Bank strike : Halts operations across country

 BL :MUMBAI, NOVEMBER 12:2014

Had the support of 10 lakh employees, claim unions

  

At 5 pm, a frail employee at one of Bank of India’s many branches in the city slowly downed the shutters.

“Nobody came today, except the Assistant General Manager,” he said, as he picked his bag and left.

At many public sector banks in the city, only security guards employed on contract were seen sitting outside downed shutters.

The participation of employees of public sector, old private sector and regional rural banks in the day-long strike today was near 100 per cent. Bank unions claim they had the support of 10 lakh employees from both the clerical and officer cadres for the strike.

At the heart of the strike is the wage-settlement issue — the 10th bi-partite industry-wide wage settlement — that has been dragging on for nearly two years.

With the Indian Banks’ Association (IBA) and bank employee unions sticking to their guns, Wednesday’s strike was just one of the many that the sector has witnessed in the past two years.

IBA, an umbrella body representing the interest of banks, is negotiating on behalf of the managements. It has offered employees a 11 per cent increase in pay-slip component, which the employees are not agreeable to. Other demands of employees include a five-day work week and higher salaries.

“The unions have been requesting, since the start of negotiations, for a time-bound approach to hold the negotiations on its demands and for conclusion of wage settlement within a reasonable time. But the recalcitrant and callous attitude of the IBA has inordinately delayed the negotiation process and there is no significant progress in the wage negotiations despite a lapse of nearly two years time,” United Forum of Bank Unions (UFBU) said in a statement.

The formal negotiations, the UFBU added, started in February 2013 and around 14 rounds of discussions have so far taken place between the IBA and the UFBU resulting in one round of discussion once in two months.

The bi-partite wage agreement is undertaken once every five years by both the parties. The 9th round expired in October 2012. Even during the last round of wage settlement in 2007, the implementation was delayed leading to similar strike calls across the country.

However, in the era of ATMs, Internet banking and wider choice of banks, such one-day strikes have become more of a symbolic exercise than a means to achieve something more substantial. A general secretary of one of the officer associations, who did not wish to be quoted, said: “Sab dikhawa hain…kuch ho nahi raha. (This strike business is a big show…nothing comes out of it).”

As branches and individual banks’ local clearing centres were not working, the daily average cheque clearing volume of about ₹4,500 crore in the city was impacted.

There was relatively thin trading in the financial markets — call money, forex and bond — due to the strike.

Bank strike : PSU bank staff go on strike; pvt banks remain open

PTI 12 Nov 2014

Employee unions of public sector banks went on a nationwide strike today to press for wage revision, affecting banking services like cheque clearance and withdrawal from branches across the country.

However, branches of private sector banks like ICICI Bank and HDFC Bank remained open. At the same time, most of the ATMs of all banks were functioning normally, as per initial reports.

“Strike is complete and total. This strike has been forced upon us as bank management did not yield to our scaled down demands,” United Forum of Bank Unions (UFBU) Convener M V Murali told PTI.

Banks, including the country’s largest one SBI, have already informed customers about the inconvenience they are likely to face.

“UFBU has given a notice to IBA calling for nationwide bank strike on November 12 and All-India State Bank Officers’ Federation and All-India State Bank of India Staff Federation, being a part of UFBU, will also participate in the said strike,” SBI had said in a statement.

“Since the said call is given at all-India level covering all banks, the bank will not be impacted separately,” the statement said.

The staff of public sector banks had gone on a nationwide strike for two days beginning February 10 after discussions with the IBA failed. The wage revision of public sector bank employees has been due since November 2012.

The UFBU is an umbrella organisation of nine bank employees and officer unions.

There are 27 public sector banks in the country with a combined employee strength of about 8 lakh. There are about 50,000 branches of these banks across the country.

Bank Of India Strike On 24 Fab And 28 & 29 March

Bank strike enters day 2: All you need to know

Fist Biz Feb 11,2014 10 mts ago
Banking operations across India were hit on Monday as members of 
an umbrella trade union of 47 banks began a two-day strike,
 opposing the proposed banking sector reforms and demanding 
immediate revision in wages. PTI

New Delhi: Operations in public sector banks were hit as their employees started a two-day strike on Monday to press for a wage revision even as Finance Minister P Chidambaram appealed to them to recognise that all profits cannot be used to pay higher salaries.

Services such as cheque clearances and withdrawing and depositing of money in PSU bank branches were affected. However, ATMs provided some relief to retail customers. Private sector banks such as ICICI Bank, HDFC Bank and Axis Bank functioned normally because their staff were not on strike.

