In a letter to State Bank Governor Dr Ishrat Hussain, the United Bank Employees Union has appealed to State Bank Governor to order probe into the withdrawal of a number of incentives and facilities to the employees by the new management after privatisation despite their commitment for not doing so.
According to the letter, all employees whose retirement is due in 2015 will enjoy benefits on the basis of their basic salary, what was up to June 2001 and despite serving the institution for another 14 years from 2001, they would not be entitled to any benefit.
According to the employees, changes in payrolls would have been welcomed, had the existing pay scale of the employees been revised by the new private sector managers, but they did not do so and the employees are working on the pay scale of 1996.
The overall strategy is to discourage permanent employees to continue service and instead hire fresh employees on contractual terms.
Under the strategy, as many as 1,075 employees have been placed in surplus pool and about 3,500 employed on contractual terms since change in the management to the new owners, it said.
The employees put in surplus included both of lower cadre staff and officers.
The excuse of extra burden on the bank could have been considered true had the management not hired fresh employees that too far better terms than of the existing ones.
As per other changes brought into the pay rolls, medical facilities to the families of regular employees has been withdrawn and all employees have been classified into "A", "B", "C", "D", "E" categories, the letter says.
As many as 150 staffers have been transferred to the guard cadres and made to work there on the existing terms and conditions while leave enactment of all employees has been cancelled.
They drew the SBP Governor's attention towards the sureties to the SBP and the government by the new management for not any "discriminatory" changes that affect employees.