P & O Ferries

Zenduri · 17 Mar 2022 at 15:00

The Funktopus said:
As a Brit working at sea myself, I fear there will come the day when we’ll be simply priced out of the market. Whole sectors of the industry have basically forced Brits out by paying wages that would be effectively untenable with the cost of living in the UK, but attractive to people from developing countries, like India, The Phillipines, Burma, Indonesia etc.

P & O better be careful they dont hire Jacob Rusli Bin or they might have another Costa Concodia on their hands.

******** move by ******** company

Haggisman · 17 Mar 2022 at 15:24

Have to say i'm not surprised theyre struggling given the prices. We were looking to go over to ireland in the summer and it was £400+ return for 2 adults + 2 kids in a car, compared to £200 for flights.

gailjon · 17 Mar 2022 at 15:31

Just seen the video of the Zoom call - sickening. I suppose that's what happens when you are owned by Russia/UAE.

Ahleckz · 17 Mar 2022 at 15:31

Haggisman said:
Have to say i'm not surprised theyre struggling given the prices. We were looking to go over to ireland in the summer and it was £400+ return for 2 adults + 2 kids in a car, compared to £200 for flights.

Good luck taking your car on an Aer Lingus plane though..

englishpremier · 17 Mar 2022 at 15:32

Freakbro said:
Funny how everyone is into cancel culture all of a sudden

Pretty sure it nothing to do with cancel culture. Boycotts existed long before any of that nonsense.

Uther · 17 Mar 2022 at 15:33

Haggisman said:
Have to say i'm not surprised theyre struggling given the prices. We were looking to go over to ireland in the summer and it was £400+ return for 2 adults + 2 kids in a car, compared to £200 for flights.

Problem with flying is you then have to hire a car at the other end.

Malevolence · 17 Mar 2022 at 15:33

Freakbro said:
We've got a cruise to the Fjords with them in Aug...been bounced since 2020 already due to Covid, looks like we're never going to get there!

englishpremier · 17 Mar 2022 at 15:38

Haggisman said:
Have to say i'm not surprised theyre struggling given the prices. We were looking to go over to ireland in the summer and it was £400+ return for 2 adults + 2 kids in a car, compared to £200 for flights.

Don't you use Stenna Line for Ireland? Better company all round.

StriderX · 17 Mar 2022 at 15:39

Not that I was ever going to use them, but a pox on their house now.

Fubsy · 17 Mar 2022 at 15:55

Literal "dey tuk eur jerbs!" moment when the change around happens.

SPG · 17 Mar 2022 at 15:56

StriderX said:
Not that I was ever going to use them, but a pox on their house now.

Yep, ***** those guys.

peige · 17 Mar 2022 at 15:57

Playing devils advocate, those losses were huge, 100million year on year. Something about the business has to change and the unions would never have helped.. I'd bet that this won't be enough though, the whole business needs rethinking.

I went over on the eurotunnel last week and it was pretty quiet, city europe was dead also so the whole cross channel market is suffering at the moment.

Freakbro · 17 Mar 2022 at 16:01

englishpremier said:
Pretty sure it nothing to do with cancel culture. Boycotts existed long before any of that nonsense.

I was being rather sarcastic

Malevolence said:

Digital X · 17 Mar 2022 at 16:09

Saw the camera crews here in the high street in Dover, apparently had been going on since 8AM today.

Nevakonaza · 17 Mar 2022 at 16:16

"As you may be aware the business has been struggling financially" he says in the zoom call,So sacking workers and replacing them on the fly with cheap labour is going to solve this quickly how? if they are truly 100 million pound in loss for the past two years do they really think sacking the current workers is going to quickly turn this around?

Baffles me how these companies never look at re-structuring their management and numerous Supervisors,bosses,Directors etc Which they really do not need that many..its always the "normal" everyday workers...you know the ones that actually earn the companies money!

Whats even more crazy,they had plenty of time to make a "Document pack" explaining to them about the redundancy,severance payout etc..but literally only given them "on the day" noticed and sacked instantly..i bet they had been having meetings for months in board rooms with all the big bosses on 100s of Ks a year.

Haggisman · 17 Mar 2022 at 16:24

Uther said:
Problem with flying is you then have to hire a car at the other end.

True, but even with that taken into account, the cost is around the same, and it's a 1hr flight from an airport 10 minutes drive away vs a 6 hr crossing with a 2hr drive to the port and back

Uther · 17 Mar 2022 at 16:30

Haggisman said:
True, but even with that taken into account, the cost is around the same, and it's a 1hr flight from an airport 10 minutes drive away vs a 6 hr crossing with a 2hr drive to the port and back

We looked in to it in 2020 as we had a two week trip booked for Ireland and with flying and hiring a car for 14 days it was hugely more expensive than just taking our own.

V F · 17 Mar 2022 at 16:32

Nevakonaza said:
"As you may be aware the business has been struggling financially" he says in the zoom call,So sacking workers and replacing them on the fly with cheap labour is going to solve this quickly how? if they are truly 100 million pound in loss for the past two years do they really think sacking the current workers is going to quickly turn this around?

Baffles me how these companies never look at re-structuring their management and numerous Supervisors,bosses,Directors etc Which they really do not need that many..its always the "normal" everyday workers...you know the ones that actually earn the companies money!

Whats even more crazy,they had plenty of time to make a "Document pack" explaining to them about the redundancy,severance payout etc..but literally only given them "on the day" noticed and sacked instantly..i bet they had been having meetings for months in board rooms with all the big bosses on 100s of Ks a year.

Like City Link laying them all off before Christmas and the owner walking away with millions?

Malevolence · 17 Mar 2022 at 16:35

Apparently, on a P&O ship docked in Hull the workers are refusing to leave and the Capt. has raised the gangway. But there are contractors on board who are nothing to do with P&O and who can't get off.

GreatAuk · 17 Mar 2022 at 16:43

I kind of understand that the P&O may need to, or may benefit from replacing staff with lower cost service contracts or overseas staff on lower wages or whatever it is they're doing. Outsourcing and using the most efficient labour to do a job is just part of being in the global economy. Especially when the company has been making such large losses it's clear something needed to change. If we don't want that to be allowed in certain cases then it's up to MPs to make that the law.

If we boycotted every company that outsourced things or paid foreign staff less than they'd have to pay UK based staff we'd basically be unable to buy anything except knitted sweaters from Etsy and cheese from a local farm shop.

The lack of notice makes this much more distasteful to me though, just dropping it on people out of nowhere. Particularly as it's probably a considerable portion of the the UK ferry workforce, not like it's just a few people who will be able to get a job with another company in a month or two - imagine a lot of them will have to start a completely different career - a bit of advance warning would have enabled people to plan changes and make plans rather than just being kicked overboard one day.

Also, mass layoff via zoom? How rude and impersonal.