Tuesday 18 March 2008

Vodafone Hit Staff with Massive Round of Redundancies and Sackings

The company have announced today that 450 people, mainly in Newbury based “back office” roles will be made redundant. More sinisterly a number of people have been told that due to “performance issues” their employment has been terminated. Given the timing this is clearly a cheaper way reducing both head count and reducing the headline figure.

Connect members in Vodafone are disgusted with the way in which the company is now treating its staff. Sadly we realised a few years ago that the company now sees its workers as little more than a commodity. For all the lip service given to “employee experience” actions prove that this is not a company that cares. Today we see a new low with the company treating staff with contempt.

Whilst the company have also announced that they will be recruiting for new retail stores and a call centre in Stoke, these new roles will be lower paid. With 10% of the already overstretched support staff axed who will support the shiny new data services that the company will sell, who will design the next Vodafone Live or 3G broadband?

Vodafone’s actions today demonstrate why we need to be part of a strong union. Individually Vodafone workers are an easy target, when we stand collectively we are stronger.

Any Connect member involved should contact their rep or the Connect helpdesk for advice as soon as possible. If you haven’t yet joined Connect stand together with us and join today.

Click here to join online or Call 020 8971 6000

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

This just proves what a joke of a company VF is these days. Complete disregard for it's staff, they flat out don't care anymore.

It's amazing we ever get in the top x company lists, when the management find it acceptable to behave like this.

I hope connect finds that they stuffed up somewhere and gives them hell in the courts!

Anonymous said...

The reported response from the Communication Workers Union was curious - it seemed to be "Hooray, 460 new jobs. Oh, and there's something going on in Newbury".

Anonymous said...

CWU? Never heard of them :P I hope nobody joined them thinking it was a good idea!