The will be settled with a total of 409 dismissals, 7.4% less than the 442 previously agreed, of which 53 will be forced dismissals, after intense negotiation between the company and unions to reduce the number of dismissals once the volunteers no longer they filled the quota.
The company has vetoed the departure of 37 workers, although it has opened up to reconsidering those vetoes or forced departures via relocations in the company, since some affected workers are in the selection process for other vacancies within the operator.
Likewise, the adjustment will include 75 early retirements, of which two have been forced by the company.
This Wednesday has been the first day that Vodafone’s own stores have begun to operate with an external distributor and the more than 230 employees have left the company, after taking advantage of the compensation proposed by the company, which also offered to continue working with the distributors.
The rest of the departures must take place before January 31 and the union representation hopes to delay them in order to increase the number of relocated and continue reducing the impact on employment in the firm.
The company attributes the ERE to the conditions of the Spanish market, with a tendency to ‘low cost’, and to changes in the workforce and sales that digitization demands.
The conditions
The workers affected by the ERE will leave the company with compensation of 50 days per year worked with a cap of 33 monthly payments, in line with the conditions that were agreed in 2019.
In addition, workers with less than 30,000 euros gross salary will have a bonus of 6,000 euros.
For their part, early-retired employees will leave the operator with income equivalent to 85% of the fixed salary, to which must be added 50% of the variable remuneration for a period of between five and seven years depending on their age, a revaluation of 1% and a special agreement with Social Security.
Employees who voluntarily join the ERE and do not belong to the stores will have a non-competition commitment for 6 months for an amount of 3 months of the regulatory salary.
Likewise, the external relocation process will be extended up to a minimum of 12 months, and may include spouses who are unemployed, and with an extension until 100% of relocations are achieved.
Employment in the sector
In the last year, the three main telephony and connectivity operators have made or are in the process of making some employment adjustment.
While Orange agreed to the voluntary departure of 400 employees in an ERE, Telefónica is negotiating a voluntary departure plan without charge to Social Security for up to 2,500 workers over 54 years of age.
In the case of Vodafone, this is the fourth adjustment process in less than ten years, which means a loss of more than 3,000 workers in this period.
Since it reached its peak at the end of the 20th century, employment in the telecommunications sector has fallen by 40,000 people, according to data collected by the National Commission for Competition Markets.
The main companies in the sector and the unions blame this on the regulatory model that makes it difficult to consolidate the sector and has eroded margins.
This week, representatives of the leading European telecoms have called on the European Union to rethink its competition policy to facilitate mergers and to force Internet giants to pay for the traffic they generate.
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