SFR wants an agreement this week on downsizing – Challenges.fr

Mathieu Rosemain

PARIS (Reuters) – SFR Group, which wants to reduce its workforce by one third by 2019, proposed a plan to the unions than 5,000 voluntary departures which provides compensation 2.5 months of gross average salary per year of service, said Tuesday the delegate Unsa Abdelkader Choukrane.

“They want to reach an agreement this week,” told Reuters that union representative majority in the company, following a meeting with the Minister of Labour Myriam El Khomri. “Better a good agreement that terrible conflict.”

This plan will result in provisions of “hundreds of millions of euros” spread over the 2016 and 2017 accounts, added a source close to the case.

the group publishes its interim results on August 9.

the management of SFR presented its proposal to the four unions representing the group at a meeting that s’ held Monday night and continued into the night, before discussions Tuesday afternoon with Myriam El Khomri.

the CEO of SFR Michel Combes was received at the end of rue de Grenelle day According to the unions.

According to Abdelkader Choukrane, management “is in a sense to try to find an agreement.”

“It’s hard to understand Mr. Drahi strategy “he said, however. “Apart reduce costs and be in a purely financial sense, it is hard to understand where he wants to go for customers, for employees and for jobs.”

1000 STARTS WHEN THIS YEAR

the social dialogue with employee representatives and unions “very constructive and very concrete,” said a spokesman for SFR.

“We took in 2014 . a commitment on jobs We respect and continue to respect the We have a clear industrial strategy, very long term, and a priority today. prepare, in dialogue, the future of SFR into a modern company with an organization adapted, “he he said.

Taking note of” the will to move forward shown by his interlocutors, “Myriam El Khomri wishes for his part” that the dialogue among SFR group continue so that the conditions for an agreement to be met “.

in a highly competitive environment and after the failure of several attempts to consolidate the french telecom market, the second operator french telecom intends to reduce its workforce by one third from the end of its commitments on employment between July 2017 and 2019. This would bring to 10,000 the number of its employees.

on redemption SFR to Vivendi late 2014, Altice, holding the businessman Patrick Drahi, pledged not to touch the job for three years, until July 2017 but on 5000 departures, 1000 intervene this year because they concern people working in subsidiaries.

for the 4,000 others, the conditions presented are similar to those proposed by SFR during a voluntary redundancy plan organized in 2013 before its sale to Altice, or 2.5 months per year of seniority in the company.

SFR wants to simplify the organization of SFR, from the merger of several companies, including unifying the systems information and support functions.

Competitors SFR, Bouygues Telecom has already implemented two voluntary redundancy plans representing about 2,000 job cuts and the incumbent operator Orange has decided not to replace part of the retirements.

at the Paris Bourse, the SFR Group shares lost 4.7% to 20.15 euros at 4:50 p.m.. The title of the parent Altice yields 2.7% to 13.13 euros in Amsterdam.

(Dominique Rodriguez for the French service, edited by Yves Clarisse)