2023-11-08 19:19:27
While supermarket employees received a higher salary, the rest of the shopping street lagged behind. That is why the FNV trade union is demanding a fourteen percent pay increase for shop workers. The union believes that ‘wage theft’ should be put to an end: having to be present early without pay or having to continue working following the shift.
“Wages on the high street have been frozen for years. They have among the lowest wages in the country,” says Linda Vermeulen, director at FNV Handel. The demand of fourteen percent extra is considerable, but according to her it can therefore be fully justified. “Shop owners have far from deteriorated.”
2900 euros in preparation minutes
Employees are not only paid too little, but sometimes not paid at all for their work. The union calls it wage theft and Vermeulen explains it using unpaid ‘start-up minutes’ and ’round-up minutes’.
“At some stores, staff are expected to be at the checkout five minutes earlier, or to help close the store following the service.” Minutes or quarters that are not paid out. The union cannot say exactly what amounts employees are missing out on, “but it is many euros per week and even more per year.”
It is not the first time that unpaid start-up minutes have been criticized. At the beginning of this year, a call center employee went to court regarding payment for his preparation time, during which he starts up his computer before his shift. The employee sued his employer, the French multinational Teleperformance, which has a branch in Zoetermeer. The judge ruled in favor of the employee: the years of accumulation of preparation minutes had to be paid out, which cost the call center 2,900 euros.
Yellow associations, banned abroad
The last requirement that FNV imposes on retail companies is that they ensure that they can arrange liveable working hours. Now the union believes that too much availability of staff is required. “Store opening hours have been increasingly extended in recent years, meaning employees are being scheduled until later in the day.”
This is at the expense of private life, says Vermeulen. “People can’t play sports or watch the children’s football like this.” Should the shops close earlier? The solution doesn’t have to be that drastic. “Giving people a fixed day off would also help. Then they know that they can go to football on Wednesday.”
The negotiations have started, but Vermeulen is sitting at the table with parties that the FNV would rather not see: the so-called yellow unions, unions that were founded by companies themselves. “Those unions hardly make any demands. These types of associations are banned in countries around us. Companies try to avoid us like this.”
The collective labor agreement for store employees also includes personnel from distribution centers. Vermeulen: “It is often migrant workers who work there. Just like the store staff, they receive too low a salary.”
Also read:
Unions are going the extra mile with wage demands
Call centers, Bijenkorf and VodafoneZiggo; The unions all require them to pay more wages to their employees.
Sham unions, disruptors in the labor market
The major trade unions FNV and CNV no longer have the sole say when it comes to concluding collective labor agreements. Small, alternative unions are emerging. Do the little ones add something to the negotiating table, or are they the ‘Achilles heel of our collective labor agreement system’?
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