Hyundai this week started annual wage talks with its labour union, with demands including an end to overnight shifts.
According to the Economic Times, the union demanded permanent employment for temporary employees and an end to overnight shifts.
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The union calculated Hyundai’s annual labour cost would increase by approximately KRW82bn (US$72.03m) by converting the temporary employees to full-time employees. The union said: “This is not an excessive demand, considering Hyundai’s (strong) business performance.”
According to a Hyundai executive the company does not convert all the temporary workers to full time workers as “it does not make sense” and the temporary workers were required to enhance labour flexibility.
The executive added, “It is a tricky matter. We will seek to reach an agreement through negotiation.”
Another difficult issue for the company was the union demanding an end to overnight shift work along with a two-shift system: early morning to midnight.
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By GlobalDataAlthough Hyundai sees the need to eliminate the overnight shift, it is worried about recovering production lost due to the axed shift.
The union has also called for a hike of 8.4% or KRW151,696 in employees’ basic salary in addition to incentives equivalent to 30% of the company’s 2011 net profit.
In 2011, Hyundai’s net income increased 35% to KRW8.1 trillion.
