Stationary Time
Good day Carriers,
Recently, one of Management’s ‘Hot Topics’ is stationary time.
What is ‘stationary time?
Well, as you know, your scanner has GPS on it and when you travel around town every so often, maybe once a minute, the scanner will send a signal to a satellite and it will record your location. A map of all of these ‘pings’ to the satellite can be generated by Management on their computer. They can tell where you drove or walked as well as when.
If the scanner is stationary in one spot for a period of time, a message will be generated by the scanner and/or the program on the Management’s computer to say the scanner was stationary and not moving around for however many minutes it was. A ‘red flag’ will appear on the Management’s computer after maybe three minutes or it might be seven minutes. I’m not sure.
Management views stationary time as time being wasted by the the Carriers and they may use excessive stationary time events as a reason for a Discussion with you or maybe other discipline.
Here are some tips to potentially help reduce your stationary time:
- Always have your scanner with you, unless you are on break.
- Always do the right thing. You can take a minute to take a drink, check the time on your phone, or send a text message, but don’t take advantage of this. These activities should only be a minute or two.
- If you are on a Park and Loop, you are given office time to count and strap out your third bundles. If you do it on the street, the time you spend doing this may increase your stationary time.
- You are given truck loading time before you leave the office. Organize your parcels in the truck. If you put down your scanner and then spend several minutes organizing parcels on the street, this may cause a stationary time alert.
- Sure, you can talk to your customers, but try not to get caught in long conversations. If there is an issue and you talk to a customer for more than a few minutes, you should call the office afterwards and let your supervisor know you were stationary for a few minutes due to a customer’s questions.
Send me questions and comments.
See you soon!
- Dave