The first collective bargaining round for the 430,000 employees in the retail sector was broken off on Tuesday without result. The next hearing is scheduled for November 3. The GPA union is demanding ten percent more wages for shop workers.
Even before negotiations began, GPA chief negotiator Helga Fichtinger and employer negotiator Rainer Trefelik both described the initial situation as “challenging” in a brief joint press conference.
Even though both emphasized the good atmosphere in the conversation, the fault lines were quickly clear. Fichtiger called for “permanent, strong salary increases”. Trefelik, on the other hand, wants government support for livelihoods to be included in the total package and expects this to offset at least 2.5 percentage points of inflation.
“We are somewhat surprised that despite a long preparation time and knowledge of the economic data, the employers only realized today during the negotiations that they still need time to put on the table concrete concepts and ideas about their ideas for a wage agreement .” the table to lay a path to an agreement. We know traders can count. The figures and key data have been known for a long time,” says Fittinger in a broadcast of the ÖGB.
If there is no acceptable employer offer in the second round of negotiations, we will inform employees about the interim status of the KV negotiations and again in detail about the request,” added Martin Müllauer, president of the GPA Economic Division Trade.
In addition to the pay increase, the union is demanding a fixed amount of 150 euros per month for students, receipt of all overpayments, easier access to the sixth week of vacation and an overtime allowance from the first hour of overtime.
Source: Krone
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