News

Santiago. The National Union of Falabella Bank, affiliated to the Union Confederation of Bank Company Workers and related activities of Chile, CSTEBA, which gathers 600 hundred workers throughout the country, decided to go on strike, in the framework of the collective negotiation being developed with the company. On October 15^th, Friday, and after hard efforts on the part of the union management to try to reach an agreement, the workers had to vote to strike. A 98, 40% gave a conclusive support to the decision, and expressed its deepest rejection towards the company’s policy, which has revealed an unyielding attitude as regards the responsible demands of the workers.



The President of this union, Luis Saavedra, informed that on October 8^th, Falabella delivered a draft agreement “which is worst than the current collective agreement. They offer us nothing, and besides the company wants us to negotiate a four year agreement, and we want a two-year one”. Bank officers demand a real wage increase of a 10%, an ethical minimum wage of 220 thousand pesos (U$S 440,00), a thirteenth salary for vacations and the benefit of coverage for kindergarten of 6 UF (monetary unit in a fixed dollar system) on a monthly basis (US$ 252,00). Currently, workers have an average wage between 250 thousand to 280 thousand pesos per month (U$S 500,00 to US$ 560,00). The company managers have completely refused to accept these petitions in spite of having perceived profits of US$ 300 millions in the first semester of 2010, a 53% more in relation to the same period the previous year.



Now the strike has been approved, five days of good offices will follow, and in the case no agreement is reached between the parts, the paralysation of activities will become effective on October 23^rd.



Source. CSTEBA Chile confederacionbancaria@gmail.com

Contact: marcio.monzane@uniglobalunion.org