No paid coffee break for postman, judge decides | Financial

The works council did not consider it fair that postal deliverers are not entitled to a paid coffee break of ten minutes on busy days, while other PostNL employees are entitled to that right in comparable circumstances.

About 2000 postmen work at PostNL. They have had a paid coffee break since 1989. In addition, there are about 18,000 postmen. These were originally, for example, students, housewives and pensioners who delivered the mail for two hours a day in their own neighborhood. But the functions have grown together over time, the works council stated in the procedure.

reasonableness

For example, the commuting allowance is also dealt with in the judgment of the Court of Appeal. “The conclusion is that the facts and circumstances put forward by the works council cannot lead to the conclusion that PostNL could not reasonably have come to the contested decision,” the judges ruled.

PostNL opposed the works council’s claims, because the discussion about the fees would not be up to the employee participation body. According to the company, the issue should actually belong in the collective bargaining agreement with trade unions.

‘Unexplainable’

An average contract for a mail deliverer is 11 hours a week, but according to the OR, some are 25 hours. “The postmen are entitled to a paid coffee break after working 3.10 hours. If they do the same loop as a postman, the postman doesn’t have this break. As far as I’m concerned, this is an unequal treatment of employees. PostNL thus affects the lowest paid employees. This is inexplicable,” said works council chairman Bert Tuk in the courtroom.

PostNL lawyer Jaap van Slooten stated that mail continues to shrink, by about 8% per year. “Last year this was not the case, but the long-term trend is that there is less and less mail. The number of letters continues to fall, and the costs have to move along,” says Van Slooten.

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