Reports from various regions said branches of public sector banks were not operational. The government extended the closing date of a follow-on public offering of shares of Engineers India Ltd by two days to February 12 in view of the disrupted banking services.

"All over the country, about 10 crore cheques worth Rs 7,40,000 crore could not be cleared. In Chennai clearing house, about 90 lakh cheques worth about Rs 64,000 crore could not be processed in clearing," C.H. Venkatachalam, general secretary, All India Bank Employees' Association (AIBEA), told IANS from Chennai.

Government transactions, foreign exchange transactions and money market operations were also affected.

"All our RTGS (Real Time Gross Settlements) involving clearing of payments with banks that are on strike are affected," an executive of a foreign bank based in Delhi and not part of the strike told IANS.

In Mumbai, all branches of public sector banks, private banks, many foreign banks in the city, and the regional rural bank branches were deserted. "The strike is total. Over a million employees in all these banks, barring the cooperative sector banks, are taking part with around 90,000 bank branches to remain shut for two days for our various demands," AIBEA vice-president Vishwas Utagi told IANS

With the strike slated to continue on Tuesday, customers face the prospect of more ATMs running dry without cash replenishment.

Chidambaram said on Monday that it cannot be that all profits are used to declare dividend and to provide enhanced wages and allowances to bank employees.

"I will appeal to employees and officers of banks to recognise that banks profits, banks earnings have other claims. While claims of officers, staff and employees must be duly acknowledged, and a fair and just (wage) settlement is arrived at, there are other claimants to banks' profit," Finance Minister P Chidambaram said.

Banks, including the State Bank of India, the country's largest, had informed customers in advance about the likely inconvenience they would face during the strike. The unions had rejected the IBA's offer of a 10 percent wage hike during a conciliation meeting held on February 6 with the Chief Labour Commissioner.

The offer made by bank managements was not in line with rising inflation, General Secretary of National Organisation of Bank Workers Ashwini Rana said. "Since IBA and government did not settle our demands, the strike has been forced on us," All India Bank Employees' Association General Secretary C H Venkatachalam said. "We are sorry that the banking public would have been inconvenienced by this strike due to the non-serious approach of the IBA by not improving their offer on wage increase and discussing our concerns on the banking sector reforms," he said.

The wage revision of public sector bank employees has been due since November 2012. UFBU is an umbrella organisation of nine bank employee and officer unions. There are 27 public sector banks in the country with a combined employee strength of about 8 lakh. There are about 50,000 branches of these banks across the country.

Agencies 

Bank unions hold 2-day strike from Feb 10

PTI    New Delhi   Last Updated: February 10, 2014  | 12:00 IST

Cheque clearances and cash withdrawals and deposits in public sector bank branches across the country were hit as employees started a two-day strike today to press for a revision in wages.

However, private sector banks such as ICICI Bank, HDFC Bank and Axis Bank were functioning normally because their staff are not on strike.

Employees are compelled to take this route as the Indian Banks' Association (IBA) did not come up with an improved wage offer, United Forum of Bank Unions (UFBU) Convener M V Murali said. The IBA represents bank managements.

Banks, including the State Bank of India, the country's largest, had informed customers in advance about the likely inconvenience they would face during the strike.

The unions had rejected the IBA's offer of a 10 per cent wage hike during a conciliation meeting held on February 6 with the Chief Labour Commissioner.

The offer made by bank managements was not in line with rising inflation, General Secretary of National Organisation of Bank Workers Ashwini Rana said.

The staff of public sector banks had gone on a nationwide strike for a day on December 18 after discussions with the IBA on wages on December 14 failed. The wage revision of public sector bank employees has been due since November 2012.

UFBU is an umbrella organisation of nine bank employee and officer unions.

There are 27 public sector banks in the country with a combined employee strength of about 8 lakh. There are about 50,000 branches of these banks across the country.

Two days All India banks strike on Feb 10 And 11

BL  Feb 6, 2014

The two-day all-India bank strike call given by the United Forum of Bank Unions (UFBU) for February 10-11 stands as the conciliatory talks held in the Capital today failed.

The strike call stands as the Indian Banks' Association (IBA) declined to improve their earlier offer of wage increase of 10 per cent on payslip cost, C.H. Venkatachalam, General Secretary, All India Bank Employees' Association, told Business Line.

Efforts by Chief Labour Commissioner B. K. Sanwaria, who presided over today's meeting, to avert the strike did not yield any result, sources close to the development said.

Bank strike deferred

BS Reporter  January 18, 2014 Last Updated at 00:47 IST

UFBU had earlier announced plans to go on a two day strike, followed by further strikes in February and March

The United Forum of Banks Unions (UFBU) have deferred the two day nation-wide strike from January 20, as the Indian Banks Association (IBA) has enhanced its offer from the initial 5% to 9.5% on payslip cost.

