently everyone clocks in and clocks off together - so if the shift runs over its mandatory that you stay back against what was told to you at interview. 
Also they sell you this dream of 31 days holiday to use when you want - again don't be fooled by this - this is a complete load of tosh aswell, during what they class as premium months in the summer - holidays have to be booked as whole block weeks, so if you go away for say a long weekend and need the Sunday Monday off you'll also need to put the Tues, Wed & Thurs in, and in effect waste another 3 days for sake of it.
Now onto the work itself, the first part of the shift for 3 hours involves getting a pick sheet from the office and then dragging a massive cage around a freezer putting boxes/bags food in it, at Brakes after 3 weeks of employment i already had the manager on my back regarding picking performance, and some of his comments made me feel absolutely terrible, they expect miracles out of you too soon and if you challenge your feelings to him then he gets all high and mighty on his high horse and starts shouting and balling at you, my picking performance after 3 weeks on the job was getting compared to other people who had been there between 10 to 20 year and the type attitude i got back was - everyone's in the same boat. Yet he didn't seem to grasp yes it is basic picking however when you never worked in a freezer environment in there before or anywhere similar, pulling cages around which 80% of time go the opposite way to were you want them to go - working in clothes as if your about to go skiing for the day, it takes time to adjust regardless. 
The second and last part of the job was fairly easy as its picking items from a pallet which comes in off the back of a lorry, but again this can also cause a lot of stress aswell - the way the pallets are laid out could be so so much stress free but you often find numbers jumping and totally out of sequence, constantly having to ask people were pallets is which slows your performance down.
To sum this company up i would say if you like been spoke to like a second class citizen, been overworked and underpaid for what's involved, been dictated too when you can/can't have your annual leave then this is the place for you. The only advantage is the cheap food/drinks you can buy off them, nothing else. Avoid at all costs!

The problem with this company is they identify the hard workers and then add to their workload. These overworked employees then feel obliged to take on this extra work out of proudness or not wanting to disappoint. This leads to employee burnout, which is what happened to me.
I was told I was going to have six weeks training on the road, I had three. 
The first several months I had my own route with the odd couple of new drops added everyday which was fine, I had a balanced work/social life and was close to working the 45 hours a week they advertise for the job.
They then took this route away from me, from then on I was sent out blind every day. When I say blind, I mean I didn’t know any of the drops most days, we are then expected to finish each drop in a timely manner. One drop I was given 12 minutes to pull 500kg off and get it up a flight of stairs with no lift. I always remember that.
I was averaging 16 blind drops a day, many times they would schedule primary schools at the end of the day, close to when they close, this adds more pressure and stress which leads to accidents. At this point I’m averaging 60 hour weeks. 
One day I’m in Northampton, the next I’m in Shrewsbury, then Worcester etc. no consistency at all. We don’t get our route plan until 8pm the night before, then sometimes some of us are scheduled in at 4:30am.
The trucks that are used are well past their sell by date, the loaders have no incentive to do a good job, so will load it in a dangerous and non helpful fashion (e.g they will load the first drop at the back of the truck), they also miss lots of items off, so you waste time looking for goods that aren’t even there.
There are several van drivers that are supposed to assist you midday once they have finished their drops, 10% of the time I asked for help I actually received it. Then drops failed because of this. 
Don’t be fooled by the money, I’m now 31years old and finally realised that money isn’t everything.
This job will seriously push your physical and mental health to the limit. There’s a reason for the low rating and high staff turnover, I’ve seen dozens and dozens of people come and go.
Would not recommend at all.

I’ve said about half of what I wanted to say, I hope it’s enough for the drivers out there to take on board


A typical day at brakes: start time is anywhere between 4am and 6am and you only find out the night before at about 6pm what time you start the next day. Then it comes to your workload for the day. anywhere between 8 - 28 drops all depending on what you're working- Bulker/Food service/Logisitcs. 

The loads on the wagon are not always loaded safely or securely and you have to end up reloading your own wagon. If you  have pallets good luck finding one a pump truck to take out with you. There's never any about or they're broken, not safe to use. Your handheld device shows you your job list and tells you how long you have at each drop. some are enough time but others are just too short and thats when you end up rushing or making mistakes and could end up having an accident. 

What i have learnt about brakes, is that no matter how long you have been there, if you go above and beyond they expect it from you all the time. If you say no overtime or doing extra you're then made to feel bad about it.  Trying to get any progress is more like if your face fits you can get places. 

Management: there are good ones and bad ones. no one was perfect but my line manager was sound. there were times when they could really help and times where they couldn't. 

The workplace has problems between departments and that would cause a knock on effect and cause riffs between all and affected the moral. 

