The company will foreseeably address the incentivized sick leave plan with labor representation next week
MADRID, 12 Nov. (EUROPA PRESS) –
The majority unions at Telefónica, that is, CCOO, UGT and Sumados-Fetico, agree on their labor demands to the company after the celebration of ‘Investor’s Day’ and the presentation of the latest results, and are focused on a new collective agreement “strong” and linked to the exit plan finalized by the company, which they consider should be voluntary.
The CEO of Telefónica himself, Ángel Vilá, confirmed this past Wednesday that the company is working on an exit plan – whose objective is the rationalization of costs – that will impact different business units and may affect, in addition to to workers in Spain, to those in “other geographies” in which the company is active.
Thus, it is expected that next week Telefónica will present to the unions a plan for incentivized departures that will affect a maximum of 5,000 workers, although the calculations on the number of employees who would finally benefit from the measure are estimated to be between 2,500 and 3,000, a figure similar to that of 2021, the last time an initiative of this magnitude was carried out.
As sources familiar with the situation have informed Europa Press, the company is also working on a voluntary resignation plan for the corporate area, that is, employees close to the team of the president of Telefónica, José María Álvarez-Pallete, and also managers of subsidiaries, among others.
The adjustment plan for the corporate area, which would include directors, managers and managers, is discretionary and could affect a minimum of 300 people, according to the same sources, and seeks to slim down an oversized management team.
In this context, and after the presentation of the operator’s results at the end of the third quarter and its strategic plan for 2023-2026, the Sumados-Fetico union considers that “one of the axes in which the company will have that supporting him to carry out his plans is, without a doubt, his staff, whom he intends to keep motivated.
“We know that the start of negotiations for the III CEV (collective agreement of related companies) is imminent and these good results of the company should not only be beneficial for the shareholders, but will also have to be reflected in the new collective agreement, where “workers must see the company’s upward trend reflected in their remuneration,” the organization added.
Along these lines, they also consider that the new collective agreement should have a duration similar to that of Telefónica’s new strategic plan, called ‘GPS’ (acronym in English for growth, profitability and sustainability).
Regarding the sick leave plan the company is working on, Sumados-Fetico believes that there are “other options”, although he clarifies that if the company “insists on carrying it out”, the model applied will have to comply with the principles of universality. , voluntariness and non-discrimination, “it being the company’s responsibility to make it attractive to workers,” the organization has added.
For its part, CCOO has claimed to Telefónica that the negotiations must serve to “support the guarantees” of the collective agreement and create long-term stability in terms of employment, economic and labor conditions.
It also advocates “assuming the relocation of the activity and the workforce as a form of conciliation” for workers and “retention of talent in the company”, while urging “to improve the collective agreement in all those aspects reflected in the ‘Social Plan for Employment'”.
“If exits are considered, these must be agreed upon within a framework of equal opportunities, with decent economic conditions that enable direct access to retirement,” added CCOO.
On the other hand, the union has also asked the company to stop the reorganization of customer service, the centerpiece of which is telephone 1004, and the “forced transfers” raised in line with the company’s intention to close 108 “low occupancy” work centers spread throughout Spain.
Telefónica has proposed that the almost 300 employees linked to the customer service department, framed in the B2C area (customer relations), move to the B2B department, in charge of responding to requests from SMEs.
For its part, UGT also insists on linking the validity of the new collective agreement to the duration of the new strategic plan, that is, until 2026, while emphasizing that on ‘Investor’s Day’ the resizing of the workforce has been an issue that was “touched on tangentially”, which is why he believes that there are still many doubts to be cleared up, according to union sources told Europa Press.
“The uncertainty that plagues our sector will not disappear in the short term. We must consolidate our employment and our working conditions beyond one year, giving certainties and guarantees to all workers,” the union organization has stressed.
In line with what was stated by the other two majority unions in Telefónica, UGT has also stressed that the exit process must “follow the path of previous plans in terms of negotiation, dialogue and social consensus.”
