{"id":39437,"date":"2013-06-06T07:03:16","date_gmt":"2013-06-06T05:03:16","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/?p=39437"},"modified":"2013-06-06T09:01:14","modified_gmt":"2013-06-06T07:01:14","slug":"surprise-move-in-telkom-dispute","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/telecommunications\/39437\/surprise-move-in-telkom-dispute\/","title":{"rendered":"Surprise move in Telkom dispute"},"content":{"rendered":"

Trade union Solidarity<\/a> spokesperson, Marius Croucamp<\/a>, has told BusinessTech that as many as 1,500 out of approximately 21,000 Telkom<\/a> employees have accepted the group\u2019s voluntary retrenchment package.<\/p>\n

This represents an approximate 7% of the company\u2019s total workforce.<\/p>\n

Negotiations between Telkom and unions, including the CWU and the SA communication union began in March, after Telkom announced that management and bargaining unit staff would be afforded the opportunity of applying for voluntary severance packages (VSPs) and early retirement packages (VERPs) until the end of August 2013.<\/p>\n

\u201cI received an update from one of my sources this morning (Wednesday, 5 June) who told me that more than 1,500 workers have accepted severance packages,\u201d Croucamp said.<\/p>\n

Telkom said it could not provide numbers as negotiations were still ongoing.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe VSP\/VERP process is still underway and will continue until end August 2013. The outcome of this process will not be assessed on the reduction of the number of employees, but on the overall impact of the Company\u2019s cost structure.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis will be monitored continuously throughout the process to ensure that the Company reaches the desired state of cost efficiency,\u201d Telkom said in a statement.<\/p>\n

On Wednesday, unions met with the Commission for Conciliation, Mediation and Arbitration (CCMA), with talks having reached a stalemate for the umpteenth time.<\/p>\n

Solidarity accused Telkom of negotiating in bad faith after it had withdrawn its revised wage offer amid a mandating process with members about the latest offer.<\/p>\n

Telkom last week presented a revised offer to trade unions after a dispute had already been referred to the CCMA following the rejection of Telkom\u2019s final offer of a 1.5% increase by trade unions.<\/p>\n

Telkom upped its offer to 6%, which CWU immediately rejected, seeking an 11.5% increase. Solidarity, meanwhile, is demanding an 8.8% increase.<\/p>\n

Croucamp said that Telkom\u2019s offer of a 6% increase comprises various conditions, including no forced retrenchments over the next three years.<\/p>\n

However, the telco withdrew this condition at a meeting on Tuesday.<\/p>\n

The amended offer is for a three year agreement of which the second and third years would be linked to a differentiation model, Solidarity said.<\/p>\n

Telkom could also offer voluntary retrenchment and voluntary early retirement packages to employees during this period, the union added.<\/p>\n

Croucamp said that at a meeting at the CCMA on Wednesday, Telkom brought the same offer back to the table.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey submitted their previous terms,\u201d he said, adding that Solidarity will not agree to more than a one year wage deal without job protection.<\/p>\n

Negotiations will continue next week with all parties expected back at the CCMA on 24 June.<\/p>\n

Croucamp stressed that the union does not want to consider strike action yet. \u201cThis is a step-by-step process. We don\u2019t want to consider the possibility of strike action,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

More on Telkom and Solidarity<\/h3>\n

Telkom workers set for strike action?<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

CWU rejects improved Telkom wage offer<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

Telkom wage dispute sent to CCMA<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

Telkom not firing 13,000 people<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

Telkom retrenchments on the way?<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

Telkom\u2019s R100 million PSL sponsorship under fire<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

Telkom staff offered separation packages<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

Telkom to retrench 4000 workers<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Solidarity says that as many as 1,500 out of approximately 21,000 Telkom employees have accepted the group\u2019s voluntary retrenchment package.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":9,"featured_media":26584,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[21],"tags":[2677,1553,26,2719,1632,65],"class_list":["post-39437","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-telecommunications","tag-ccma","tag-cwu","tag-headline","tag-marius-croucamp","tag-solidarity","tag-telkom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39437","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/9"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=39437"}],"version-history":[{"count":11,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39437\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":39449,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39437\/revisions\/39449"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/26584"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=39437"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=39437"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=39437"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}