The company commits to reducing working hours in 2025
VALENCIA, 18 Dec. (EUROPA PRESS) –
Mercadona and the representatives of UGT, CCOO and the Independent Union have signed the new company collective agreement, which will come into force on January 1, 2024 and will last for five years until the end of 2028.
According to the supermarket chain, the agreement guarantees the purchasing power of the workforce and contemplates a salary increase of up to 6%.
Specifically, the increase in the base salary is linked to the CPI, up to 2.5%. If it is higher, the company will complete this increase up to a maximum of 6%, a percentage linked to the profit objectives.
This is a measure in line with the “wealth creation and sharing of shared benefits” model that has been applied for years.
Mercadona already guarantees a minimum starting salary of 1,507 gross euros per month, 20% more than the minimum interprofessional salary (SMI), to which are added the complements of its remuneration policy that represent increases of 11% annually up to the 5 and that can represent 60% more than the minimum wage, among others.
In the new agreement, the rest of eight weekends a year is extended to workers in the hives (exclusive warehouses for online sales) and logistics blocks. This initiative will come into force progressively in 2024 and will end in 2025, which will mean that it will reach the majority of its workforce.
In addition, the company is committed to reducing working hours in 2025. The Valencian chain highlights that they continue to be pioneers in the introduction of work-life balance policies.
“This new agreement is the result of the effort of all the parties involved to guarantee the satisfaction of the more than 100,000 people who make up Mercadona, who are the cause of the company’s success and growth. A company whose management model is based on satisfying to the workers, because they are the ones who satisfy the more than 5.7 million households every day,” says the Director of Labor Relations, Ruth García.
As state head of the UGT Commerce sector, Lola Luna highlights the importance of the agreement, as it is the one that will most affect the sector, and values the agreements reached in this negotiation: “Agreements that will allow the people who work at Mercadona to continue at the head of the sector; not only in terms of economic remuneration, but also in terms of quality in the distribution of working hours and qualified breaks, something that facilitates the reconciliation of personal and work life so demanded in the commerce sector.
Jose María Martínez, secretary of the CCOO Services Federation, states: “This agreement demonstrates once again that, through social dialogue, new work realities can be adapted with the participation of all parties, improving working conditions. and with an increase in salaries that guarantee purchasing power in the largest company in the sector.” He also highlights the continuity of the observatory that was created in the previous agreement in which how the working day will be reduced and the analysis of its distribution will be studied.
“From Mercadona’s first collective agreement to the current one, the Independent Union has observed a double line: maintenance of the purchasing power of all workers and continued creation of stable employment,” says the secretary of this union center, Fermín Palacios.
