IELTS General Training Reading Test 3: Free, with Answers

Welcome to Speedline Parcels. This guide explains what we expect from our drivers during their first weeks with the company.

Before your first shift

All drivers must hold a full driving licence and have at least two years' driving experience. During your first week, you will spend three days accompanying an experienced driver, who will show you how the scanner works and introduce you to the routes. You will be given a uniform, which must be worn at all times while you are on duty, and a pair of safety boots.

Starting the day

Drivers should arrive at the depot by 7.15 am. Before setting off, you must carry out a check of your van, including the tyres, lights and mirrors, and record the results on your scanner. Any faults must be reported to the transport supervisor, who will decide whether the vehicle is safe to drive. Parcels are loaded in the sequence in which they will be delivered, so it is important not to change their order once loading is complete.

Making deliveries

Every parcel must be scanned at the moment it is delivered. If nobody is at home, you may leave a parcel with a neighbour or in a safe place chosen by the customer, but never on a doorstep where it can be seen from the street. In this case, take a photo of the parcel as proof of delivery. Parcels that require a signature must be brought back to the depot if the customer is out.

Dealing with customers

Always be polite to customers, even if they are unhappy about a late delivery. Do not try to deal with complaints yourself: give the customer the number of our customer service team, who will look into the matter.

On the road

Drivers must take a break of at least 30 minutes after five hours of driving. Mobile phones may only be used through the van's hands-free system, and only when it is safe to do so.

At the end of the day

On your return, hand in any undelivered parcels and plug your scanner in so that it can charge overnight. Vans should be left with at least a quarter of a tank of fuel for the next driver.

All employees who have worked for Brookfield Engineering for at least six months may ask to change their working pattern. This might mean working part-time, starting and finishing at different times, working compressed hours (for example, doing a full week's work in four days) or sharing a job with a colleague.

Making a request

Requests must be made in writing, using the form in the human resources section of the intranet. Explain the change you would like, the date on which you would like it to start and how you think it might affect your team. It is a good idea to suggest how any difficulties could be overcome. Your manager may contact you for more information before deciding whether to meet. Only one request can be made in any twelve-month period.

What happens next

Your manager will arrange to meet you within four weeks to discuss your request, and you may bring a colleague to this meeting if you wish. In some cases, your manager may suggest a trial period, usually lasting three months, so that both of you can see whether the new arrangement works in practice.

Decisions

You will receive a written decision within two weeks of the meeting. Requests can only be refused for business reasons, such as an inability to meet customer demand or a negative effect on quality. If your request is accepted, the change will be permanent unless both you and the company agree otherwise. If it is refused, you have the right to appeal to a senior manager within 14 days.

Pay and holidays

If you reduce your hours, your salary and holiday entitlement will be reduced in proportion, and your pension contributions will also change. Staff who work compressed hours keep their full salary, since the total number of hours they work stays the same.

Changing your mind

If your circumstances change after a new arrangement has started, you can ask to return to your previous working pattern. The company will try to agree to this, but it cannot guarantee that your old pattern will still be available.

AIn the early 1930s, British readers who wanted to own a book faced an unsatisfactory choice. New hardback novels cost several shillings, far more than most working people could afford, while the cheap paperbacks sold on railway bookstalls consisted largely of sensational fiction of doubtful quality. Allen Lane, the managing director of the publishing firm The Bodley Head, was convinced that there must be a third possibility. According to the story he liked to tell, the moment of inspiration came in 1934, when he was on his way home after visiting the crime writer Agatha Christie and found himself at Exeter station with nothing worth reading for the journey. Whether or not that afternoon was as decisive as he later claimed, Lane became certain that a vast public existed for serious books, provided that they cost no more than a packet of cigarettes.

BHis fellow directors at The Bodley Head were far from enthusiastic. With each book priced at just sixpence, the venture could only make a profit if sales were enormous, and the established book trade was largely hostile, fearing that cheap editions would damage sales of more profitable hardbacks. Ironically, this pessimism worked to Lane's advantage. Because other publishers were confident that his paperbacks would soon disappear, they were willing to sell him the rights to reprint their titles for considerably less than they might otherwise have demanded.

CThe breakthrough came from an unexpected quarter. Woolworths, a chain of stores better known for selling household goods at low prices than for selling literature, placed an order for 63,000 copies, a quantity that covered the cost of the entire project. The first ten Penguins, which included a novel by Ernest Hemingway and a life of the poet Shelley by the French writer André Maurois, went on sale on 30 July 1935. Lane was keen to sell them wherever people might be tempted to buy, and he even installed a vending machine, nicknamed the 'Penguincubator', outside a bookshop in London's Charing Cross Road. Within ten months, a million Penguins had been printed, and in 1936 the business became a separate company.

DThe name and appearance of the books contributed a great deal to their success. Lane had asked for a symbol that would be 'dignified but flippant', and it was his secretary, Joan Coles, who suggested a penguin. The cover design and the first version of the logo were the work of Edward Young, a 21-year-old office junior. Each cover consisted of three horizontal bands, with the upper and lower bands coloured according to the type of book: orange for fiction, green for crime and dark blue for biography. Lane resisted the introduction of cover pictures for several years, and this restraint distinguished Penguins from the brightly illustrated paperbacks of their competitors, giving even the cheapest of them an air of quality.

EHaving proved that fiction could be sold in this way, Lane turned to other markets. In 1937, he launched Pelican Books, which offered accessible introductions to subjects ranging from economics to archaeology at the same low price, beginning with a two-volume work by the playwright George Bernard Shaw. Lane later wrote that he had believed in 'a vast reading public for intelligent books at a low price'. The series was aimed at readers who wished to continue their education on their own, and it proved so popular with them that a newspaper later described it as an informal university for a whole generation. Three years later came Puffin. The idea came from Noel Carrington, an editor who proposed a series of colourful non-fiction picture books for children, and a list of stories followed in 1941.

FThe Second World War, which might have been expected to ruin a business so dependent on paper, in fact strengthened Penguin's position. When paper rationing was introduced in 1940, each publisher's allowance was calculated according to the amount it had used before the war, and Penguin's huge print runs entitled it to a generous share. During the war it published practical manuals such as Aircraft Recognition, and supplied books to the armed forces. Many copies carried a message inviting readers to leave the book at a post office when they had finished it, so that it could be sent free of charge to people in the services.

GIn 1960, Lane took the greatest risk of his career by publishing the complete text of D. H. Lawrence's Lady Chatterley's Lover, a novel that had never been legally available in full in Britain. Penguin was prosecuted for obscenity, and the trial at the Old Bailey became a national sensation. The prosecutor famously asked the jury whether it was a book they would wish their wives or servants to read, a question that made him seem hopelessly out of touch. After three hours, the jury found Penguin not guilty, and the publicity helped the novel to sell several million copies. The publisher had once again shown that it understood the public better than its critics did.