"Since there is an improvement in the offer from the IBA, the forum has decided to differ from the strike which was planned for January 20 and 21 and further talks will be carried out," said C H Venkatachalam, general secretary, All India Bank Employees Association (AIBEA).

The next round of talks between the forum and the IBA would be held on January 27, he said.

It may be noted that the UFBU had earlier announced plans to go on a two day strike on January 20 and 21, followed by further strikes in February and March 2014 for their demand and urged the Indian Banks Association and Government to resume the talks with a better and reasonable offer of wage increase and expedite the settlement at the earliest.

On December 18, 2013, around 10 lakh Bank employees went on a strike demanding early wage revision and opposing banking reforms, as the talks with the IBA failed to come up with a solution. The IBA argued that the economy is in bad condition and the Banks cannot revise wages now. However, the forum did not agree with this view and reiterated their demand.


UBFU includes AIBEA, All India Bank Officers' Confederation (AIBOC), National Confederation of Bank Employees (NCBE), All India Bank Officers' Association (AIBOA), Bank Employees Federation of India (BEFI), Indian National Bank Employees Federation (INBEF), Indian National Bank Officers Congress (INBOC), National Organisation of Bank Workers (NOBW) and National Organisation of Bank Officers (NOBO).

All-India bank strike on Dec 18

The United Forum of Bank Unions, an umbrella organisation of bank officers’ and employees’ unions, will go on an all-India strike on December 18 to press for a halt to the ongoing banking reforms and immediate wage revision in the banking sector

.

In a press statement, State Banks’ Staff Union (Kerala Circle) said that the last five-yearly bipartite wage settlement had run out more than a year back but the Indian Banks’ Association had not taken steps for the overdue settlement.

The union pointed out that the workload of bank staffers had gone up enormously across the industry and the cost of living too had risen, necessitating substantial increase in pay and allowances.

It also noted that the Government had recently introduced a series of reforms in public sector banks many of which were aimed at privatising them. The banking regulations, it said, had safeguarded the banking system from collapse even as several major banks in other countries folded up during the global economic crisis.

The Government was now trying to water down these regulations. The December 18 strike is part of the unions’ resistance to the reforms.

(This article was published in the Business Line print edition dated December 7, 2013)

All-India bank strike on September 25 ,2013

BL :MUMBAI, AUG. 25:  2013

The All India Bank Employees Association (AIBEA) and the Bank Employees Federation of India have called for an all-India bank strike on September 25 to protest against the Government’s proposal to effect mergers among public sector banks.

They are also against the merger of Associate Banks with State Bank of India (SBI).

“It is naked double standard and dichotomy that while private sector banks are being encouraged and allowed to be expanded, public sector banks are sought to be consolidated and merged.

“This is totally against the objectives of public policy under the nationalisation of banks envisaged and committed by the Government,” said the two trade unions in a joint statement.

There is a need to increase the reach of banking services as nearly 60 crore people in the country still don’t have bank accounts and more than 5 lakh villages in the country do not have a bank branch, the statement said.

“More and more branches have to be opened by all the banks to reach the people. But the Government’s policy is misdirected. It wants to consolidate the public sector banks while the need is to expand them,” opined the unions.

Referring to efforts under way to hand over licences to big industrial and business houses to launch banking operations, the unions said pre-nationalisation, all banks were in private hands and their track-record was only well known to the country.

LICENCE WOES

“Even in developed countries like the US, corporate and industrial houses are not given licence to run banks. The whole world has experienced financial turmoil due to them. But, our Government wants to reverse the clock,” said C.H. Venkatachalam, General Secretary, AIBEA.

The unions say SBI is merely a shareholder in Associate Banks, having invested in their capital.

“Even though these banks are known as Associate Banks of State Bank of India, SBI is neither the promoter of these banks nor the owner,” claimed the statement.

According to the unions’ assessment, out of the net owned fund of Rs 26,436 crore (including share capital of Rs 482 crore) of the Associate Banks, SBI’s investment is only Rs. 430 crore.

The Associate Banks — State Bank of Bikaner and Jaipur, State Bank of Hyderabad, State Bank of Mysore, State Bank of Patiala and State Bank of Travancore — have a total network of more than 5,200 branches, which constitute about 8 per cent of the total branches of public sector banks.

“There are many private banks in our country which have far less business and far less impressive performance than the Associate Banks.

When all the banks are able to survive in the market, what is the need to merge these Associate Banks (with SBI)?,” said the statement.

(This article was published on August 25, 2013)