A total of 2,700 workers from CaixaBank welcomed to Record of employment regulation (ERE) that the entity is executing are officially separated from the bank this Saturday, January 1, in which it is the second window of exits within the framework of the employment adjustment process. CaixaBank will have completed more than 60% of the labor agreement agreed last July between the bank and the unions as a result of the merger with Bankia, which means the extinction of 6,452 jobs. CaixaBank’s ERE, which occurs after the absorption of Bankia, is the largest in the history of banking in Spain and affects 14% of the workforce. But it is not the only one in the framework of a financial sector in full restructuring. Sabadell agreed to leave 1,605 workers. The pandemic has accelerated staff adjustment processes and reduction of the commercial network of banks. CaixaBank, BBVA and Sabadell, three of the largest banks in the country, have agreed this year on employment regulation files that together will affect almost 11,000 employees. Office closures, an increase in the weight of online banking, new competitors and the rise of decentralized finance mark the financial sector.
The first exit window took place on November 1 and led to the termination of 1,203 contracts, while today, January 1, another 2,700 people will leave the entity. To these 3,903 voluntary departures, representing 60.5% of the total withdrawals agreed in the ERE, a new batch of dismissals will be added on March 1, according to the CaixaBank CEO, Gonzalo Gortázar, during the presentation of the results of the third trimester. As the manager revealed then, the bank’s plans were to have executed 70% of the ERE at the close of the first quarter of 2022. This would mean that around 600 other employees would leave CaixaBank in March, although this figure is being defined and adjusted in every moment and depending on the commercial and business strategy, for which it has not yet been confirmed. The text of the signed agreement states that the term of execution of the planned measures extends until December 31, 2022.
Related news
In order to guarantee voluntary departures, the bank and the workers’ representatives designed an adhesion process in several phases. The organizational measures applied are making it possible to adjust the acceptance of voluntary departures in centers and territories with excess applications and to resolve the pending surplus in other areas and provinces. At the beginning of December, a total of 8,142 membership applications were still in force for the 6,452 positions to be amortized. The second phase ended with a surplus of only 75 positions in the branch network, distributed among Las Palmas, Jaén, Almería, Asturias, Badajoz, Córdoba, Palencia, Cáceres, Melilla, Orense and Segovia, while the surplus of corporate services has been resolved. During this month, the third phase of the adhesion process was developed, in which employees of the commercial network that provide service in one of the provinces where there was still a surplus could sign up. According to bank sources consulted by Europa Press, 17 workers have joined in this phase, so the pending surplus is reduced to 58 places.
In less than six months, CaixaBank and the unions have managed to resolve 99.2% of the surplus collected in the labor agreement. To achieve 100% of the voluntary departures contemplated in the ERE, both parties will agree on new organizational measures in the next meetings of the monitoring commission, which will meet again from January 10, 2022, according to the calendar managed by the unions .
Reference-www.elperiodico.com