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Unpaid leave period extended for 4 months until next March
6-month government job maintenance support period expired
Experts “The next thing is a restructuring, like a hopeful retirement”
More than 2,000 employees of Hana Tour, the number one travel industry, are in a “zero income” situation where they cannot receive a penny starting next month. The company decided to extend the leave without pay until March next year, when government support for maintaining employment ends. A Hana Tour official said: “On the 13th, we announced the extension of the unpaid leave without government subsidies for 4 months starting next month to a total of 2,300 employees through the internal communication network.” Among the 2,300 employees who are eligible for unpaid leave, 2,000 employees excluding the 300 required employees. Hana Tour is also known to be considering a plan to cut the size of the required workforce by almost half to cut staff costs.
Hana Tour went on unpaid leave since last June. During the period of unpaid leave, the salaries of HanaTour employees all came from government employment support support. The government’s job maintenance allowance is up to 66,000 won per day (50% of monthly salary), which is 1.98 million won for 30 days and 2.46,000 won for 31 days. But starting next month, I can’t even get this. This is because the government’s job maintenance allowance period ends at the end of this month. The allowance period for unpaid leave for unpaid leave is 6 months (180 days).
As Hana Tour extends the unpaid leave, restructuring, such as reducing jobs, is becoming a prerequisite. This is because while the unpaid leave is being extended, the waist is tightened as much as possible.
Labor manager Kim Dong-han said: “Paid and unpaid leave is a way to maintain employment in a crisis situation, but it is also a process to obtain evidence that the company has made sufficient efforts to maintain employment. employment prior to restructuring, such as downsizing of the workforce. ” It means that the extension of Hana Tour’s unpaid leave can be seen as a preliminary step in reducing the workforce, such as a hopeful retirement and layoffs.
Government support for maintaining employment for paid vacations is renewed annually, with applicants receiving qualifications again when the year changes. However, unpaid leave cannot be received again after 180 days of government support. The Ministry of Employment and Labor explained that “unpaid leave without corporate charge can cause moral hazard, so the period or scale of support cannot be extended as paid leave.” That is why experts view unpaid leave as the last bastion a company can choose to maintain employment.
Of course, it is possible to switch to paid leave after March next year, when the unpaid leave ends. However, taking into account the situation of the national crown and abroad, it is public opinion that the possibility is not high. Paid leave, unlike unpaid leave, is because instead of receiving support from the government for job maintenance, the company also has to pay between 10% and 20% of employees’ salaries .
Hana Tour’s results are down 95% compared to the previous year due to the crown crisis. Only the accumulated deficit from the first quarter of this year to the third quarter amounted to 125.6 billion won (provisional value). Hana Tour was supported by government paid leave for up to six months (180 days) for just three months (90 days) from March to May, and entered unpaid leave in early June. This is to minimize the burden of labor costs.
Hana Tour ruled out the possibility of a restructuring, saying that the extension of the unpaid leave was not a decision made with the reduction of the workforce in mind, as a hopeful retirement. A company official emphasized that “in addition to the implementation of the leave without pay in June, this extension was a decision made through discussions with the ‘Hana Tour Development Council (Cooperativa Habal)’, which is the representative organization of employees “.
Legally, in order for a business to take unpaid leave, it must go through a labor-management agreement process in advance. In Hana Tour, where there is no legal union, ‘Habalhyup’ is in charge of the union function representing 2,300 employees.
Reporter Lee Sun-woo [email protected]
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