The job itself is physically hard and you can get some really heavy days. dealing with customers who would get upset if your late or their delivery was supposed to be yesterday. but it failed because of a breakdown etc. But on the flip-side to that you would get some really great customers who would have a chat with you and ask how your day is going. 

In summary, Brakes aren't for everyone. It's a tough job and has some great benefits. Don't be too eager to give the overtime it will just get used and abused. Progression don't expect it to happen. There's always going to be issues that don't seem to get fixed and there are too many to mention. It is a starting point for new passes of a HGV licence but its not the best job. 

Well where to start... Brakes lead you into a false sense of security telling you you'll get trained by a TSD on your own routes which never happens unless you say something... So instead they send you on awful routes to test you to see if you've got what it takes. You'll probably get your own routes 4 maybe 5 months whilst employed by brakes. You'll end up learning the job yourself with no help. The managers don't help you with anything so it's a waste of time asking them, your in this on your own. The planners can't plan correctly so when it comes to organising your paper work in the morning you'll end reorganising the route plan, which then makes the load plan incorrect so you have to shift everything around, very time consuming and could be ignored, burns to much energy when having long days. (Planners use to be drivers as well so should no better) The back of the truck is very ugly, very unorganised when it comes to picking items and you spend to much time looking for products for customers. So you have warehouse who pick items, then the driver has to pick what the warehouse have picked which makes no sense, you have to separate departments doing the same job TWICE. Mind boggling if you ask me... They have no weight limits on the cages or don't obey by, some are way to heavy to move once your at a drop, this is just asking for an accident to yourself or someone else. The devices they give you for your sat nav don't work properly, if your in Bristol your screwed... you'll receive a text saying 'are you using your device?' When you are... The chargers don't stay on the dashboard and they never charge so you'll probably use your phone instead. They'll make you do anything for a delivery, not think of the stress your going through just there profit, send your truck down places they shouldn't be going or to tight to get down, you report this and nothing happens. again your on your own and ignored, be prepared for very long days, very overworked, overlooked , undervalued. No one should go through the stress and pain they put you through. Don't let £30.000 fool you...

I worked at Brakes Logistics on a temporary basis through The Response Recruitment Agency. I found the role very enjoyable because I was helping customers locate their missing items during the busy Christmas period. My duties included taking incoming telephone calls from customers who were waiting for their deliveries that were running late due to the extra items being ordered that were on the Christmas menus. I found this role helped develop my communication skills because I had to calm the angry customers down by reassuring them that there delivery was on route to them while at the same time making notes on their quires to investigate the delays to their deliveries. I would reassure the customer that this would be investigated straight away & I would keep the customer updated on the progress of locating there missing items. My next process was phoning the depot to locate the missing driver & get an eta of when the driver will arrive with the customer delivery. I would them phone the customer & pass on the expected delivery time of the driver. After the expected delivery had passed I would phone the customer to make sure they had received there delivery before closing the query. If the delivery had still not arrived then I would phone the depot again to try & arrange a new eta time for delivery for the customer. I would also receive incoming calls from customers wanting to add items onto there next delivery. I would write down & process there order while they were on the phone & confirm that there order has been placed. I found workings in a busy team enjoyable because everyone would communicate & would help each other to make sure that the highest standard of customer service was provided. I thing I’m a good team player works well in a team because I always take pride in the role I am working in.

I would advise anyone to stay away from this depot.  The wages may seem to be good  at first glance but wages aren't everything. This place is soul destroying. The morale of the employees is lower than a snakes belly due to the unreasonable expectations of the management who are more interested in making themselves look good to the higher archy than looking after the ever changing staff.  The transport and delivery manager has no practical experience whatsoever in the driving and running of goods vehicles ,  and does not understand the problems drivers have on a daily basis. He was the night shift manager  but read a book and had an interview and was given the job over another applicant with previous experience in the real world of transport.  (Jobs for the boys). Morale got to its lowest after he got the job
The night shift is even worse, health and safety policies and procedures as set by Brakes are constantly overlooked. Speed is more important than safety.  There is a sickness policy.... 4 instances of sickness in  12 months, wether a single day for each period or a month for each and you are fired .A disciplinary comes after each instance of sickness. You have to sign reams of forms to say that you have had training on every possible senario to do with the job even when no training is actually given for 90%  This is to ensure that in the event of an accident, You are totally to blame and no comeback on the company.  Typical American owned company.  The shift is understaffed ,  workloads are increased. and there are too many chiefs and not enough Indians   This is a Face fit depot. Suck up to the management and you are in. Actually have a brain and you are looked on as a trouble maker.     If they had a reunion for previous staff,  they would have to hire the Albert Hall to fit them in.  Try 3663.

