Ericsson pay deal out to ballot

Telecoms & Financial Services, Ericsson

Members in Ericsson are being urged to accept a significantly improved pay offer following a breakthrough in negotiations that followed employees’ overwhelming rejection of an earlier offer that the union had branded ‘paltry and insulting’.

A full nine months after the 2018 pay rise became due, members are now voting on a two-year deal which, in stark contrast to the earlier proposal, secures a pay-out for everyone in 2018 – over and above which members will receive which a fully consolidated above inflation rise in April this year.

The turning point in talks came about after an earlier membership ballot in August in which members trashed the company’s initial 2018-specific offer – one that would have resulted in eight out of ten employees receiving nothing at all.

No fewer than 97 per cent of those polled voted against that deal – with nine out of ten also expressing a willingness to take industrial action to secure a better one.

Assistant secretary Allan Eldred is convinced that the strength of feeling displayed by members in the August ballot was a decisive factor in getting the company back to the negotiating table.

The resulting deal that is now on the table deals with 2018 and 2019 separately. Full details can be viewed here – but in summary:

  •  For 2018, a flat rate payment of £290 will be paid to everyone in the Field Services Operations bargaining unit, and that increase will be fully consolidate for everyone apart from those whose current salaries are 20 per cent or more above the ‘industry benchmark’ date used by Ericsson. The deal also includes a 4 per cent increase to shift, on-call and climbing and rigging allowances.
  •  The 2019 settlement, meanwhile, provides a consolidated increase for everybody, ranging from 4.4 per cent for those on less than 90 per cent of the ‘industry benchmark’, to 3.5 per cent for those below the 120th percentile. For the first time in years, the company has also agreed to pay consolidated increases to individuals whose current pay rates are already 20 per cent above the ‘industry benchmark’ – with everyone who has been performance graded as ‘meeting expectations’ receiving 2.4 per cent, rising to 2.5 per cent for those categorised as ‘exceptional’.

If accepted, the 2018 element of the deal will be paid in February salaries (backdated to April 1 last year) – while the 2019 element of the deal will come just over a month later, on April 1.

Allan Eldred concludes: “In large part because of the strength of members’ resolve to achieve a fair pay settlement, as demonstrated in last August’s consultative ballot, we’ve moved from a situation where the company thought it could get away with paying 80 per cent of its employees no increase at all for 2018, to one where everyone receives something.

“The offer we’ve achieved for 2019, meanwhile, is above all of the forecasts for inflation and, for the first time in years, sees a consolidated increase for even those whose salaries are above the 120th percentile.

“Under these circumstances the negotiating team has no hesitation in recommending members to vote ‘yes’.

  • The ballot closes on Friday January 25 – so any Ericsson member who has not yet voted is urged to do so right away.