I loved working here, I loved my work and got on well with most of my colleagues. Other than the usual office politics and cliques, it is a good place to work. The rewards however are only for the higher grade staff; it does not filter down like they claim it does.

Career progression is possible, if you're prepared to be ruthless. And I mean, ruthless - ie taking credit for other peoples work. The irony being, this flies against the "One Brakes" mantra (which is supposed to mean "we're all in this together"). Some managers for instance get thousands of pounds of bonuses by taking credit for other colleague's work (usually their coordinators).  Meanwhile, the colleague(s) who do all the actual work day in, day out, get no reward or bonus - but if they complain, they're reminded that what they do is all part of "One Brakes". This is one of the key drivers for low-level admin staff leaving. 

There is a mechanism for rewards at a lower level; what is known as a "Star Award". Your colleagues have to nominate you for it though, and some teams/departments/cliques worked out that if they take turns to vote for each other, they're almost guaranteed a bonus - even if it is for effectively doing their day jobs. Or in some cases, they get a reward for something they played no part in at all. Shortly before I left, there was a Star Award for a report I had put together - and in front of the whole floor, the manager gave the Star Award for it, to another colleague. That colleague immediately came over to apologise; he admitted taking a copy of my report to a presentation, and was mystified as to why someone nominated him for waving a copy of my report, rather than nominating me for producing the report in the first place. That's the good side of Brakes - for every bad egg there are probably five or six proper honest colleagues. And I'll miss them.

No enjoyment.
You get told you can have two 15min breaks and one 30min lunch, the lunch you dont get paid for so you have that regardless but the two 15s are "performance related" so you have to actually go and ask a manager if you've worked hard enough to have one, which is always a no. It doesn't seem much but trust me, you'll need these breaks to keep your sanity.
You aren't allowed to talk to other members of staff during work.
The pick rate is fixed so that if you get one massive order of one item (ie water) your pick rate goes through the floor.
You don't get a uniform.
The managers watch over you like prison wardens.
Don't bother having any issues because nobody knows how to resolve anything and generally don't care if you do.
Pay rate is good for warehouse but actually shocking for the workload.
Staff canteen is a health hazard, unless you want to lose weight from dehydration.
You're not allowed drinks while you're picking regardless of how hot it is. You cant just take your jumper off because you'll need that for when you go into the chilled section. There isn't enough time to keep stopping to put your jumper on.
You get threatened with the sack for the most ridiculous things.
Overtime is compulsory, no matter how much you want to go home. It will say they can ask you to do a reasonable amount, but the managers are the judges of what is reasonable. You will get sacked if you disagree with them.
They teach you about manual handling, which would be useful if you didn't have to constantly reach for the heaviest items.
Don't bother offering any ideas to any of the managers, you'll be questioning their intelligence.
You don't get the tools needed for the job. Your gloves will wear down within minutes and you won't get a box knife until someone dies.

Difficult to know how to start because this joke of a company has so many bad points 
I will start at the top the management have all been promoted from within brown nosed their way into cushy office jobs without having the slightest clue of how to manage people/plan routes / etc in short they don’t have the skill set to do the job and they know it so this breeds paranoia always looking over their shoulder terrified to make a mistake incase somebody gets on to the fact they can’t do the job. Basically they  will all shift blame onto anybody but themselves nobody will take any responsibility for anything until some poor sap lower down the food chain gets sacked 
And they will sack anybody that is not a yes man who has any sort of brain to point there mistakes out so be warned  this is why they constantly advertise for staff 

You are expected to work your breaks everyday the management all know this and plan routes accordingly 
When you start you will be given impossible runs with unrealistic time to do the job then get hassled all day to go faster finishing at 6-7 at night after a 5am start this is everyday while you watch the brown noses and lads who are mates with managers get cushy runs and are back at1-2pm ( these will also be the ones with a half full wagon while you will struggle to close the doors because they tried to cram that much on them ) 

If you complain or say anything about this you are looked at like you are lazy or can’t do the job 

This is a horrendous place to work with horrendous people 

Do yourself a a favour and listen to what people say on the reviews I wish I had

Top Job Titles	Average salary
Truck driver 6 salaries reported	£30,870 per year
Warehouse worker 13 salaries reported	£33,065 per year
Administrator 35 salaries reported	£22,118 per year
Sales executive 32 salaries reported	£28,397 per year
Support worker 24 salaries reported	£22,761 per year

Working at Brakes Group: company overview and reviews

Brakes Group

Brakes Group ratings

Popular jobs at Brakes Group

Salary satisfaction

Jobseeker tools

Employer Tools

Browse

Stay Connected